Yes, it’s that time again—we’re going to take some days off and go traveling. As always, part of the agenda will be finding more material to post, but there will also be some earthly pleasures mixed in. At least we hope so. Not sure when we’ll be back, but wherever we are we’ll start posting again regardless on Monday. If we don’t, call the authorities. Oh, and pop by and water the ficus. Thanks. 

We found two more Mafé one-sheets, and we’re now going to just go ahead and declare him the greatest illustrator of x-rated posters ever. He did non x-rated work too, but he flourished in porn, bringing a real elegance to the material, as you can see for yourself. He’s still a bit of a mystery to us, but we’re digging for more info. These two posters are circa mid-seventies, and you can see the other two Mafé pieces we posted here. 

Well, we said we’d explore Japanese bondage arts a bit more, so here’s a nice beginning—a collection of colorful SM magazines from the 1970s. We’ll show you what’s inside one of these later. 

March 1960 Action for Men with cover art by Julian Paul. This trio will soon have some serious issues to sort out, because once immediate danger passes the male mind focuses entirely on getting laid. Usually two virile guys and one beautiful, sarong-clad girl means there’s one too many swinging dicks in the picture, but it could also be the girl who’s the obstacle to hot tropical love. You better recognize. Regardless, somebody’s getting cast adrift. 

Covers and interior images of Bruce Lee from assorted Hong Kong martial arts and cinema magazines, circa early 1970s. Click keyword "Bruce Lee" below to see more magazine covers.

We were out barhopping not long ago when we spotted this promo poster on the wall of one of the many joints we visited. You’ll notice most of the text is in English. That’s because Ondarra sort of markets itself to the expat Brit crowd here. Anyway, after a couple of attempts to adequately photograph the poster, we just ripped it down and departed, because hey, just like that old rap group Naughty By Nature, in a pinch we’re down with o.p.p. This particular o.p.p. features the work of mid-century pin-up artist Peter Driben, who painted covers for the Robert Harrison-operated pulp mags Wink, Flirt, Beauty Parade, and others. Driben is one of the most important and prolific pulp illustrators who ever lived, so we’ll be posting—or, ahem, borrowing—some more of his work in the future. 

Above are selections from a March 1952 Adam magazine, with interesting cover art of a blonde being narrowly missed by several rounds of machine-gun fire. By the 1970s Australia’s Adam was publishing pages of fully nude women, as you can see for yourself here and here, but in this early issue there’s exactly one photograph—American actress Sally Forrest, who you see in panel two. Forrest is pretty much unknown now, but she appeared in notable films such Fritz Lang’s noir While the City Sleeps, Joseph Pevney’s horror flick The Strange Door, and Hard, Fast and Beautiful, which was directed by Ida Lupino, who as a woman director during the forties and fifties kicked open some of the doors that led to Kathryn Bigelow’s Oscar win last night. More Adam magazines soon. 

Above we have a National Police Gazette with a boxing cover, from sixty years ago this month, with the editors’ warning to the retired Joe Louis to stay out of the ring. But what the Gazette didn’t know was that the 36 year-old Louis was under investigation by the IRS, and he suspected the outcome wouldn’t be good. In May 1950 Louis was jolted when the authorities declared that he owed half a million dollars in back taxes. With only one way to earn the cash, he cut a deal to box for prize money to put toward his debt. He fought and lost to Ezzard Charles in September, and the next year was knocked clean out of the ring by Rocky Marciano. But for all his efforts he was still in debt. The purses had been low because no one wanted to pay to see Louis—who was the first African-American considered a national hero by both blacks and whites—beaten to a pulp. After the Marciano debacle, the fight offers dried up. Louis retired again, and this one stuck. We’re going to get back to Joe Louis at a later date, because his is one of the more interesting and inspiring stories you’ll run across. His financial troubles were not so much a failure of character as a failure to comprehend the corrupting force of money, and the need to hire not just a lawyer, a manager, and an accountant, but a lawyer to watch your lawyer, a manager to watch your manager, and especially an accountant to watch your accountant. We have some Gazette interior pages below, and you can see the other Gazette boxing covers here and here. 

Vintage poster for Jitsuroku onna kanbetsusho: sei-jigoku, aka True Story of a Woman Condemned: Sex Hell, directed by Koyu Ohara and starring Hitomi Kozue. It premiered in Japan today in 1975. 

We love Bond stuff here, as you’ve probably figured out already. So we were pretty excited to find this Japanese advert for Imai’s scale model Aston Martin DB-5, a car which appeared in the James Bond films Goldfinger, Thunderball, Goldeneye, Tomorrow Never Dies, and Casino Royale. The painting is a lot more impressive than the actual model, but we could be convinced to buy it anyway, as long it’s equipped with a tiny ejector seat.