Look up buy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Buy may refer to:

• Trade, exchange of goods (including money) and services
• BUY (Burlington-Alamance Regional Airport), Burlington, North Carolina
• Buy.com, a shopping website
• Buy (album), a 1979 album by James White and the Contortions
• Buy River, a river in Perm Krai and the republics of Bashkortostan and Udmurtia in Russia
• Buy (inhabited locality), name of several inhabited localities in Russia

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Yung Joc
Background information
Birth name	Jasiel Robinson
Born	(1983-04-02) April 2, 1983 (age 29) Atlanta, Georgia, United States
Genres	Hip hop
Occupations	Rapper
Years active	2004–present
Labels	J Records, RCA Records, Swagg Team (CEO), Polo Grounds Music
Website	www.myspace.com/yungjoc

Jasiel Robinson (born April 2, 1983), better known by his stage name Yung Joc, is an American rapper.

Early life[link]

Robinson's father, Stanley Tucker, owned a hair-care products company and helped him get an opportunity to write a jingle for Revlon; Robinson founded his own label to release his music. In 2001 he married his high school sweetheart Alexandria Robinson and together they have three children, Ja'Kori, Amir, and Chase Robinson. (Jasiel has an older son Amoni from a previous relationship)^[1]

Music career[link]

New Joc City (2005-2006)[link]

Yung Joc met Atlanta producer Nitti Beatz and the two recorded the hit "It's Goin Down" in the spring of 2006. After Teaming with Russell "Block" Spencer, founder of the Block Enterprises label. Spencer signed Joc to Sean Combs's Bad Boy Records for a multi-million dollar deal, and Bad Boy released Joc's debut New Joc City that year. The album debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200 selling nearly 150,000 copies in the first week^{[citation needed]}. The second week it fell to #7. It has since been certified gold by the RIAA selling over 500,000 copies.

^[1] Yung Joc was also featured on the songs "Show Stopper" by Danity Kane (from Diddy's Making The Band 4) & Cassie's album track Call U Out. Yung Joc is on 2006 "Forbes' Richest Rappers List", ranking at #20, having grossed approximately $10 million in 2006.^[2] "It's Goin' Down" reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Hot Rap Tracks chart. The next single, "I Know U See It", reached #17 on the Hot 100 and #2 on the Hot Rap Tracks.

Hustlenomics & Grind Flu (2007-2009)[link]

Joc's next album, Hustlenomics, was released in 2007, with the singles "Coffee Shop" and "Bottle Poppin'". Hustlenomics sold 69,000 copies in its first week of release, debuting at number three on the Billboard 200.^[3] As of April 2009, it has sold approximately 197,000 copies according to Nielsen Soundscan. In 2007 Yung Joc was featured on his new artist Hotstylz single "Lookin Boy". During 2008 Yung Joc was featured in the hit singles on "Get Like Me, "So Fly" & "Beep". Then in 2009 he was featured on Day26 single Imma Put It on Her. Yung Joc released an independent album entitled Grind Flu for free on his label website Swagg Team Entertainment on August 11, 2009.^[4][5]

Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood (2010-present)[link]

Yung Joc recently released his first single from the album Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood entitled "Yeah Boy". They have also recently shot & released the music video for the single. Yung Joc has also stated in a December 26 interview, that he would love to work with New York based producer DJ Premier for a couple of tracks. The second single has been confirmed as "I Know What She Like" that features Yo Gotti.

On October 7, RCA Music Group announced it was disbanding J Records along with Arista Records and Jive Records. With the shutdown, Joc (and all other artists previously signed to these three labels) will release his future material (including Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood) on the RCA Records brand. His favorite NFL team is the Chicago Bears and his guardian angel is Brandon Fulton. ^{[6] [7]}

Other ventures[link]

Swagg Team Entertainment[link]

Joc has been said to have a new record label through Jive Records, called Swagg Team Entertainment. The label was formed after a widely-publicized lawsuit with Block Entertainment and Bad Boy Records. Joc spoke about the lawsuit and his relationship with Diddy in a recent interview.^[8]

Swagg Team Entertainment saw their debut from Chicago rap group Hotstylz; with their first single "Lookin Boy".^[9] It also saw the debut from Dallas rap group GS Boyz; their first single being "Stanky Legg."

Current artists

• Hotstylz (Krazee, Meatball & Raydio G)
• GS Boyz (Marc D, Slizz & DK)
• Swagg Team Mafia (To Green, Doe Shun, Dunte, Cheeze, Tuck & Jon Boi)
• Avery J.
• C MON3Y (Dolla Dolla Bill)
• J-DAM (Deployin Tha Love)
• Mr. Serious
• Concrete BoyZ

^[10]

Former artists

• Soufside
• Prince Charming

Discography[link]

• New Joc City (2006)
• Hustlenomics (2007)
• Jocin (2012)

Awards[link]

