Musical albums that made you laugh out loud.

Cafe Society
1

Sure Weird Al and Victor Borges make me laugh, but they write musical comedy. I’m talking about bands with a sense of humor.

Does anyone remember Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band? They were the first musical act that I actually laughed out loud to. Bare Naked Ladies always make me chortle. Blink 182 and even Smashmouth have their moments. But the one album that had me wiping tears of laughter from my eyes was The Offspring’s Americana.

So, who can I add to my CD collection that’ll give me music I can dance to while making me laugh?

2

Some of GWAR’s lyrics are pretty funny, there is an old band called Mucky Pup (who I seem to always mention here) that were hystical. If they were around today, they would be huge. I was also listening to Green Jello’s (or Green Jelly) 1st album, which is filled with some humorous songs.

3

Check this which I first hear coming out of the tannoys of a Greek taverna some years ago.

4

Back in the late seventies, Steve Martin came out with a comedy album. I don’t remember the title of it, but it had the song “King Tut” . It was pretty damn funny.

5

Oh, you meant BANDS with comedy albums! Never mind!

6

When I’m in the right mood, They Might Be Giants can make me nearly pee my pants.

They have this one song that is just, well, like a compendium of songs. A few measures of each one, not unlike when you hear a advertisement for a K-Tel collection. Except every one of the supposed songs is bizarre. When they come up with this line “How did that blue thing get in here?” I crack up every time.

7

The Bonzo Dooh-Dah Dog Band are pretty funny.

Going for the obscure, Flanders and Swann write some screamingly funny songs, but if you aren’t a fan of rather dated wordy british humour they will sound like hell. Everyone knows (don’t they?) the hippopotamus song “mud mud, glorious mud” but most of their stuff is quite subtle.

Rich Hall as Otis Lee Crenshaw has released at least one album that is so funny it hurts. His prison rape ballad “he almost looks like you” is wonderful.

Fun Lovin Criminals are very funny, but most Americans I know don’t like them, or have never heard of them.

the Pharcyde are hilarious rappers, check 1992’s classic Bizzarride II the Pahrcyde.

Pulp do a nice line in bleak, wry lyrics.

And of course, when the mood took him, Mr Frank Zappa could be very funny indeed. Bet his kids wish he wasn’t in one of his funny moods when he was at the font, though.

there must be more, but i can’t think of any right now.

8

All of the Forbidden Broadway and the Forbidden Hollywood CDS. They have a standard of excellence that is very unique!

It’s astounding, Rocky Horror is now mainstream Broadway fair.
Though I’m scarey, mid-Western tourists love my underwear.
I remember visiting Times Square, it was raunchy way back when.
But since they’ve cleaned it, the shows are all tacky.
Let’s ruin Times Square again!

9

I’ve always like the Young Fresh Fellows, especially The Men Who Loved Music.

“When the girls get here
We’ll talk about integrated circuits and things
To show them how smart we are.
We’ll set ourselves on fire (accidentally)
We’ll spill beer all over our t-shirts (to impress them)
We’ll show them what kind of guys we are…”

10

The Kentucky Headhunters’ cd Rave On! is pretty amusing. It guess it would be a toss up between Dixiefried and The Ghost of Hank Williams for my favorite cut. Also, Rednex, the folks who brought you that souped-up version of Cotton-Eye Joe that annoyed so many people, are good for a chuckle. Electronic-flavored hillbilly music sung with Swedish accents…how can you go wrong?

Most recently, it was a single cut that made me laugh out loud. I was driving my daughter and her friend and they put in an old Limp Bizkit cd. I’m not a big fan, so I had no idea that they had covered George Michael’s Faith. The song comes on and Fred Durst starts vomitting out “you gotta have faaaiiith…” and I nearly drove off the road. The girls were looking at me incredulously, “It’s not that funny!” and I was choking out “oh yes it is!”

11

I laughed at The Bloodhound Gang. Both One Fierce Beer Coaster and Hooray For Boobies had some funny, raunchy lyrics. Some of it should be taken with a grain of salt, but The Ballad Of Chasey Lain had me wiping tears from my eyes.

