In the late ’70s, disco video was all the rage. TV programs such as Kicks, Hot City, and Soap Factory Disco marred the broadcast airwaves. As long as folks had the desire to celebrate their beautiful brawn on the set of some sleazy soundstage, the ecstasy prevailed and became perfect visual wallpaper for the winking TV eye.
But for sheer spunk, no disco program ever approached Moon Man Connection which I first experienced on UHF Channel 20 in Washington DC. This low-cost program was visual wallpaper so extreme that its very insubstantiality became hypnotic.
Filmed in a rat-infested basement, Moon Man opened with a blast from an echo chamber. Ten years after Neil Armstrong strolled on the moon, Mr. Moon Man milked the scratched footage of the NASA moonwalk, splicing it in at random intervals. Moon Man was a true trash auteur from Scuzzville.
Moon Man’s backdrop scenery was a moonscape painted on cardboard sprinkled with glitter and Day-Glo. Compared to other disco programming of this era, Moon Man’s dance floor seemed nearly vacant; the dancers, puppets on Sleep-eze. Tipsy camera angles, cheap simulcasting, color filters, “psychedelic lighting”–all combined to create the best example of dope TV ever made.
After months of indulging in Moon Man Connection, I began to notice several similarities between supposedly different episodes:
–Moon Man always seemed to play the same ten records (he was the only cat who ever misspelled Rod Stewart as “Rot Stuart”)
–The regular dance sequence, where couples are paired according to their astrological signs (to the strains of Danny Pearson’s “What’s Your Sign?”), always featured the same couple.
–Every time the dancers did the “Moon Walk” (which could only be performed to a Bohannon record), it was the same bunch.
Finally, I realized that, not only did Moon Man Connection contain similar sequences merely rearranged for each show, but that it was actually the same show repeated endlessly! (Boy, Moon Man, what a card!)
Nothing could explain the Moon Man phenomenon at a time when disco video supplied an endless stream of visuals illustrating the physical dynamics of going tapioca with one’s limbs. I mean, Moon Man–and his whole stupid show–just sat there.
Hey, Moon Man! How bout that…he got away with something!! Give him a hand or a hand job or whatever you wanna do….the guy deserves it.
BUT HERE’S THE OTHER PERSPECTIVE FROM THE INNER DC CONNECTION:
What a trashy review from a true playa hater…
Moonman provided the ‘real connection’ that was missing from the hyped Soul Train broadcast. The so-called ‘endless repeat of shows’ was genius, and I laugh… LOL.
You misrepresent information of a genre of Go-Go Playas (not gender specific) who know the truth about Channel 20 and The Moonman Connection. They funked and rocked old school and new beats and rhymes without fail. Perhaps your town could only afford to pay for cut and pasted shows… In D.C., it was real and they dealt funk on a regular.
I watched the show comfortably in my B-More attic (The Playas Clubhouse), with no less than room fulla honeys and some Espirit. The dancers were a bit repetitive, but they danced like no other place, except for maybe a house party.
D.C. and B-More are cousins down south (south of the Big Apple)…we are not ashamed of our funk and you will never find us spinning on our heads or swimming out of water. We funk, we rock, we connect.
To all the playas back in the day, I gotchya back!
Moonman, thanks brother… Thank you for keepin’ it real.
(The music Moon Man played can always be found at the wayout world of POPKRAZY.)