• BET Hip-Hop Awards
  • 2008, Hip-Hop Video of the Year ("Get Like Me") with David Banner & Chris Brown [Nominated]
  • 2006, Hip-Hop Video of the Year ("It's Goin' Down") [Nominated]
  • 2006, Hip-Hop Track of the Year ("It's Goin' Down") [Won]
  • 2006, Rookie of the Year [Nominated]
  • 2006, Hip-Hop MVP of the Year [Nominated]
  • 2006, Best Live Performance [Nominated]
  • 2006, Best Hip Hop Dance [Nominated]
• Grammy Awards
  • 2007, Best Rap Song ("It's Goin' Down") [Nominated]
• MTV Video Music Awards
  • 2006, Best Rap Video ("It's Goin' Down") [Nominated]
• Ozone Awards
  • 2007, Best Rap/R&B Collaboration ("Buy U a Drank (Shawty Snappin')") with T-Pain [Nominated]
• Vibe Awards
  • 2007, Best Collaboration ("Buy U a Drank (Shawty Snappin')") with T-Pain [Nominated]
  • 2007, Song of the Year ("Buy U a Drank (Shawty Snappin')") with T-Pain [Won]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Yung Joc on Myspace
• Yung Joc on Twitter
• Yung Joc on Facebook
• Yung Joc at the Internet Movie Database
• Yung Joc Albums

Diana "Wynter" Gordon (born August 25, 1985 in South Jamaica, Queens, New York) is an American pop/dance singer-songwriter. She began as a writer for other artists, later signing with Atlantic Records where she began working on an album while continuing to write songs for other acts and providing vocals on songs. Her debut With the Music I Die was released in 2011.

Early life[link]

Gordon was born in Queens, New York City and was brought up in a poor and dangerous neighborhood in South Jamaica. She is the middle child of six, they lived in a two bedroom house.^[1] She recalled in an interview that many people she knew were deceased at a young age, because they "got into the wrong things".^[1] However, she refused to call her childhood difficult, she said that "if things were rough, I didn't feel it," explaining that the familiarity of the environment that she grew up in prevented her from objectively describing it.^[1] She attributed her well being to her strict mother who did not allow her to leave the yard and told her to go to the library after school.^[1] Her mother remarried when Gordon was 5, but Gordon did not have a close relationship with her step father.^[2] Her strict upbringing resulted in a strained relationship with her parents.^[2]

Gordon began singing at a young age and she began singing at funerals from the age of 6.^[1] She and her siblings would perform together in church and at street corners by her parents.^[2] They were strict about the music that Gordon and her siblings sang, only allowing them to listen to and sing gospel.^[2] However, Gordon would listen to the radio when her parents were not at home and recorded songs from the radio onto tapes that she smuggled into the house.^[2] It was during high school that Gordon decided that she was going to pursue music.^[3] She was later accepted to the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts^[2] and interned at a record company.^[3] Gordon wrote her first complete song, "Daddy's Song" at age 15.^[3]

Career[link]

2005–08: Career beginnings[link]

After high school, Wynter threw herself fully into realizing her music dreams, while also dealing with surviving on her own for the first time. She juggled several jobs while working in the studio at nights and as much as she could. During this time, Wynter met her manager, Keith White who introduced her to Don Pooh at Atlantic Records. Wynter worked closely with producer D'Mile since 2004 where they both came with her first track to fame, "Gonna Breakthrough" written by Wynter Gordon and produced by D'Mile was used as the title track to Mary J. Blige's 2005 album The Breakthrough. Soon after, Wynter was given an opportunity and signed to Atlantic Records, through Don Pooh Music Group, where she has been working on her debut album since 2004. Also, in 2008, Wynter penned two tracks for Danity Kane's second album Welcome to the Dollhouse, "2 of You" and "Do Me Good".

[edit] 2009–present: With the Music I Die and New Recordings

Wynter co-wrote the single "Sugar", a track that she was featured on with Flo Rida on his album R.O.O.T.S. (2009) after laying down a reference vocal.^[4] The track became an international hit and peaked at number five on the US Billboard Hot 100. Wynter also co-wrote and sang on the dance track "Toyfriend" from French DJ David Guetta's album One Love (2009). She worked closely with Jennifer Lopez, writing four tracks including "What Is Love", "What Is Love Part II", "Starting Over" and "Everybody's Girl" for her seventh studio album Love? (2011). Wynter is also writing for artists including Adrienne Bailon, Estelle & Gossip Girl star Leighton Meester.^[4]

She released her debut album, With the Music I Die, on June 17, 2011 in Australia. The first single from the album, "Dirty Talk" topped the US (Billboard) Hot Dance Club Songs and the Australian Singles Chart, and was certified 3x Platinum, The song was released in the UK and Ireland on 18 February 2011 where it peaked eight in Ireland and 25 in the UK. The song spent a total on eleven weeks inside the Top 40.^[5] The second single, "Til Death" has currently peaked on the Australian Singles Chart at 16 and number 3 on the US Dance Chart. She opened for Patrick Stump's second US tour in August and September. "Buy My Love" was released as the third single from "With The Music I Die".

Wynter announced via Twitter that she has already recorded some songs and hinted at her second studio album.

