Real-Life Simpsons House

Photo: Design Fetish
In 1997, home developer Kaufman & Broad built a house in Henderson, Nevada that looks exactly like the house that the Simpson family lives in, both inside and outside, including furniture and pictures on the walls. From an article in The Las Vegas Sun, written at the time of construction:
“The Simpsons”, the satirical, animated clan who put the phrases “Doh!” and “Eat my shorts” into the national vernacular, are celebrating their 10th year on television. And in true Simpson fashion, the producers of the show are doing the unexpected – recreating the family’s two-story domicile right down to the throw rugs. Builder Kaufman & Broad has taken the 724 Evergreen Terrace address out of two dimensions and cast it in three, placing it smack dab in the middle of Henderson, Nev., in a housing development appropriately called “Springfield.”
News Story and Gallery via GearFuse
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Itchy and Scratchy Episode or Cheesy Horror Film?

The Itchy & Scratch Show is a “show within a show” featured on The Simpsons. If you are at all familiar with it, you’ll enjoy today’s Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss. See if you can decide which title is an episode of Itchy & Scratchy, and which are actual names of horror films. It’s not easy! I scored only 50%. Link
Moe Szyslak

Today’s Luchtime Quiz at mental_floss is about another character from The Simpsons. Moe Szyslak is Homer’s favorite bartender. How much do you know about him? Certainly more than I do! Link
The Simpsons A Cappella
I can’t get enough of this: The Simpsons theme song, the a cappella version sung by Canvas. Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] – via Land-O-Links
TV Theme Songs That Will Never Die
Star Trek- composed by Alexander Courage
Check out these opening lines: Beyond the rim of the starlight / My love is wand'ring in starflight. Even though the lyrics were never used, Roddenberry still got half the royalties for the theme. (Photo: Listening Post) The Simpsons - composed by Danny Elfman
To see his vision through, Groening approached composer Danny Elfman to write the opus, handing him a mix tape to help him get the idea. Highlights included The Jetsons theme, selections from Nino Rota's Juliet of the Spirits, a Remington electric shaver jingle by Frank Zappa, some easy-listening music by Esquivel, and a teach-your-parrot-to-talk record. After listening to it for a while, Elfman told Groening, "I know exactly what you're looking for." Apparently, he did. The Emmy-winning theme has been covered on screen by everyone from Yo La Tengo to Green Day. Jeopardy! - composed by Merv Griffin
Friends ("I'll Be There For You") - composed by Michael Skloff & Allee Willis and performed by The Rembrandts
When The Rembrandts agreed to record "I'll Be There For You" for the TV show Friends, they were little-known rock band that was happy to get the gig. Overnight, the theme became a sensation, earning The Rembrandts a Grammy nomination. Years later, band member Danny Wilde reflected, "We went from being a cool, cutting-edge band to a pop flavor-of-the-month." And just like that, the flavor was gone. By the end of the 1990s, there was so little demand for The Rembrandts' music that the band resorted to playing shopping malls, opening once for Richard Simmons. It wasn't their day, their month, or even their year. Bonus: The Legendary Soundman Behind Hollywood's Most Famous Noises
After taking his first (uncredited) job on the original Death Race 2000 in 1975, Burtt would go on to turn movie sound into an art. By capturing and manipulating ambient and mechanical noises, he created entirely new aural worlds. Here are a few of his trademark sounds. R2D2's Voice: Most movie fans think that the robot's voice is an elaborate creation of computer synthesizers, but it's actually a combination of Burtt whistling and making fart noises into an old tape recorder. The Clicks of Wall-E's Cockroach Pet: After experimenting with various synthesized animal noises, Burtt settled on accelerating the chatter of an irritated raccoon. The Star Wars Lightsaber: The hum and the clash of the lightsaber came from two malfunctioning devices - a broken television set tuned between two VHF channels and an idling film projector. Chewbacca's Voice: Although the fictional wookie looks all ape, his voice is based on the barks and grunts of dogs, mixed with the growls of lions and bears. Star Wars' T.I.E. Fighter: The roar of the evil Empire's fighters (the name stands for Twin Ion Engine) is actually the roar of an elephant. To add some length to the sound, Burtt layered in the buzz of his car driving on a wet road. Indiana Jones' Whip: The crack of Dr. Jones' whip is just that - the sound of Indiana Jones cracking his whip. During the making of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Burtt recorded Harrison Ford snapping the whip along a rural road in Marin County, California. To add a little more whoosh, Burtt dropped in the sound of a Harrier Jump Jet that flew by. |
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TV Theme Songs That Will Never Die is written by Bill DeMain, and The Legendary Soundman Behind Hollywood's Most Famous Noises is written by John Scott Lewinski. They are reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the May/June 2009 issue of mental_floss magazine. Be sure to visit mental_floss' entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!
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The Simpsons Stamps

