Festival season once again reared its drunken head in Covington this past weekend. I figured I’d share a little sweet treat to celebrate the upcoming months of Hudy Delight, Goetta Balls and common-law love in the Commonwealth. Here’s a collection of traditional Dutch carnival music to creep your balls off. The album features the following jolly time instruments:
The Carillon
Introducing Willem, the star attraction for ladies' night at the Amsterdam public library.
The Music Box
Kiss your 808 goodbye!
The Barrel Organ
There are also a lot of other instruments on here that don’t seem to exist anymore in a functional capacity, at least on the first 3 pages of any YouTube or Google Image search. These include but are not limited to the canary organ, the tongue organ, and the belly organ. The weenis organ is featured on the rare 7″ epidermis-colored bonus disc for this album that, unfortunately, isn’t in my collection.
It’s my hope that someone will take this album and sample a bit of it in the worst way possible. That, of course, would be in the same vein as the following song by Mark Mothersbaugh:
Ok, so this is the most important piece music of the 20th century. Yes, you read that correctly. In 1982 L. Ron Hubbard introduced Space Jazz, the first ever soundtrack to a book (not just any book…Battlefield Earth!!!) and forever altered the creative path of human history. Many historians credit this album with slaying the incredible high-hat breathing Disco Dragon. Others blame it for laying the Yoshi egg that hatched Lady Gaga. However, there’s much more to this story than hilarious musings…
Exhibit A!
(from the album gatefold)
SPACE JAZZ is a completely new musical sound destined to be hailed as the music of the future. The many and varied forms of music are an integral part of the cultural heritage of Earth.
Now, the sound of the future has been established by L. RON HUBBARD, author of the blockbuster science fiction novel Battlefield Earth.
The concept of a soundtrack is something one normally associates with motion pictures. Now for the first time ever–a soundtrack for a book–Battlefield Earth–”Space Jazz.” Think of the “Star Wars” Sagas, and “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” mix in the triumph of “Rocky I,” “Rocky II” and Rocky III” and you have captured the exuberance, style and glory of “Battlefield Earth”–The Evening Sun, Baltimore MD.
Consider the magnitude of the challenge Hubbard set himself. Conventional musical instruments and even huge symphony orchestras have their limitations. He turned to the technology of the future–computers.
Recent breakthroughs in computer musical instruments offered the needed versatility to match his new musical concepts.
Today, a computer is able to reproduce any natural sound. It can record a single note of a musical instrument and from that reproduce the rest of the instrument.
But better yet, it can take any sound and turn this into a rhythm. A coyote can sing the blues. A horse can tap dance. Liquid can splash out a Strauss waltz. Laser beams can hum a lullaby. You name it and you can get it
Yes, L. Ron Hubbard took the most technologically advanced musical instrument of the time, the Fairlight Computer Musical Instrument, and used it to recreate the sonic feast of a horse tapdancing! Thank your stars L. Ron Hubbard was one of the first people to get his hands on the $25,000 Fairlight CMI and thus create this epic masterpiece. What follows is just a small sampling of L. Ron Hubbards musical pioneering.
Exhibit B!
Be sure to carefully absorb the rich tonal haunches in this track. The playful neighs of the heroic horse Windsplitter, created through the Fairlight CMI’s digital processor, stir feelings of hope within the listener that, yes, man, beast and machine can coexist peacefully in a world free of Psychlos.
Exhibit C!
L. Ron Hubbard used his Hubbard Electrometer to test if tomatoes felt emotional pain. Seriously, check out this UK Telegraph article.
Ok, so I took a long time to trying to figure out exactly what this album was all about. I looked for hidden answers about Scientology in the ridiculous anti-stereo narration. I then looked for some sort of psychic pattern in the horribly repetitive and shrill synthesized filler “music”. Finally, I sought solace in the suspiciously mundane track titles:
1. Golden Era of Sci Fi
2. Funeral For A Planet
3. March of The Psychlos
4. Teri, The Security Director
5. Jonnie
6. Windsplitter
7. The Mining Song
8. The Drone
9. Mankind Unites
10. Alien Visitors Attack
11. The Banker
12. Declaration of Peace
13. Earth, My Beautiful Home
But I didn’t experience even a single mysterious revelation from on high.
So I listened again. And again. And again. And upon my umpteenth listen, just as Space Jazz began evoke memories of my endless hours spent playing Oregon Trail 2, the answer blasted itself all over my face: L. Ron Hubbard was the greatest practical joker of all time.
His absurdly bogus biography, his hackneyed bibliography, his intensely whacko yet ridiculously profitable Scientology cult had all been part of the greatest monkeyshine ever unleashed on mankind. The man was a hybrid of Andy Kaufman’s unflinching, rabble-rousing comedy with Joseph Smith’s pied-piper espièglerie–now that’s saying something.
The aural assault Space Jazz makes complete sense when you view L. Ron’s life in that light. You could even say this composition was the punchline to a lifetime of pocket-emptying tomfoolery.
So, Xenu bless you, L. Ron Hubbard…you hilarious fucking bastard.