12

the violent femmes. my husband just bought a “best of” sort of cd by them, and everytime i hear “come on dad, give me the car tonight”, i laugh my butt off. lots of their stuff is really funny, lots of it is really grim. “country death song” will give you nightmares, while “dance, motherf***er, dance” is hysterical.

and if you’re looking to “laugh instead of cry”, nothing beats yoko ono. in small doses. very small. teeny. but to listen to her sing, you’d expect joel and the 'bots to be in the studio, doing running commentary. she really is like a vocal B-movie, just begging for somebody to MST her!

13

I started a reply to this the other day, but my PC crashed while composing it and I never got back to it.

While I’m just old enough to remember Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band’s “Cherchez le Femme/Se Si Bon” I wasn’t really old enough to appreciate it or to have heard the rest of the album at the time. I did greatly enjoy August Darnell, Stony Browder, and Andy Hernandez’s later efforts as Kid Creole and the Coconuts, especially the first two albums, Off the Coast of Me and Fresh Fruit in Foreign Places; how could you not like songs like “Mister Softee” and “(Dario) Can You Get Me into Studio 54?”. Fresh Fruit was probably a better album overall, but wasn’t really laugh-out-loud funny.

To second some other nominations: The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band’s Gorilla (especially “The Intro and the Outro”); The Bonzo Dog Band’s Urban Spaceman (UK title: The Doughnuts in Granny’s Greenhouse) was also brilliant, especially “Trouser Press” and “Can Blue Men Sing the Whites?”. Though I don’t know how much you’ll be dancing as you listen. And of course They Might Be Giants are almost always amusing and often incredibly funny, not just lyrically but musically as well.

In another vein, I loved the Snuff Rock EP by Alberto y Los Trios Paranoias, which was a brilliant parody of British punk rock from its early days, with a little reggae thrown in for good measure. Songs included “Gobbing on Life”, “Kill”, and “Snuffin in a Babylon”. They also did a wonderful skewering of Status Quo with “Heads Down No Nonsense Mindless Boogie”

Atlanta’s own The Coolies’ first album, dig…? was entirely made up of Simon and Garfunkel covers in highly inappropriate styles (including a transcendent surf-rock instrumental version of “Mrs. Robinson”), along with a cover of Paul Anka’s “Having My Baby” that puts an unprecedented spin on it. Their second effort, Doug, was a rock opera about a skinhead who beats to death a transvestite fry cook, then becomes a millionaire when he publishes the cookbook he stole from the cook, only to descend back into paranoia, substance abuse, and poverty. It includes truly inspired pastiches and parodies of The Who, R.E.M. and the Replacements, Led Zeppelin, zydeco, and others.

No thread like this would be complete without a mention of The Rutles’ All You Need is Cash and Spinal Tap’s This is Spinal Tap.

14

Much of Frank Zappa’s JOE’S GARAGE is hilarious.

WET T-SHIRT NIGHT always arouses and amuses me.

15

Hey, I’d forgotten about *Kid Creole and the Coconuts! Is GWAR the name of the band or an abbreviation? Nostradamus, that was funny. I wonder what it sounds like!

Which albun is Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow on?
If ever I needed a reason to smile and laugh, today is the day. Thanks all.

16

I meant to do that.

17

The Dead Milkmen had some funny songs: (Theme from) Blood Orgy of the Atomic Fern (actually I don’t even remember how the song goes, I just like the title), Bitchin’ Camero, Punk Rock Girl. Admittedly, these aren’t quite as funny as when I 14 years old, but I still like 'em.

John Prine has a few songs that make me laugh out loud too, like “Spanish Pipedream” and “Dear Abby.”

Finally, anything sung by a member of Star Trek on the Rhino “Golden Throats” CDs is pretty hilarious too, but only in the unintentional sort of way…

18

Offspring definitely does it, though Blink 182 has done a good job of it lately.

Rafi…Afroman was good for a while…and definitely Bloodhound Gang…

19

P.D.Q. Bach. Anything by him. I’m thinking particularly of The 1712 Overture. The first time I heard that I was crying and convulsed with laughter. Truly good stuff if you like classical music.

That is all.

20

King Missile. Sure, we’ve all heard “Detachable Penis”, which was the only moderately funny song on that album, but some of their early stuff was absolutely hilarious.
(A Capella:
“I’d like to go to Scotland.
I’d like to wear a kilt.
I’d like to show off my two legs,
And do, just what, I’d wilt.” <triangle>)

David Bowie also used to have a sense of humor (see “Laughing Gnome Song”).

-LV