NAKED, REALLY NAKED

Alen Robin, a comic with a droll, very nasal voice, took the Buchanan & Goodman "Flying Saucer" concept - intercutting found recordings with original comedy - and applied it to political speeches. His "Welcome To The LBJ Ranch" hit the top of the pops in the mid '60s, and can be found in approximately 84% of American thrift-stores.
This album continues the concept into the '70s, with American politicos Nixon, Humphrey, Rockefeller, McGovern, Agnew, Kennedy and Lindsay finding their voices ripped out of their original context, now making various bizarre and neurotic statements to Robin, playing their psychiatrist. It's still quite funny and clever, even if you don't know much about the speakers. Even more impressive: it's recorded live. Not sure how he did it in the days before laptop samplers. Maybe he had all the voices, and pauses allowing for him to speak, pre-recorded on a long tape (this album's a little over a half-hour long). If so, his timing's amazing.

Alen Robin "Naked, Really Naked"
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M4M on Radio Misterioso 10/25/09

My most recent guest dj appearance on Greg "Spacebrother" Bishop's weekly examination of the bizarre is now up. Much thanks to Radio Misterioso for not only having me up, but engineering my often dodgy-quality recordings. "Notable tracks played included a reggae song about Apollo 11, four or five old UFO drop-in songs (think “The Flying Saucer” by Buchanan and Goodman), sounds from the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, elephants playing xyolphones and theremins, a mashup of the Muppets and the Stray Cats, Sad Kermit, and music from L. Ron Hubbard." And we throw on some old 45s we found lying around the studio. Listen to two hours of crypto-musicology

HERE!

"Plan 9" intro/talk
Caterina Valente "Out of This World
Steven Garrick & His Party Twisters "Astro Twist"
The Hellers "The Mechanic"
Buchanan and Goodman "Flying Saucer the Third"
The Rezillos "Flying Saucer Attack"
Go Home Productions "GHP Goes Bananas"
White Noise "Here Come The Fleas"
Ray Allen & The Embers "Ham The Space Chimp"
Man in Orbit "The Space Men"
Owen Gray "Apollo 12"
[talk break]
The Thai Elephant Orchestra
Spike Jones "Spooky Spooky (Lend Me your Tomb)"
[talk break, in which we discuss Messer Chups without actually playing them. So go here or here and listen to 'em already!]
Colonel Elliot and the Lunatics "Plutonian Pogo Stick"
Martinn "The Muppet Strut"
dj BC "I'm Happy (On Sesame Street)"
[talk break]
Sad Kermit "Hurt"
James Houston "Big Ideas (Don't Get Any)"
Sid Lawrence & Friends "The Answer to The Flying Saucer"
The Ames Brothers "Music From Outer Space"
Yodeling Bob Lewis "Ghost Riders in the Sky"
Clouseaux "The Toy Store of Tomorrow"
??? "Mambo Rock"
Kazoo Funk Orchestra "The Jagables"
The Flesh Eaters "See You In The Boneyard"
Elvis Presley "Rock a Hula Baby"
Alan Freed, Steve Allen & Al 'Jazzbo' Collins "The Space Man"
[talk break]
children's French lesson 45, mixed The Thai Elephant Orchestra
Sad Kermit "The Rainbow Disconnection"
The Bran Flakes "Don Knotts"
Wendy Chambers (on the Car-Horn Organ) "Star-Spangled Banner"
The Bran Flakes "Don Knotts"
The Missiles "The Space Ship"
children's French lesson 45, mixed The Thai Elephant Orchestra
The Bran Flakes "Don Knotts"
Jim 'Supersaw' Leonard "Your Song by Jim Leonard"
Tony Perkins "Rocket It To The Moon"
Mickey Katz "Nudnick The Flying Schissel"
Brian Currant "Banjo/Continuum"
sTallio! "The Future Sound of Retro"
L. Ron Hubbard "March of the Psychlos"
[talk break]
Jim of Seattle "Welcome To Windows".

Songs for the Jogging Crowd

Vic Mizzy just died at age 93, so let's listen to his now out-of-print album of (mostly) new songs he just recorded a few years ago. Apart from versions of two of his most famous TV theme songs, "The Addams Family" and "Green Acres," he sings original, mostly light-hearted songs about his everyday life - ladies playing tennis, his Hollywood social circle, barbecuing, some sentimental songs, and yes, jogging. From his liner notes to his ode to running, "The Huff and Puff Song" (one of the album's catchiest tunes): "...with my pacemaker recently installed and further refined to change the arrhythmias, everything I was composing lately began sounding like a tango. And so I wrote this song."

We don't hear much music about elderly life cuz that's considered uncool, and musicians are supposed to remain young forever - hence, the Rolling Stones-like look of dyed hair and personal-trainer-thin bodies.

So if Mizzy wasn't a Hollywood legend, it's doubtful that anyone would put have out this charming album, especially with his singing voice, which is more like an old vaudeville comedian croaking out a routine then a "real" singing voice. But I'm glad it was released. The simple bouncy songs make Mizzy sound less like a music pro then a genial grandparent on his electric keyboard singing to you in his living room, e.g.: his version of the "Green Acres" theme isn't a remake - it's just him singing over the original version!