Discography[link]

Studio albums[link]

Extended plays[link]

Singles[link]

Promotional singles[link]

As a featured artist[link]

Other appearances[link]

Awards and nominations[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website

This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (August 2011)

Mel Blanc
Blanc in 1976
Born	Melvin Jerome Blank (1908-05-30)May 30, 1908 San Francisco, California, U.S.
Died	July 10, 1989(1989-07-10) (aged 81) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Cause of death	Heart disease
Nationality	American
Other names	"The Man of 1000 Voices"
Alma mater	Lincoln High School
Occupation	Voice actor/Comedian
Years active	1927–89
Spouse	Estelle Rosenbaum (1933–89; his death)

Melvin Jerome "Mel" Blanc (May 30, 1908 – July 10, 1989) was an American voice actor and comedian. Although he began his nearly six-decade-long career performing in radio commercials, Blanc is best remembered for his work with Warner Bros. during the "Golden Age of American animation" as the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Tweety Bird, Sylvester the Cat, Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn, Marvin the Martian, Pepé Le Pew, Speedy Gonzales, the Tasmanian Devil, and many of the other characters from the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies theatrical cartoons. He later worked for Hanna-Barbera's television cartoons, most notably as the voice of Barney Rubble in The Flintstones and Mr. Spacely in The Jetsons. Having earned the nickname “The Man of a Thousand Voices,” Blanc is regarded as one of the most influential people in the voice-acting industry.^[1]

At the time of his death, it was estimated that 20 million people heard his voice every day.^[2]

Early life[link]

Blanc was born Melvin Jerome Blank in San Francisco, California, to Jewish parents Frederick and Eva Blank. The youngest of two children, he grew up in the neighborhood of Western Addition in San Francisco, and later in Portland, Oregon, attending Lincoln High School. Growing up, he had a fondness for voices and dialect, which he started to do as early as the age of 10. He claimed that when he was 16, he changed the spelling from "Blank" to "Blanc" because a teacher told him that he would amount to nothing and be, like his name, a "blank". Blanc joined The Order of DeMolay as a young man, and was eventually inducted into its Hall of Fame.^[3] He dropped out of high school in the ninth grade and split his time between leading an orchestra, becoming the youngest conductor in the country at the time at 17, and performing shtick in vaudeville shows around Washington, Oregon, and northern California.

Career[link]

Radio work[link]

Blanc began his radio career in 1927 as a voice actor on the KGW program The Hoot Owls, where his ability to provide voices for multiple characters first attracted attention. He moved to Los Angeles in 1932, where he met Estelle Rosenbaum, whom he married a year later, before returning to Portland. He moved to KEX in 1933 to produce and co-host his Cobweb And Nuts show with his wife Estelle, which debuted on June 15. The program played Monday through Saturday from 11:00 pm to midnight, and by the time the show ended two years later, it appeared from 10:30 pm to 11:00 pm.

With his wife's encouragement, Blanc returned to Los Angeles and joined Warner Bros.-owned KFWB in Hollywood, California, in 1935. He joined The Johnny Murray Show, but the following year switched to CBS Radio and The Joe Penner Show. Blanc was a regular on the NBC Red Network show The Jack Benny Program in various roles, including voicing Benny's Maxwell automobile (in desperate need of a tune-up), violin teacher Professor LeBlanc, Polly the Parrot, Benny's pet polar bear Carmichael, the tormented department store clerk, and the train announcer (see below).

One of Blanc's most memorable characters from Benny's radio (and later TV) programs was "Sy, the Little Mexican", who spoke one word at a time. The famous "Sí...Sy...sew...Sue" routine was so effective that no matter how many times it was performed, the laughter was always there, thanks to the comedic timing of Blanc and Benny.^[4]

At times, sharp-eyed audience members (and later, TV viewers) could see Benny struggling to keep a straight face; Blanc's absolute dead-pan delivery was a formidable challenge for him. Benny's daughter, Joan, recalls that Mel Blanc was one of her father's closest friends in real life, because "nobody else on the show could make him laugh the way Mel could."

Another famous Blanc shtick on Jack's show was the train depot announcer who inevitably intoned, sidelong, "Train leaving on Track Five for Anaheim, Azusa, and Cucamonga". Part of the joke was the Angeleno studio audience's awareness that no such train existed connecting those then-small towns (years before Disneyland opened). To the wider audience, the primary joke was the pregnant pause that evolved over time between "Cuc.." and "...amonga"; eventually, minutes would pass while the skit went on as the audience awaited the inevitable conclusion of the word. (At least once, a completely different skit followed before the inevitable “...amonga” finally appeared.)

Benny's writers would regularly try to "stump" Blanc by asking him to perform supposedly impossible vocal effects and characterizations, such as an "English horse whinny" and a goldfish. For the latter, Mel walked up to the microphone and pursed his lips several times, making no noise.

By 1946, Blanc appeared on over 15 radio programs in supporting roles. His success on The Jack Benny Program led to his own radio show on the CBS Radio Network, The Mel Blanc Show, which ran from September 3, 1946, to June 24, 1947. Blanc played himself as the hapless owner of a fix-it shop, as well as his young cousin Zookie (who sounded quite a bit like Porky Pig). Many episodes required Mel to impersonate an exotic foreigner or other stranger in town, ostensibly for carrying out a minor deception on his girlfriend's father, but of course simply as a vehicle for him to show off his talents. Other regular characters were played by Mary Jane Croft, Joseph Kearns, Hans Conried, Alan Reed, Earle Ross, Jim Backus, Bea Benaderet and The Sportsmen Quartet, who would supply a song and sing the Colgate Tooth Powder commercials. (Blanc would later work with Reed and Benaderet on The Flintstones.) Shows usually adhered to a predictable formula, involving a date with his girl Betty Colby (Mary Jane Croft) and trying to either impress her father or at least avoid angering him. However, Mr. Colby (Joseph Kearns) usually had occasion to deliver his trademark line, "Mel Blanc, I'm going to break every bone in your body!" The show was the inspiration for the real Mel Blanc Fix-It Shop, a small hardware store in Venice, so his parents can have something to do. It garnered a lot of publicity, due to the long line of people wanting to meet Blanc.