The back cover of this album perfectly conveys what Snoopy is all about:
I think if one has followed the Peanuts’ comic strip and particularly those segments that deal with Snoopy, one quickly becomes aware that one is reading installments of a fascinating allegory. Snoopy is a very individual dog and has a special meaning to all of us. Like all allegories, the significance of Snoopy really depends upon our own experience. For example–to a child, Snoopy represents everything that a child wants to bein in his or her fantasy world…Snoopy is a pilot, Snoopy is a secret agent. He can sit on a limb of a tree and hunch himself over and look like a vulture. He can stalk his prey like a saber-toothed tiger. He flies his doghouse and calls it his Sopwith Camel. He plays baseball and, of course, battles the Red Baron.
It is the battle with the Red Baron that I think expresses the primary adult philosophy. This battle is the battle between good and evil. Snoopy, of course, representing good and the Red Baron evil. However, the evil that the Baron represents is not the evil that really exists in the world today. The evil is a gentle evil and in the battle nobody is supposed to get hurt. In this conflict, namely of the simple truths that so often get lost in our hectic civilization come readily to the fore. In its simplicity, this conflict becomes almost a romantic adventure.
Our recording of Snoopy’s Christmas was made with this philosophy in mind. There is an underlying seriousness. Snoopy’s Christmas basically exposes the futility of never-ending conflict. This fact is particularly accentuated at Christmas time.
Side I of this LP presents a drama as fanciful as any child’s dream world involving all three of the Snoopy records. It uses the medium of radio when radio didn’t really exist to tell the story. We did this because there is a universality of timelessness represented by Snoopy’s battle against the Red Baron. The battle against evil is yesterday, today, tomorrow and forever.
This is one of the of the weirdest, corniest, and most annoying records you’ll ever hear. I guarantee you’ll love every minute of it. Here’s a breakdown of the tracks, now with spell check!
1) Lonnie Donegan – Does Your Chewing Gum Lost Its Flavour (On The Bedpost Overnight)
I can only imagine that this was one of the few tracks that was benign enough to appeal to both kids and senior citizens during the dawn of the tumultuous 60s. The weirdest part of this track is the wild applause from the crowd at the song’s close. Seriously, this song gets your rocks off that hard?
A sugary track from back when hittin the beach in a two-piece was grounds for a lynching in many parts of the Gulf Coast. I like to play this song while I’m watching footage of the nuclear tests performed in Bikini Atoll. Beautiful.
She was afraid to come out of the locker.
3) The Ran-Dells – Martian Hop
Insanely catchy with outer space party lyrics? Count me in. Too bad the glory only lasts 2 minutes and 16 seconds. That makes moonman cry.
4) The Hollywood Argyles – Alley-Oop
Apparently there was some comic strip back in the day called Alley-Oop that was famous and this song capitalized on it. He rode around on a dinosaur and was basically the poor man’s Fred Flinstone minus the ever-sexy Wilma.
Stamp worthy.
5) Ray Stevens – Gitarzan
On paper this song should be totally unlistenable: a jungle themed song sung by a Disney version of Lou Reed. But the full band accompaniment complete with horn section just blasts its way into the Coca Cola Chill Zone. I’m sorry I ever doubted you.
Boing!
6) The Trashmen – Surfin’ Bird
This is the only song I want played at my funeral.
7) Allan Sherman – Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh!
This summer camp-themed song just makes me itch. My stepdad told me that his siblings and he would listen to Sherman’s record over and over back in the 60s. For some reason, unknown to the modern psychologists, it really cracked their shit up. I guess the lyrics reminded them of their own summer camp experiences. When recounting such totally lame memories they had no choice but to laugh or to cry.
So mega lame.
8. Bobby (Boris) Pickett – Monster Mash
The undisputed king of Halloween songs has two unbelievable fun facts attached to it: It hit number one on the charts in 1962 and was banned by the BBC the same year for being too offensive. Huh?
Maybe DRAGULA was the culprit.
9) Larry Verne – Mr. Custer
This track pays tribute to General Custer’s ill-fated final battle at Little Big Horn. For some reason I just imagine the band members recording this in between swigs from XXX moonshine jugs and spilling all over cornflake-encrusted mustaches.
Even this dog couldn't save him.
10) Napoleon XIV – They’re Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!
Try listening to this song on repeat for an hour. Now imagine doing that for a week straight. I did it. Don’t ask why, but I did. And I’m much worse for it.
11) Dr. West’s Medicine Show & Junk Band – The Eggplant That Ate Chicago
In the past sleepy ragtime saloon music and Madlibs just seemed like a good idea. It’s taken 50 years but science has finally proven that assumption wrong.
His favorite song.
12) Rusty Warren – Bounce Your Boobies
Yes, a song sung by a woman about wobbling your titties to and fro in an itchy polyester sweater until the friction causes a flash fire which destroys all life within a 3 mile radius. Man the 60s were a great time to be alive.
13) Tiny Tim - Tip-Toe Thru’ The Tulips With Me
Radio stations were trying really hard in the 60s to captivate audiences and a creepy ass dude playing a ukulele was just the trick. I wish I had his teeth in a jar.
mmmmm
14) Tom Lehrer – So Long, Mom (A Song For World War III)
My only gripe about this song is that it wasn’t feature in Dr. Strangelove. It’s the only thing I can think of when I hear this.
