Mister 8

This will wrap up February’s theme of spy surf, and carry us into March’s similar theme, which is instrumental spy music. Seems similar, but I wanted to cover non-surf bands like the Revengers and Billy Strange, and perhaps bring some left-field items into the mix as well.

Tomorrow, we’ll be featuring a lengthy interview with Spy-Fi’s Tom Pervanje, and he’ll be talking about spy surf in general, and his band’s latest album, Black Tie Spy. So stay tuned for that!

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This version of the Get Smart theme is taken from a 1993 compilation album called B Movie Brain that features tracks from The 3D Invisibles, The Zombie Surfers, The Hellbenders, and the perpetrators of this track, the Kaos Killers. The track was sent to me by a reader calling himself Reverb Herb, but now that I’ve seen the track listing, I think I might hunt down the album. I believe the Kaos Killers share members with the Hellbenders and the Invisibles — at least I suspect Chris Flanagan and Rick Mills on bass and guitar, respectively. The Kaos Killers have three tracks on the album, including another that seems Get Smart-related, “The Man From Control.” I’ll try to track down some more information on these guys. Thanks, Herb!

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I’ve always debated whether The Persuaders was a spy show or not, but since A&E included it on their recent sampler of British spy TV, I won’t argue the point. At the very least, the adventures of Danny Wilde and Lord Brett Sinclair qualify under the “international crimefighters” part of this site. This cover of John Barry’s Persuaders theme was successfully orchestrated by the German band The Sidemen on a really solid 2007 release, The Sidemen Go Too Far. Uwe Grefrath plays guitar, Andy Bungert takes on the drums, and Oldrik Scholz plays bass. For more information on the Sidemen, check out their website, or their MySpace page, where you can hear other awesome spy surf songs and buy their albums.

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Our next band hails from Janesville, Wisconsin, and that’s about all I know about them. They’re The Dynamic Subarashi, and their website is under construction. This version of the Mission Impossible theme is certainly dynamic, though. I downloaded it last year from a music blog that seeks out cover songs, and haven’t been able to find more on the band, except a track listing for the self-titled album this song came from, on a German website, with no ordering information. Dynamic Subarashi, if you’re listening, I think you’re awesome and would like to know more about you!

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Last, but certainly not least…this version of the Avengers was performed by one of my all-time favorite surf bands, Laika & the Cosmonauts. Featuring Mikko Lankinen (guitar), Janne Haavisto (drums), Matti Pitsinki (organ and guitar), and Tom Nyman (bass), Laika enjoyed a 20-year career that ended last year. This cover of the Avengers theme was on their 1995 album Amazing Colossal Band, which also had a great cover of the IPCRESS File. For more information on Laika & the Cosmonauts, check out their website.

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To paraphrase the immortal Ice Cube, I have to say today was optimal (use of the AK was optional). My wife, knowing that I’ve been under an immense amount of school-related stress lately, forced me to take the day off to go on a number of surprise excursions. We started in the direction of Vermont, where we spent a few hours taking in the majesty that is a New England autumn, celebrated the coming of the moose in Bennington, and on our return home stopped by a hidden used book store that’s only 15 minutes up the road from our house.

Housed in what, from the outside looks to be an old barn, the bookstore turned out to be a bit of a TARDIS, a labyrinth of what had to be hundreds of thousands of books on the inside. I’d already accumulated an armful across two stories and an hour’s worth of searching, and was checking out when I mentioned to the elderly owner that I was disappointed that there wasn’t a paperback thriller section. He smiled and asked if I’d been downstairs yet.