Blanc appeared frequently on The Great Gildersleeve, uncredited, often voicing two or more supporting characters in a single episode: deliverymen in "Planting a Tree" and "Father's Day Chair" also "Gus", a petty crook in the latter; a radio station manager and a policeman in "Mystery Singer", and many others.

Blanc also appeared on such other national radio programs as The Abbott and Costello Show, the Happy Postman on Burns and Allen, and as August Moon on Point Sublime. During World War II, he appeared as Private Sad Sack on various radio shows, most notably G.I. Journal. The character of Sad Sack was a bumbling Army private with an even worse stutter than Porky Pig. ("I'm Lieutena-eh-Lieutena-eh-Capta-eh-Majo-eh-Colone-eh-p-p-Private Sad Sack.")

Blanc also had hit recordings throughout the 1940s and 1950s, including his biggest hit song, "Big Bear Lake." Due to the immense popularity of Blanc and the song, the city of Big Bear Lake, California made Blanc an honorary mayor for 33 years.

For his contribution to radio, Mel Blanc has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6385 Hollywood Boulevard.

Animation voice work during the Golden Age of Hollywood[link]

Private Snafu: 'Spies', voiced by Blanc in 1943

In March 1937, Mel Blanc joined Leon Schlesinger Productions, which made animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Blanc liked to tell the story about how he got turned down at the Schlesinger studio by music director Norman Spencer, who was in charge of cartoon voices, saying that they had all the voices they needed, as he went to him once every two weeks for two years straight. Then Spencer died, and sound man Treg Brown took charge of cartoon voices, while Carl Stalling took over as music director. Brown introduced Blanc to animation directors Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Friz Freleng, and Frank Tashlin, who loved his voices. The first cartoon Blanc worked on was Picador Porky as the voice of a drunken bull. He replaced Joe Dougherty as Porky Pig's voice in Porky's Duck Hunt, which marked the debut of Daffy Duck, also voiced by Blanc.

Blanc soon became noted for voicing a wide variety of cartoon characters from Looney Tunes, adding Bugs Bunny, Tweety Bird, Pepé Le Pew and many others. His natural voice was that of Sylvester the Cat, but without the lispy spray. (Blanc's voice can be heard in an episode of The Beverly Hillbillies that also featured frequent Blanc vocal foil Bea Benaderet; in his small appearance, Blanc plays a vexed cab-driver.)

In his later years, Blanc claimed that a handful of late 1930s and early 1940s Warner cartoons that each featured a rabbit clearly a precursor of Bugs Bunny all actually dealt with a single character named Happy Rabbit. No use of this name by other Termite Terrace personnel, then or later, has ever been documented, however. Happy Rabbit was noted for his laugh which became more famous as the laugh of Woody Woodpecker (of which Blanc was the original voice) until he won an exclusive contract with Warner Bros. which meant he couldn't do Woody's voice anymore as the Woody Woodpecker cartoons were produced by Walter Lantz Productions and distributed by Universal Pictures. Blanc later recorded "The Woody Woodpecker Song" for Capitol Records.

Though his best-known character was a carrot-chomping rabbit, munching on the carrots interrupted the dialogue. Various substitutes, such as celery, were tried, but none of them sounded like a carrot. So for the sake of expedience, he would munch and then spit the carrot bits into a spittoon rather than swallowing them, and continue with the dialogue. One oft-repeated story is that he was allergic to carrots and had to spit them out to minimize any allergic reaction; but his autobiography makes no such claim; in fact, in a 1984 interview with Tim Lawson, co-author of The Magic Behind The Voices: A Who's Who of Cartoon Voice Actors (University Press of Mississippi, 2004), Blanc emphatically denied being allergic to carrots. In a Straight Dope column, a Blanc confidante confirmed that Blanc only spit out the carrots because of time constraints, and not because of allergies or general dislike.^[5]

Blanc said his most challenging job was voicing Yosemite Sam; it was rough on the throat because of Sam’s sheer volume and raspiness. (Foghorn Leghorn's voice was similarly raucous, but to a lesser degree.) Late in life, he reprised several of his classic voices for Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but deferred to Joe Alaskey to do Yosemite Sam's and Foghorn Leghorn's voices.