The US Postal Service will begin selling stamps featuring The Simpsons on May 7th. The first-class stamps will be worth 44 cents each.
“This is the biggest and most adhesive honor The Simpsons has ever received,” said Matt Groening, creator and executive producer of The Simpsons.
Link -via J-Walk Blog
Ned Flanders

If you are a longtime fan of The Simpsons, you’ll do well on today’s Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss. How well do you think you know the Simpson’s next door neighbor, Ned Flanders? I don’t -I would have probably scored 0% if I had tried! Link
Ralph Wiggum

Today’s Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss deals with a character from The Simpsons.
Of all the brilliant characters the writers of The Simpsons have gifted to popular culture over the years, Ralph Wiggum is one of the few who make me giddily happy to the point of embarrassment. Something about his absurdist oddballism speaks to everything fundamentally great about inspired comedy writing.
How much do you know about Ralph Wiggum? Since I don’t watch TV, I didn’t even try the quiz. You, no doubt, will do better. Link
VideoSift Clips of the Week

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Green Tie in Front of a Green Screen
It certainly made the weather report more interesting, perhaps all weathermen should wear green ties! |
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Backwards Beethoven Previously on Neatorama: Singing Backwards |
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Yoshimoto Cube Philip Brocoum explains: Link |
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Bob Munden: Fastest Gunman Ever
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Simpsons Duet: 2 Guys 1 Piano They're pretty awesome! Link |
For more the web's most interesting videos, check out: VideoSift.
An Interactive Guide to The Simpsons' Springfield

This is amazing! It’s an interactive map of Springfield that a fan put together. Click anywhere on the map to zoom in – the black text represents retail stores and the pink text represents restaurants. If you hover your mouse over the green boxes, you can view a screen cap of that particular building.
I can’t imagine the time it must have taken to put this together! Even if you don’t care that much about the map itself, it’s worth it just to go through and read the clever names of some of the establishments – the Texas Cheesecake Depository cracks me up.
Link via Instructables.
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Side Show Bob Carved out of a Mexican Turnip

Remember our post about Jar Jar Bink carved out of a jicama? Well, the guy who did that made another one. This time, it’s Side Show Bob of the TV series The Simpsons , carved out of a Mexican Turnip! Link – Thanks Ken!



Did
you know that the Star Trek theme music has lyrics? Neither did composer
Alexander Courage when he signed a deal to write the music. The fine print
gave the show's creator, Gene Roddenberry, the option to write words to
Courage's tune - and he did.
From
the beginning, The Simpsons creator Matt Groening wanted his
show's song to be big. Here's how he put it: "The trend in TV themes
for the previous 15 years had been namby-pamby synthesizer schlock that
seemed to whimper, 'We can't offer you much, but please like our pathetic
little show.' I wanted a big orchestrated, obnoxious, arrogant theme that
promised you the best time of your life." (Photo:
Game
show maven Merv Griffin knew what he was doing when he wrote the theme
song for Jeopardy. He later recalled, '[The Jeopardy
theme] is only 14 seconds. So I rewrote it in another key, [repeated it],
then added the 'bum-bump' to get it to 30 seconds, which was the amount
of time contestants needed for the Final Jeopardy answer. Now, it's played
at sporting events; I've played it with the Boston Pops. It's one of the
most lucrative themes in history." In 2006, Griffin estimated he'd
made $70 million in royalties from the tune.
If
you've seen Star Wars, Indiana Jones, or Wall-E, then
you know the work of Hollywood's most legendary sound designer, Ben Burtt.
(Photo: 



