Here’s what I picked up from the store, Dog Ears Antiquarian Books in Hoosick, NY:

Donald Hamilton - The Silencers

Donald Hamilton - Murderer's Row

Donald Hamilton - The Ambushers

Donald Hamilton - The Wrecking Crew

I’m not incredibly familiar with Hamilton — I’ve only read The Interlopers, from the middle of the series — so I grabbed the four titles I was familiar with, namely those who share names with Dean Martin films. I am tempted to say, having looked over the list, that the whole lot were there, and I may go back and pick them up a few at a time until I’ve built the whole collection. I might also do the same for the Edward S. Aarons Sam Durrell series. And I’m already thinking about reviewing these, the movies, and perhaps an episode or two of the show (if I can get my hands on it) somewhere round-about Christmas in a multi-part series called “Helm for the Holidays.”

Yes, I know my plate’s already a bit full, but I can’t pass up that pun, can I?

The Avengers: Too Many Targets

I already had a copy of this one, but couldn’t resist picking up a copy from the first printing on the cheap (this cover is much cooler than the other version I have as well).

Billion Dollar Brain

I FINALLY turned up a copy of this one on the cheap without turning to eBay. Yes, I started the Harry Palmer Files without even owning all of the books, but thanks to the fact that this bookstore owned every book ever, I now have a copy for myself! I also picked up a non “Harry” book Bomber, said to be Deighton’s best by many critics (including Kingsley Amis).

The First Saint Omnibus

While I love the show, I’ve never actually read any of the Charteris books. Thought this would be a good place to start, a nice smelly old edition.

The Complete Mission: Impossible Dossier

This looks to be a nice addition to my TV spy reference shelf, and it’s the major 60s-era spy show about which I know the least, for some reason.

The Official James Bond Movie Book

From the era of Living Daylights. Because I can’t turn down cheap James Bond ephemera. (And yes, I’m being lazy and stealing these pictures from other sites).

Allen Dulles - The Craft of Intelligence

And lastly, but certainly not least…ly, a paperback copy of Allen Dulles’ thoughts on the intelligence business in 1963. Chock full of fun and informative bits by the director of the CIA (just after he was ousted actually, following the Bay of Pigs). We’ll be quoting bits of this here in a regular series, as soon as I can think of a witty title. I’m thinking “A Dulles Moment,” or “Mere Dulles Ink.”

All of the above rang up to roughly $15. Not a bad haul, and I’m sure I’ll soon be going back for other books I had to leave behind.

On the way home, I also scored 70 issues of Heavy Metal for mere cents at a garage sale. And then we watched two wonderful films — Toy Story I and II — on the big screen in 3D. What a great day.

Oh, and as I’m typing this, news has come in over the wire that we have a new member of the COBRAS, Rob Mallows of the Deighton Dossier. I’ll give Rob an official welcome tomorrow, but for now…I’m exhausted!

Despite the dearth of posts lately, Mister 8 is not dead. Sadly, we did lose one of the renowned television spymasters yesterday with the passing of Peter Graves, Mission: Impossible’s Jim Phelps. I have to admit that despite seeing every episode of most of the other 60s spy television shows, I’ve only seen a handful of M:I episodes. Perhaps this is a good time to rectify that, in memory of Graves.

I recently downloaded an emulator and a handful of ROMs from Nintendo games that I played as a kid, and wanted to post about a handful of them here. I’ve been meaning to post about some of these early games since last year, but Patrick McGoohan’s death derailed my posting plans.

1. Mission: Impossible

This one was based on the 1988 Mission: Impossible series, put out by Konami in 1990. The late Peter Graves assigns your missions in this overhead style action game. As you can tell from the video above, the best thing about this game is the introduction. Otherwise, gameplay is surprisingly frustrating. A side-scroller would have been more effective.

2. The Mafat Conspiracy

This is one of my all-time top 10 favorite NES games, especially now that I have a map to the mazes. The gameplay is fun, and as a kid, I pretended that Duke Togo, aka assassin Golgo-13, was actually James Bond. There were so many cool things about the first three levels of this game that I’m looking forward to finally finishing the rest of it as an adult. Check out the awesome intro imagery at 2:36. This was the second Golgo-13 game, but I never owned the first.