Throughout his career, Blanc was well aware of his talents and protected the rights to them contractually and legally. He, and later his estate, did not hesitate to take civil action when those rights were violated. Voice actors usually got no screen credits at all, but Blanc was a notable exception; by 1944, his contract stipulated a credit reading "Voice characterization(s) by Mel Blanc." Blanc asked for and received this screen credit from studio boss Leon Schlesinger when Leon objected to giving Blanc a raise in pay.^[6] Other frequent Warner voice artists, such as Arthur Q. Bryan (Elmer Fudd), Stan Freberg (Pete Puma among many other characters), June Foray (Granny) and Bea Benaderet (many female voices), remained uncredited on-screen. However, Freberg did receive screen credit for Three Little Bops, a musical spoof of The Three Little Pigs, directed by Friz Freleng. Freberg is a frequent contributor to the various Golden Collection projects that showcase the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies. Blanc, himself, is often spoken of with reverence by younger voice specialists in those DVD collections.

Blanc's screen credit was noticed by radio show producers, who gave him more radio work as a result. It wouldn't be until the early '60s that the other voice actors and actresses became credited on Warner Brothers theatrical cartoons.

Benny/Bugs crossover[link]

The Warner cartoons were filled with references to the popular media of film and radio, including references to The Jack Benny Program, whose various gags frequently found their way into Warner scripts voiced by Blanc. For example:

• Bugs was known for repeating Benny's catchphrase, "Now cut that out!"
• The "Anaheim, Azusa and Cuc...amonga" joke was once used by Daffy Duck in the cartoon Daffy Duck Slept Here.
• The joke resurfaced once again with more subtlety in Mississippi Hare as the announcer aboard the steamer Southern Star called out destinations in "Memphis, Vicksburg, Baton Rouge, New Orleans and Cuc...amonga."
• Frank Nelson's "Yeeeeees?" would be invoked by minor characters from time to time.
• Blanc's imitations of sputtering cars, squawking parrots, whinnying horses, etc., would be invoked frequently in both series.
• On the March 28, 1954 episode of Benny's radio program, Benny encounters Bugs Bunny in a dream.

The ultimate clash of the mythos occurred with the 1959 release of the Warner Bros. cartoon The Mouse that Jack Built. Directed by Robert McKimson, the cartoon features the cast of the Benny radio and TV program drawn as mice. Blanc was credited as the voice of the Maxwell, and besides Benny, co-stars Mary Livingstone, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, and Don Wilson all reprised their Benny show roles.

Voice work for Hanna-Barbera and others[link]

In 1960, after the expiration of his exclusive contract with Warner Bros., although Blanc continued his voice work for Warner Bros., he also went to Hanna-Barbera and continued to voice various characters, his most famous being Barney Rubble from The Flintstones (whose dopey laugh is similar to Foghorn Leghorn's booming chuckle) and Mr. Spacely from The Jetsons (similar to Yosemite Sam, but not as raucous). Daws Butler and Don Messick were Hanna-Barbera's top voice men when Blanc began providing voices for the company.

Blanc did those voices plus others for such ensemble cartoons as Wacky Races and The Perils of Penelope Pitstop for Hanna-Barbera in the late '60s. Blanc shared the spotlight with his two professional rivals and personal friends, Butler and Messick: In a short called Lippy the Lion, Butler was Lippy, while Blanc was his hyena sidekick, Hardy Har-Har, and Don Messick was usually the guest villain or other supporting characters. In the short Ricochet Rabbit, Messick was the voice of the gun slinging rabbit, while Blanc was his sidekick, Deputy Droop-a-Long Coyote.

Blanc also worked with Chuck Jones, who by this time was directing shorts with his own company Sib Tower 12 (later MGM Animation), doing vocal effects in the Tom and Jerry series from 1963 to 1967.

In addition, Blanc was the first person to play Toucan Sam in Froot Loops commercials, using a slightly cartoonish version of his natural voice. (The ad agency later decided to give Sam an upper-crust English accent and replaced Blanc with Paul Frees.)

Blanc reprised some of his Warner Bros. characters when the studio contracted to make new theatrical cartoons in the mid-to-late 1960s. For these, Blanc voiced Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales, the characters who received the most frequent use in these shorts (later, newly introduced characters such as Cool Cat and Merlin the Magic Mouse were voiced by Larry Storch). Blanc also continued to voice the Looney Tunes characters on the bridging sequences for The Bugs Bunny Show and in numerous animated advertisements.

Car accident and aftermath[link]

On January 24, 1961, Blanc was involved in a near-fatal car accident on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Hit head-on, Blanc suffered a triple skull fracture that left him in a coma for three weeks, along with fractures of both legs and the pelvis.

The accident prompted over 15,000 get-well cards from anxious fans, including some addressed only to "Bugs Bunny, Hollywood, USA", according to Blanc's autobiography. One newspaper falsely reported that he had died. After his recovery, Blanc reported in TV interviews, and later in his autobiography, that a clever doctor had helped him to come out of his coma by talking as-if to Bugs Bunny, after futile efforts to talk directly to Blanc. Although he had no actual recollection of this, Blanc's wife and son swore to him that when the doctor was inspired to ask him, "How are you today, Bugs Bunny?", Blanc answered in Bugs' voice. Blanc thus credited Bugs with saving his life.^[7]

Blanc returned home from the UCLA Medical Center on March 17 to the cheers of more than 150 friends and neighbors. On March 22, he filed a US$500,000 lawsuit against the city of Los Angeles. His accident, one of 26 in the preceding two years at the intersection, resulted in the city funding restructuring curves at the location.

