April 18 is National Velociraptor Awareness Day! The first velociraptor fossil was found in 1923. That’s not that long ago! It seems fairly odd to me that people had no awareness of the Tyrannosaurus until the Roaring Twenties.
The Dinosaur was a dance step that people did in the 1980s. One could WALK The Dinosaur and even KILL The Dinosaur.
The song “Walk The Dinosaur” reached No. 7 on the US chart in 1989, two years after hitting No. 10 in the UK. It became the biggest hit single for Was (Not) Was in the USA. It’s certainly not the band’s best track in my opinion, but it’s good fun.
Kurt Schwitters (1887-1948) was a German artist, graphic designer, typographer, set designer and poet. From 1923-1932 he published an arts and poetry magazine called “Merz”. What this blog is concerned about are his works of Sound Poetry.
In 1926, after a trip to Prague, he was inspired to work on his epic sound-poem called Sonate in Urlauten which he performed throughout Europe for years afterward. The sound poem depicts phonemic and syllabic expressions according to the German language. These were not words. They were sound elements from the language. The performer was expected to read every sound off the paper but improvise and interpret things like pitch and tempo.
This is an example of what the sound poem looks like and paper. Keep it mind that the letters represent German sounds not English.
Here are two short samples, as voiced by the man himself.
Now compare that to this bit of Jazz Scat Singing by the great Ella Fitzgerald.
People can do a lot with their mouths. Here is a famous example of The “Human Beat Box” style of rhythmic mouth sounds once used widely in hip-hop. It’s currently a global phenomena and does not show signs of abating. Here is a collection of mostly young people demonstrating their skills on TikTok
Take yet another turn, and here is an example of sampling mouth sounds and then triggering them with a computer or keyboard. Kraftwerk’s “Music Non Stop”.
For good measure, here is a more modern recording of Kurt Schwitter’s work.
What do you think about all of this? Leave you thoughts in the comment section below!
I don’t even know if I would ever play this song on the radio. It really looses something without the video. I am referring to a rather strange cover version of the David Bowie Classic – “The Man Who Sold The World” as performed by Bubbles. Bubbles is actually a character that appears on The Trailer Park Boys, an ongoing TV series that you can find on YouTube and IDK where else. This monster was created in 2016, the year Ziggy Stardust left our tiny planet.
The video is what makes this song worth listening. The vocals are terrible and usually unintelligible. In this way he is pissing all over David Bowie. As an avid Bowie fan, I have a hard time tolerating that but then I remember that David had a good sense of humor about himself.
I am ultimately won over by the crappy low budget production value of this video and all the mugging and posing. Bowie was all about mugging and posing.
So I love this track. Yes it sounds terrible but it goes with the gag video and thus is a fitting tribute.
For some reason, our music teacher decided that we should get into groups of three. Each group would practice a song together and then present to the class as a group. The best part was that we were allowed to pick any song we wanted. In 5th grade I was a bit of a prankster. This was a golden opportunity to get a laugh from my classmates and sweet exasperation from our music teacher.
I easily talked the other two kids in my group into my plan to disrupt the class. We were going to sing “Song of the Pious Itinerant”, also known as “Hallelujah, I’m a Bum”.
The song had been recorded by several performers over the years, but I learned the song from The New Christy Minstrels. Apparently my uncle had originally purchased a copy of their album, Tall Tales! Legends & Nonsense. I found it among other records that had been collected before I was born, but ended up at grandma’s house.
Finally it was our turn to sing our song in front of the class. I even had typed lyric sheets.
First, the intro.
Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
Of course this was taken directly from Handel’s Messiah. In the Catholic Church this is considered sacred music. We got through the intro with only a stern glance from the teacher.
Then the song goes right into a chorus
Hallelujah, I’m a bum Hallelujah, bum again Hallelujah, give me handout And you’ll be my friend
My little singing group got through nearly a minute of the song when the teacher demanded that we stop. She told us to step out to the hall and wait for her. Shortly thereafter I was in the principal’s office.
It turns out that we were committing blasphemy. WHOOPS! The reason they gave was that the music to Handel’s Messiah was too sacred to mock by using it as an intro for such a vulgar song. They sent me home with a note to my parents. My mother saw the note and asked me what happened at school. I told her. She laughed. I hope you did too.
Have you ever gotten in trouble at school for singing a song? What song? Did you sing it for class like I did, or maybe got caught in the hallway in between class? Let me know in the comments!
“I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas” is a novelty song written by John Rox and performed by Gayla Peevey. She was 10 years old at the time in 1953. The Three Stooges went on to record a version in 1959. Many others have recorded it since then as well.
In the song, the singer expresses that she wants to become the proud owner of a hippopotamus. For example, these Lyrics:
Mom says a hippo would eat me up but then Teacher says the hippo is a vegetarian
The problem here is that while it is entirely true that Hippos do not eat meat, they are still very capable of killing human beings.
According to the BBC, “the hippopotamus is the world’s deadliest large land mammal, killing an estimated 500 people per year in Africa. Hippos are aggressive creatures, and they have very sharp teeth. And you would not want to get stuck under one; at up to 2,750kg they can crush a human to death.”
National Geographic has reported on conflicts between Humans and Hippos in Kenya over land and resources. They Hippos are not playing and they are tired of our crap.
So while this is a great song, maybe we should give plush toy hippos to our kids and some reserve habitat to the hippos.
I signed up for Paramount Plus for the Star Trek. I didn’t expect that I would also gain access to all of the original Ren & Stimpy episodes that first appeared on Nickelodeon. As of 2021, 37 episodes are available to watch on P+.
We didn’t have cable at my house when I was a kid in the 80s and 90s. By the second year the show was on, I was attending college. I took being a college student seriously. Basically, I never got to see much of the show when it was originally aired.
I remembered the Happy Happy Joy Joy song. I remembered the parody commercials for “log”. I am super late to the party on this but while binge watching the show, I stumbled onto this little number.
“The Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksmen Anthem” is bat-shit crazy. HOLY SHIT. I wish I could find the entire song on YouTube. Nick is only giving us this little snippet. Now I plan to buy the ‘Best of NickToons” CD it was later released on, if I can locate a copy!
And if you are ready for something even STRANGER, check out the GERMAN VERSION!
“All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” is a novelty Christmas Song written in 1944 by Donald Yetter Gardner. He was a music teacher at the time. As many teachers do, he asked his second grade class what they all wanted for Christmas. He noticed that many of his students answered with a certain lisp because they had lost a tooth or two in the front of their young mouths.
The song was published in written form in 1948 after music executive discovered Gardner singing the song at a music teacher’s conference. The rest is history, as they say.
A quick search on Discogs reveals that this song have been recorded by dozens of artists. These include Little Tommy Tucker, Alvin & The Chipmunks, The Andrew Sisters, Spike Jones, Arthur Godfrey, The Three Stooges, The Platters, The Sesame Street cast, and even Danny Kaye. My favorite version is by Nat “King” Cole.
Pretty nifty right?
What is even more fun is the cover-art found on the various singles, compilation and albums that feature the song. Take a look at what I found, starting with the cassette tape that I had as a child.
courtesy of discogs
Below we have the jacket used on the Spike Jones version released on RCA Victor as a 45rpm 7inch record.
courtesy of discogs
The LP below has been re-released a number of times on different record labels.
FunHouse Radio 