3. The Hunt For Red October

In this ridiculous game, you control the titular submarine like a fish while shooting a variety of objects. NES games based on movies were usually crap. This one was at least better than games based on Tom Cruise (Top Gun, Days of Thunder) films. As a kid who spent time doing a book report on Hunt For Red October and begging to see the film the second it was in theaters, I wanted to play as Jack Ryan. Apparently, there’s a level at the end of the NES game that I never reached where you actually play as Ramius, running around the October defusing bombs.

4. Man From UNCLE

I didn’t own this one either, but I’m including here because neither did anyone else. When following on the success of the Mission: Impossible licensing, Ultra Games / Konami looked further back in the spy-fi archives and created a game based on the adventures of Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin (who was the second player character in this side-scrolling shoot’em up, reportedly just a recolor of the Nap Solo sprite with blonde hair).  Each cut scene featured an introduction from Alexander Waverly, and there’s where the trouble began. While they had the rights to use the images of actors Robert Vaughn and David McCallum, they hadn’t sought approval from the estate of the late Leo G. Carroll. This held up release of the game to the point where Konami moved onto other projects. The video above is taken from a bootleg ROM distribution that unfortunately crashes once you click past the menu screen.

What’s your favorite spy-related NES game? Let me know in the comments section!

A POTENTIAL MAJOR UPSET! After a personal plea via blog and Twitter from creator Greg Rucka, Tara Chace has managed to lap James Bond to the tune of 100 votes. Can Bond catch up in the final day of voting?

In the match with the lowest total votes so far, Jason Bourne is beating Cate Archer, though not by much. I’m guessing that some of Archer’s votes are from anyone-but-Bourne voters.

The Avengers are providing a solid butt-kicking to OSS 117, who only has two votes so far!

The Men From UNCLE are barely ahead of Maxwell Smart and 99. At this point, it could go either way.

Thanks to voters pouring in from the I Spy message board, Robert Culp and Bill Cosby are ahead of Nick Fury (a character who has been played by both David Hasselhoff and Samuel L. Jackson).

Voting just began yesterday in the match between John Drake and George Smiley, but so far they’re neck-and-neck.

Here’s today’s match-up!

Jack Bauer

I’m going to confess something shocking now…I’ve never seen an episode of 24 before in my life. I plan to start watching after it goes off the air, the same I do with every TV show that isn’t Lost (and I wish I’d done the same thing with it!). So what follows is a condensed version of the wiki on Jack Bauer (played by the talented Keifer Sutherland). Bauer’s an agent for the fictional Counter Terrorist Unit, preventing terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, along the way, he’s seen his wife murdered, been forced to kill innocents, tortured criminals, and developed a heroin addiction. The seven-and-a-half days we’ve (well, figuratively “we”) seen of Bauer’s life have been intense. But is Pedro Cerrano still President?

The Impossible Missions Force

I also haven’t seen much of Mission: Impossible, because, unlike most of the other spy shows I talk about here, A&E didn’t air it when I was an easily influenced pre-teen during my summer vacations. I’ve steadily been working my way through the show though, and have been impressed with the operations executed by Jim Phelps, Dan Briggs, Cinnamon Carter, Barney Collier, Willy Armitage, and my personal favorite, Rollin Hand. There were other agents in other seasons too, a reboot of the show in 1988, and of course the movie version where it turns out that Jim Phelps was a traitor (I don’t believe it!). Feel free to vote for whichever Mission: Impossible team that you prefer!

Voting ends May 22, circa 2:30 PM EST!

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We’ll have to make some slight changes soon in our ongoing Mister 8 May Madness…because I’m not very good at math. The staggering of contests in the first round worked well, but I haven’t allowed enough days for voting in the contests for the second round. I’ll hopefully get back to you tonight with some changed dates and a second match-up, but in the meantime….

Nick Fury

Jim Phelps and Co.

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One of these two will go on to the championship round of Mister 8 May Madness!

Tara Chace

The IMF

Voting will end on May 29, at 11:59:59 PM, EST!

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