“The Elements” was indeed on Tom Lehrer’s album An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer. He used the music from “The Major-General’s Song,” from The Pirates of Penzance, by Gilbert & Sullivan; the liner notes even acknowledge that Sir Arthur Sullivan wrote the music.
The liner notes also point out that the words of the last line were true as of the date of the recording, but are so no longer. (It goes, “These are the only ones of which the news has come to Hah-vahd;/There may be many others but they haven’t been discah-vahd.”) According to the song, nobelium was the last one discovered; lawrencium hadn’t yet been discovered.)
“If you drive an automobile, please drive carefully–because I walk in my sleep.”–Victor Borge
Star Trekin’ across the universe
Boldly going forward 'cause we can’t find reverse…
I am truly blessed. Dr. D, himself, did a live show at the place just down the street from me. He played the songs. He showed film shorts. He told stories. And, because my boyfriend’s radio station was one of the sponsors of the show, I got to meet him live and in-person after the show. He is so nice and a really sweet guy.
Unless Dr Demento has gone off the air very recently he’s still doing his weekly show. A local station plays it in my area Sunday nights and I’ve caught it as recently as a couple of months ago. And it must be new shows because he’s playing songs from Weird Al’s recent CD.
I second Little Nemo. The good Dr. is still on the air around here, or was as of a couple months ago. Unfortunately, it’s played at a time that I’m usually busy.
I got to see the Dr. live as the opening act of a Weird Al concert. I think it was '84 or '85. He played some short films on a large screen behind him. I remember The Wizard of Speed and Time and *Godzilla vs. Bambi{/i] were two of them. Great stuff.
Oh, this is sick. Let’s see if I can remember all the tracks from An Evening Wasted With Tom Lehrer
Elements
Poisoning Pigeons in the Park
Smut
The one about “Good bye mom, I’m off to drop the bomb, so don’t wait up for me”
The one about “Don’t drink the water, and don’t breath the air”
Ahh, I can’t do it. It’s been too long.
–Tim
We are the children of the Eighties. We are not the first “lost generation” nor today’s lost generation; in fact, we think we know just where we stand - or are discovering it as we speak.
Cabbage, I don’t know if they have that particular song, but Rhino Records sells a series called Golden Throats which features various celebrities singing their untalented hearts out.
Golden Throats has Nimoy singing Proud Mary, which is as bad as Shatner singing Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.
An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer contains the same songs as More Songs by Tom Lehrer, just performed live. There’s a CD out by Rhino of Lehrer’s first two albums (along with a few bonus cuts, including “I got it from Alice.”). Well worth getting.
And, of course, no serious fan of novelty music can afford to miss the Bonzo Dog Band, probably the greatest novelty band of all time (and I include Spike Jones, the closest thing to them). Click on this link for their classic album “The Donut in Granny’s Greenhouse” (aka “Urban Spaceman”). http://www.rnsd.com/donut.ram
“East is east and west is west and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does.” – Marx
Also for the Tom Lehrer fans: “That Was The Year That Was”. I haul it out every year for a spin. (Vinyl, remember vinyl?)
Let’s see if I can recall the cuts:
National Brotherhood Week
MLF Lullaby
Send The Marines
So Long Mom, I’m Off To Drop The Bomb.
The Folk Song Army
New Math
Alma
Werner Von Braun
The Vatican Rag…
I’m sure I’m missing some…
With God as my witness, I thought turkey’s could fly.
The other titles from That Was the Year That Was are:
George Murphy
Smut
Pollution
Whatever Became of Hubert [Humphrey; written about 1965]
Who’s Next?
The titles from *An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer are:
Poisoning Pigeons in the Park
Bright College Days
A Christmas Carol
The Elements
Oedipus Rex
In Old Mexico
Clementine
It Makes a Fellow Proud to Be a Soldier
She’s My Girl
The Masochism Tango
We Will All Go Together When We Go
To Homer: The Tom Lehrer songs you are referring to are “So Long, Mom” (a song for World War III); and “Pollution,” both from Lehrer’s 1965 album That Was The Year That Was.
Surely some of the Teeming Millions must remember Lehrer’s first album–which he originally published under his own label.
smeggy began this post remembering: *One year, many moons ago, there was a song contest on Dr. Demento, and the song that won was a lovely Christmas song. It went something like this:
" I found the brains of Santa Claus*
[snip]
This song is one of the featured tunes on this week’s show. From rec.music.dementia:
The Dr. Demento Show #99-50 - December 12, 1999
Special Topic: Christmas part 2/3
Here Comes Fatty Clause - Rudolph & The Gang
I Am Santa Claus - The Hot Buttered Elves/Bob Rivers & Twisted Radio
I Was Santa Claus At The School House (For The P.T.A.) (edit) - Yogi Yorgesson w/ Johnny Duffy & The Scandahoovians I Found The Brains Of Santa Claus - Jason & The Strap-Tones
You Ain’t Gettin’ Diddly Squat - Heywood Banks f/ The Heylettes
Smeggy and torq, you are both correct about the Chipmunks/Bird on My Head creator.
David Seville is an alias of Ross Bagdasarian’s, under which he did a lot of writing, producing, and singing, as well as “managing” the Chipmunks.
Anyone recall this ditty by Tim Cavanaugh?
I wanna kiss her butt…
she won’t let me.
I wanna whisper sweet nothings
in herrear.
I wanna hold her behind
Closed doors and more…
(It doesn’t translate well into the written word, I’m afraid, but those of you who know it will know what I mean)
CT
Ah, fond memories. Yes indeedy, Chrome, I do remember said ditty. It was wonderful, tooling along the highway singing along with that song.
My favorite Dr. D. song was “My baby has rabies” (I think by The Piggies, though I’ll have to check that out.) Lush vocals, warbling sentiments of true love:
“My baby has rabies,
She’s a contraceptive wonder,
her foam’s up top as well as down under…”
Given my hometown, I take chauvinistic pride in “The cockroach that ate Cincinnati”.
I sure do, I even own a copy. And I also have the reissue CD by Rhino, bless 'em.
"Oh I ache for the touch of your lips, dear,
But much more for the touch of your whips, dear.
You can raise welts
Like nobody elts
As we dance to the Masochism Tango!’