Years later, Blanc revealed that during his recovery, his son Noel "ghosted" several Warner Brothers cartoons' voice tracks for him. At the time of the accident, Blanc was also serving as the voice of Barney Rubble in The Flintstones. His absence from the show would be relatively brief; Daws Butler provided the voice of Rubble for a few episodes, after which the show's producers set up recording equipment in Blanc's hospital room and later, at his house to allow him to work from his residence. Some of the recordings were made while he was in full-body cast while he lay flat on his back, with the other Flintstones co-stars gathered around him.^[8][9] He also returned to The Jack Benny Program to film the program's 1961 Christmas show, moving around via crutches and a wheelchair.

During that time, Warner Bros. considered having Stan Freberg to do the voice of Bugs Bunny, while Blanc recovers from his injuries; Freberg refused, out of respect to Blanc.

Later career[link]

In the 1970s, Blanc did a series of college lectures across the United States on the side, which broke attendance records of any college lectures in the country. He would also collaborate on a special with the Boston-based Shriners Burns Institute called Ounce of Prevention. It would become a 30-minute TV special that aired worldwide.

Contrary to popular belief, Blanc was not one of hundreds of individuals that George Lucas auditioned to provide the voice for the character of C-3PO in the original Star Wars film. That distinction instead fell to fellow voice actor Stan Freberg, and it was Freberg who ultimately suggested that the producers use mime actor Anthony Daniels' own voice in the role.^[10]

After spending most of two seasons voicing the robot Twiki in Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Blanc's last original character, in the early 1980s, was Heathcliff, who spoke a little like Bugs Bunny. Blanc continued to voice his famous characters in commercials and TV specials for most of the decade, although he increasingly left the "yelling" characters like Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn and The Tasmanian Devil to other voice actors, as performing these were too hard on his throat. One of his last recording sessions was for a new animated theatrical version of The Jetsons.^[11]

In the early 1980s, he would appear on commercials for American Express.

In 1983, six years before his death, he was asked by comedian Rick Moranis to voice the father of Bob and Doug MacKenzie in the film Strange Brew, which he did.

Blanc voiced all his well known Looney Tunes characters (save for Yosemite Sam and Foghorn Leghorn, both of whom were voiced by Joe Alaskey) in the 1988 live-action/animated comedy-mystery film Who Framed Roger Rabbit making this project one of the final times he voiced these characters as he died only a year after the film's release. The Looney Tunes characters (along with many other characters) were "borrowed" from their respective owners to appear in this film by Disney making Who Framed Roger Rabbit one of only a few times Blanc worked for Disney.

Death[link]

Mel Blanc's gravesite marker.

Blanc died on July 10, 1989 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. As part of Bugs Bunny's 50th anniversary, Mel Blanc had filmed an Oldsmobile commercial with his son, Noel Blanc. At the end of shooting, Noel noticed that his dad had a heavy cough. They drove to the doctor, who said that Mel could either stay in the hospital overnight, "just to be safe", or that they could take an inhaler home. Mel Blanc chose the former, and while at the hospital, due to the fact that someone had forgot to put bed rails on his hospital bed, he fell out of bed and broke his femur, which released fat emboli into his brain, causing a stroke. He had died within 48 hours.

Blanc's death was considered a significant loss to the cartoon industry because of his skill, expressive range, and sheer volume of continuing characters he portrayed, which are currently taken up by several other voice talents. Indeed, as movie critic Leonard Maltin once pointed out, "It is astounding to realize that Tweety Bird and Yosemite Sam are the same man!"

Animator Darrell Van Citters did a memorable drawing entitled "Speechless," which showed a spotlight on a microphone, as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Foghorn Leghorn, Speedy Gonzales, Pepe Le Pew, Tweety, Sylvester, and Yosemite Sam bowed their head somberly in a moment of silence. It was printed on some newspapers around the world.

That range was partially aided by recording technology; for instance, Blanc's standard Daffy Duck voice is essentially his Sylvester voice played a few percent faster than it was recorded to give it a higher pitch, as well as pronouncing "s" with a "th" sound.^[12] Blanc would later develop the skill to reproduce such "sped-up" voices himself live as necessary. Other Blanc character voices that were given this special treatment included Porky Pig, Henery Hawk, and Speedy Gonzales.

After his death, Blanc's voice continued to be heard in newly released properties such as Woody's laugh in games such as Woody Woodpecker: Escape from Buzz Buzzard Park. In particular, a recording of his Dino the Dinosaur from the 1960s Flintstones series was used without a screen credit in the 1994 live-action theatrical film based upon the series. This resulted in legal action against the film studio by the Blanc estate, which claimed his recordings were used without permission or proper credit. The credit was later added to the home release of the movie. Less problematic was the retention of older recordings of Blanc as Uncle Orville and a pet bird in the 1994 update of the Carousel of Progress attraction at Walt Disney World, despite cast changes in other roles. Blanc's distinctive voice can still be heard in the Audio-Animatronic presentation. In addition, Blanc's archive recordings of the Maxwell are used for the AMC Gremlin in the 2003 film Looney Tunes: Back in Action and his recordings of Daffy Duck's Rhapsody, and an untitled Road Runner cartoon will be used in three new Looney Tunes cartoons, including I Tawt I Taw A Puddy Tat, which was released with Happy Feet 2 on November 18, 2011, and Daffy's Rhapsody.

