...We had Spike Jones on the box...
...She said, "I can't take the way he singsBut I love to hear him talk"Now that just gave my heart a throb To the bottom of my feetAnd I swore as I took another pullMy Bessie can't be beat
For all the Bessies out there!
Spike was so cool!
ReplyDeleteWell, thee and me think so!
ReplyDeleteMy father's family loved humor in music. I grew up listening to Spike Jones, Tom Lehrer, PDQ Bach, Victor Borge, and the Smothers Brothers. Cheers to Spike and his City Slickers!
DeleteWhat about Phil Harris - Darktown Poker Club
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aufCfiS0AA
Darktown Poker Club is a classic. My uncle used to recite it verbatim.
DeleteI like this one as a little kid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1tKZ3flZZY&ab_channel=ScrambledEggs1969
Another Phil Harris classic from my childhood. I still remember the lyrics from both these songs. Thanks Babs.
DeleteThen it played "Smoke, Smoke That Cigarette" Phil on the Johnny Cash show. Amother classic.
DeleteUm . . . I like Spike Jones, too!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI6FkzQahNs
what zappa shouldda.
ReplyDeleteFZ occasionally reached these heights, but he didn't want to be seen as simply "comedy music" (hence the Flo n Eddie raps).
DeleteHere's Zappa on humour in music and his only reference to Spike that I've found so far. From "The Real Frank Zappa Book".
Deletehttps://i.postimg.cc/C5N4HtPL/Capture.jpg
In spite of what FZ says, I think there's a lot of influence from Soike.
DeleteI've always thought that Frank used his brand of juvenile, scatological, and borderline misogynistic humor to finance his “serious compositions” that his typical fan didn’t like or understand.
DeleteI'm not sure there wasn't a part of Frank that enjoyed the opportunity to be nasty to some people.
Delete@SteveShark: In my 20s and 30s (say around the mid-1980s) I was much, much more of a music snob than I am now, and what I had against Zappa was that he seemed to be mocking his own audience. He struck me as not just biting the hand that fed him but, worse than that, acting in bad faith. Of course, I would definitely have been mocking Zappa's audience at that time, so I'm no longer clear as to how I could have occupied the moral high ground. Over the years, I've become increasingly receptive to Zappa's work (and I love that he grew up listening to what I listen to now), but I still think there's, just as often as not, something a little backhanded to it.
DeleteIt makes you wonder how many "phony hippies" bought "We're Only in it for the Money", heard themselves being satirised and really didn't mind.
DeleteMy father had Spike's album "Dinner Music for People Who Aren't Really Hungry" that had "Cocktails For Two" on it.
ReplyDeleteThere's a lot of talent going on here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0dw2UKRYSA&ab_channel=DonMcGlynnFilms
Even my 13-year-old twins know "....And the winner is....BEEEE-TLE-BOOOOOOOMB!!!!"
ReplyDeleteC in California
Since the lead-in to the usual conversational random-walk was the Band's "Up On Cripple Creek," I will vear off and point you in the direction of a cover version by Buck Owens. A lot gets written about country-rock from the perspective of rock...that is, rock gets credit for incorporating country elements. Less noted are the occasional country records that use something from the rock side of things...in this case, fuzztone and wah-wah.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3rF82V7eus
ReplyDelete