Vic Mizzy: Songs for the Jogging Crowd
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1. Name Dropping
2. The Huff And Puff Song
3. It's Your Ad, Sylvia
4. Stay Awhile
5. I Belong To Somebody Else
6. Dance, Granny, Dance [bluegrass/disco fusion!]
7. When Your Dreams Are Younger Than You
8. Don't Forget, Baby Baby
9. My Kaleidoscope
10. Merry Xmas, Hollywood
11. Green Acres
12. The Addams Family
13. Spider Man 2 theme

MASHED 'N' SLASHED

Just barely in time for Halloween is a brief (9 tracks) but excellent mashup collection courtesy of the good folk at Mashup Industries. DJ NoNo gives The Count from "Sesame Street" a dancehall riddim, Orange County's Voicedude mixes a tango (!) with Blue Oyster Cult, Edgar Allen Poe, and Disneyland's Haunted Mansion; Clivester (the album compiler) actually makes me like Korn and Alanis Morissette by skillfully mixing them with Rocky Horror's "Sweet Transvestite," LeeDM101's "Six Sick 6" is a satanic dancefloor stormer; even the more throw-away tracks are fun, using the likes of M4M faves Spike Jones, and Twink The Toy Piano Band. Listen/download here:

Mashed 'n Slashed

British producer Cheekyboy usually compiles a "Monster Mashup" various-artists collection, but not this year. That's okay cuz he has a batch of new Halloween tunes, and has made all the old collections available again (tho some of the artists will probably cringe at the thought of those tracks from back in '04 being raised from the dead!). This new Cheekyboy tune is ace, featuring the "Halloween theme, Vincent Price, Steve Miller and more...."

Cheekyboy "Halloween Royale With Cheese"

Loyal reader Ringo Stalin from way down Adelaide, Australia way made three tunes inspired by the first three George Romero "Dead" movies, then invited a host of talented folk to remix them every which way, including adding original vocals and intrumentation to the sample fest (Vincent Price, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Danny Elfman, Einsturzende Neubauten, Front 242, New Order, Faith No More, Buzzcocks, The Easybeats, Public Enemy, Pop Will Eat Itself, Aaliyah & Timbaland, and from TV: "Gimme A Break," "Twin Peaks," "Unsolved Mysteries.") There's plenty of fun stuff to be found in the resulting 2 cd set, "The Dead Trilogy," which ranges from scary:

Force of Fear (Dead Mix), to surreal:

Sunrise (Handy Pocket Calculator), to downright silly, sampling the Muppets theme:

Wake Up (Romero Original)
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DREAD, DREAD, DREAD! DEAD, DEAD, DEAD...

Presenting a 16-song collection for a Caribean Hallowean. A (mostly) '50s-'70s Afro-Latin-Reggae-lypso Halloween, to be precise, including, as usual, some out-of-print obscurities recorded off vinyl. Apart from the monster songs (I guarantee King Horror WILL be your new favorite artist) there's some weird psychedelic tracks that have a dark, evil voodoo vibe to them.

Zombie Jamboree

Carl McKnight "The Devil's Out Tonight"
King Horror "Dracula prince of darkness"
The Sandpebbles "Zombie Jamborie"
Desmond Dekker "Dracula"
Africa "Paint it Black"
Xavier Cugat "Zombie"
King Horror "Frankenstein"
Vulcans "Dracula"
Lord Melody "The Creature From The Black Lagoon"
King Horror "Loch Ness Monster"
The Mighty Sparrow "Madame Dracula"
Vulcans "Dark Shadows"
Daktaris "Voodoo Soul Stew"
King Horror "Cutting Blade"
Johnny Zamot and His Orchestra "Spaced Out"
The Upsetters "The Vampire"

2012 EDITION BONUS TRACKS:
Augie Colón - "Witch Doctor"
Peter Tosh - "Vampire"
Peter Tosh - "Dracula (Vampire version)" 
The Voodoo Trombone Quartet - "Monster Island"
Lucky Dube - "Dracula"
King Flash & Calypso Carnival - "Zombie Jamborie"

UPDATE 10/13: A real cool ghoul, Paul Dobry, has put this collection up streaming on grooveshark. Fangs a lot, Paul!
http://grooveshark.com/#!/playlist/Music+For+Maniacs/91712064


"The Devil's Out Tonight" is one of my favorite songs. The rest of the album is an unremarkable steel-drum outing, but that title song is brutal. I mean, check out this album art:

From the liner notes: "Thumbs down (as in the days of the gladiators) to those we have dealt with in the past, may we write your epigraphs [sic], while you dig your own graves, for such dwellings are appropriate to your cause." And to think that tourists and Ja-fakin' hippies have this idea that Carribean music is so peaceful and mellow...
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Music BY Maniacs

Since this blog comes up near the top when people search for "David Koresh music," I've been getting comments like: "Does anyone have that "There's a madman living in Waco" song that keeps playing on MSNBC? I swear that's one of the catchiest little hooks I've heard in a long while. I can't get it out of my head! I'm searching all over the web for it."

Anyone?

UPDATE 10/23/09 - Got it! Thanks to Nile for the info. My readers rock.

David Koresh "Mad Man in Waco"

I re-upped the Koresh songs on the original post. Apparently there have been a lot of songs about Koresh: dozens, heck, maybe hundreds, according to an amazing site called Waco Songs. It's an old site with not many working links, but it certainly makes for an interesting shopping list.


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YOGA FOR ZOMBIES

Yoga's a pretty wimpy name for a band, but fear not - this ain't no New Age, it's all dark, evil scuzzy guitars and spookhouse organ instrumentals, loudly recorded in grainy black-and-white lo-fi sound. The promotional materials for this album describe it as Throbbing Gristle meets death metal. Heh heh, I don't know about that, but it does remind me of Killing Joke, Chrome, The Chameleons, Kommunity FK, and other '80s goth/metal/punk bands whose names started with "kh" sounds. Tho these guys are more about ambient atmosphere then in-your-face rock.

The new album "Megafauna" is start-to-finish solid, perfect for non-cliched Halloween listening/dancing/brain-eating.

Yoga "Fourth Eye"
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