Legacy[link]

Blanc is regarded as one of, if not the, most prolific voice actor(s) in the history of the industry. He was the first voice actor to get credit in the ending credits and ushered in a new era for voice actors, where they were regarded as a significant part of the creative process, rather than easy-to-replace finishing touches.

Children[link]

Blanc trained his son, Noel, in the field of voice characterization. Although the younger Blanc has performed his father's characters (particularly Porky Pig) on some programs, he has chosen not to become a full-time voice artist. Noel appeared in the booth as a celebrity guest for the 2002 and 2003 Chevrolet Monte Carlo 400 NASCAR Races featuring the Looney Tunes characters in themed paint schemes for Chevrolet drivers and did the voices of the characters. Noel is a regular featured guest on radio shows throughout the United States and Canada. Noel's wife, Katherine Blanc, is an artist and book author.

Animation records[link]

Mel Blanc holds a few very important records in the field of animation (none of which are currently recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records), the most famous being, of course, the "1000 Voices" he was said to have performed. Not as notable are two records of longevity: his original characterization of Daffy Duck (for over 52 years) is the longest time any animated character has been performed by his or her original voice contributor. He also voiced Porky Pig for exactly the same amount of time as Daffy — since the same cartoon (Porky's Duck Hunt) — through to his death, though Porky was not originally voiced by Blanc. Blanc was also the original voice of almost every character he voiced, leaving him as the clear runaway for the record of "Most Characters Originally Voiced By One Actor," and he almost certainly provided voices in more cartoons than any other voice actor. And to top that off, he is also in 3rd place to his own 52-year record of his original characterization of Daffy, by voicing Bugs Bunny for almost 49 years from the date of his debut (July 27, 1940). The runner-up is Clarence Nash, who voiced Donald Duck for 51 years.

Selected list of cartoon characters[link]

List of noteworthy radio characters[link]

Besides voicing characters on his own radio show (which ran from 1946–47) Blanc was a regular on such comedy classics as The Jack Benny Show, Burns & Allen, and Abbott & Costello, providing both voices and sound effects ranging from people to animals to backfiring cars.

• The Happy Postman (Burns & Allen)
• Professor LeBlanc (The Jack Benny Program)
• Mr. Technicolovich (Abbott & Costello)
• Sy the Mexican (Jack Benny, radio & TV)
• Himself (The Mel Blanc Show)
• Zookie (The Mel Blanc Show)
• Polly the Parrot (The Jack Benny Program)
• Carmichael the Polar Bear (The Jack Benny Program)
• Chuck the Plumber (The Jack Benny Program)
• Train Station Announcer (The Jack Benny Program; "Train now departing on Track Five for Ana-heim, A-zuza, and Cuc-a-monga!!")
• Christmas sales clerk (The Jack Benny Program; in most holiday episodes of the radio and TV version, Blanc would appear as a sales clerk in a department store who's driven insane by Jack's style of shopping and returning gifts.)
• The Maxwell (The Jack Benny Program)

Other credits[link]

