I learnt the other day that it was rumoured in the Estonian press in the early 1920s that Mars had exploded and the pieces were headed straight for Estonia.

And, apropos of what you said about Bulgarian folk and machine guns the other day, here's pianist Jean Wiener on early European jazz:

"People understood almost too well that jazz was improvisation - but they didn't understand how to do it. So you got jazz bands whose only purpose was to make as much noise as possible - bells, klaxons, drums, revolvers, etc."