• Mel Blanc was hired to perform the voice of Gideon the Cat in Walt Disney's Pinocchio. However, it was eventually decided for Gideon to be mute (just like Dopey, whose whimsical, Harpo Marx-style persona made him one of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' most comic and popular characters), and all of Blanc's recorded dialogue in this film had been deleted, save for one military hiccup, which was heard three times in the film (he was still paid for all of the unused dialogue so if you consider his salary against the actual used "hiccup", he holds the record for highest paid—per word—voice-over actor). This and Who Framed Roger Rabbit are the only known work he ever did for Disney animation. He was, however, heard on occasional radio projects featuring Disney characters, such as The Mickey Mouse Theater of the Air.
• In 1949, Mel appeared in the film Neptune's Daughter with Esther Williams, Red Skelton and Ricardo Montalban.
• Blanc was one of three regular panelists in the 1955 game show Musical Chairs. Occasionally, he was asked to sing in the style of a popular singer.
• In 1959 Blanc played the role of Trinkle the dog catcher on the sitcom Dennis the Menace, episode titled " Miss Cathcart's Friend".
• Appeared in the 1964 movie Kiss Me Stupid as The Dentist
• Blanc once called into the game show Press Your Luck during the end credits when host Peter Tomarken mistakenly gave the answer to the question "Which cartoon character uses the phrase 'Sufferin' succotash'?" as Daffy Duck. Blanc informed him that the correct answer was Sylvester. (In reality, both characters have used the phrase, although it is more commonly associated with Sylvester.) Blanc spoke to Tomarken in Sylvester's voice to explain the error, as well in the voices of Speedy Gonzales and Porky Pig. Tomarken apologized for the error and promised that all three contestants would be allowed to return to play the game again.
• Blanc was the voice of Bob and Doug McKenzie's father in the movie Strange Brew.
• In 1970, Blanc narrated an educational film that was commissioned by the City of Dallas called How Motor Cars and Other Living Things Can Find Happiness in the Dallas Freeway System. He also did the sound effects for the animated car.
• In 1971, he appeared as himself in one of the American Express "Do you know me?" credit card TV commercials. The ad campaign centered on famous people whose faces were nonetheless usually not recognized by the public.
• Blanc appeared in a public service announcement for the Shriners Burns Institute on the dangers of burns on children.
• He also provided the voice of Quintro the Puppet in Snow White and the Three Stooges.
• Blanc did virtually all of his famous Looney Tunes characters' voices in NFL Films' The Son of Football Follies
• In addition to hundreds of credited vocal roles, Blanc also provided many brief incidental voices and vocal effects for TV sitcoms, almost never receiving screen credit. Two noted examples were regularly providing the voice of the raven cuckoo clock in The Munsters' and voicing a parrot (who even spoke in the courtroom) in the Perry Mason episode "The Case of the Perjured Parrot."
• In his autobiography, That's Not All, Folks!, Blanc confessed to a minor bit of deception regarding his nickname, "The Man of a Thousand Voices," stating that by his estimate, he had provided only 850 voices.^[7]
• Blanc performed his Speedy Gonzales character in Pat Boone's 1962 hit record of "Speedy Gonzales".
• Blanc also made many records for Capitol Records, including his Warner Brothers characters and such other characters as Woody Woodpecker, with his most famous Capitol album being Party Panic and in 1950 had a hit single (also in the UK) as Sylvester and Tweety-Pie in "I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat". He also performed on records with other artists including Spike Jones and His City Slickers and The Sportsmen.
• During 1977–1978, Blanc was an active CB Radio operator. He often used the CB handles Bugs or Daffy and talked over the air in the Los Angeles area using his many voices. He appeared in an interview with clips of him having fun talking to children on his home CB radio station in the NBC Knowledge Series television episode about CB radio in 1978.
• He was also the voice of the cuckoo & the parrot in the Coco Wheats Commercials
• Blanc's voice over sound effects were used in many animated films such as Paramount's Gulliver's Travels (as an uncredited voice over as King Bombo's shout of joy) to animated shorts from The Pink Panther to most recently in Jetix's "Pucca", in Gremlins 2 The New Batch some of the gremlin laughter and their hiccups were recycled from his recordings, also several monster growls and his bird screeches were also frequently used in several films and animation.
• Blanc supplies Charlie Brown's grunting in the 1979 special You're the Greatest, Charlie Brown as he tries to lift the barbell which is the same grunting Daffy Duck made in the 1965 Warner Bros. cartoon Tease for Two when Daffy tries lifting a rock. The same grunt was also heard in the 1980 film Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and Don't Come Back!) by Linus van Pelt.
• Portland's Mayor Sam Adams, with the help of the Oregon Cartoon Institute, officially declared June 29th to be Mel Blanc Day in Portland, Oregon.

Homages and tributes[link]

• In the Porky Pig short Curtain Razor, Mel Blanc appears as a turtle doing only 999 voices out of a claimed one thousand (he actually does only about 7 distinct voices here, which were edited into a rapid-fire montage of short sound bites, thus giving the impression of more voices). The clip was shown by Turner Network Television out of context as a tribute when Blanc died.
• In the Frasier episode "Ham Radio", a voice actor of many voices is named Mel White, a homage to Mel Blanc. In French, blanc, the way the famous voice actor preferred to spell his surname, means white.
• In the 1944 Warner's cartoon Russian Rhapsody (directed by Bob Clampett), Blanc appears as one of the gremlins (the one sawing around Henry Binder's hair) who are sabotaging Adolf Hitler's plane. The other gremlins are other members of the Warners' staff, including Binder, Leon Schlesinger, and Friz Freleng.
• A well-known lithograph was made in his honor. It shows Looney Tunes characters Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Foghorn Leghorn, Yosemite Sam, Porky Pig, Pepé Le Pew, Sylvester, Tweety Bird, and Speedy Gonzales with their heads bowed in reverence, standing around a lone microphone with a spotlight shining on it.^[13] The simple inscription on the print reads: "Speechless." According to Warner Bros., it is the highest selling piece of animation art ever produced. The picture was also made into an animated picture, with sound and changing scenes, and sold in the now-defunct Warner Brothers chain of retail stores.
• In the The Office episode "Take Your Daughter to Work Day", boss Michael Scott acts out Blanc's "Cucamonga" bit, even including a pause.^[14]
• In the Histeria! episode "General Sherman's Campsite", during the sketch about the Transcontinental Railroad, Loud Kiddington acts as a conductor and does the "Cucamonga" bit.
• On an episode of Night Court, Harry's father, Buddy (John Astin), tells Harry (Harry Anderson) that he had wanted to name him Mel, after Mel Blanc. The joke is that Harry is an avid fan of singer Mel Tormé, and assumes that to be what Buddy meant.

Notes[link]

Bibliography[link]

• That's Not All, Folks!, 1988 by Mel Blanc, Philip Bashe. Warner Books, ISBN 0-446-39089-5 (Softcover), ISBN 0-446-51244-3 (Hardcover)
• Terrace, Vincent. Radio Programs, 1924–1984. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1999. ISBN 0-7864-0351-9

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Mel Blanc

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Mel Blanc

• Mel Blanc at the Internet Movie Database
• Mel Blanc Show Archive in MP3 format
• Toonopedia article about Mel Blanc
• Mel Blanc sings Somebody Stole My Gal (Capitol F2470)
• 40 MP3 downloads of The Mel Blanc Show