Lovable loon Crispin Glover released an album called * Big Problem [does not equal] the Solution. The Solution = LET IT BE* that features bizarre spoken word performances and cover tunes, including “These Boots are Made for Walkin’”.
You simply must hear it.
“Transformed Man” was the first one posted - and rightfully so.
“Mass In F Minor” by the Electric Prunes (1967) was a concept album. Basically a “rock mass” in Latin. One song “Kyrie Eleison” is featured in “Easy Rider”. Actually not a bad album but VERY unusual for its time. And for you trivia folks out there, it is considered to be THE first rock opera, theme album, concept album, etc. Yep it came out BEFORE “Tommy”.
I never heard the album “America Why I Love Her” by John Wayne but can just imagine it is something less than spectacular. Supposedly, after Sept 11, 2001, the album was re-released and sold quite well. Nice to see people “cashing in” on America’s grief.
Back in the days of Napster, I got a few songs from an album entitled “Celebrities Butchering Songs”. Oh what a treasure trove that was !! This album had selections from a LOT of celebrity albums (Transformed Man e.g.). Highlights I think were “It Ain’t Me Babe” recited by Sebastian Cabot and Joel Grey siniging “White Room” !!!
You’re favorite cowboy songs, in German! Yes, these wacky Germans try their best to sound like real dadburned cowpokes. The result-Germans trying to sound like real dadburned cowpokes. Didja know ki-yi-yippee-yippee-yay can be yodeled? It can.
I love this album and would give you more information. But, my Dad owns the original.
“Acid Folk”, which I bought in the early '90s: hard and heavy dance drums at 200bpm accompanying some appalling speeded-up bagpipe playing.
It was so bad I took it off the turntable and threw it into the trash after one listen.
Back in college, I took an English lit. class on the Beat Generation. Since we were talking about the social context of the 60s, someone brought a record from his father’s collection, I think it was called An Open Letter to my Teenage Son. It’s a long monologue set to patriotic background music, I think it migh have been a pompous arrangement of “God Bless America.” It made me laugh then, but I think I’d cry if I heard it again now.
Paraphrasing:
“Son, you decided to let your hair grow long, because you believe it is a way by which you can express your individuality. Although I prefer to keep mine short, I respect this choice. After all, many great men in past have worn their hair long. However, should you ever burn your enlistment card and fail in your duties as a citizen of this great land, then all I can say is: you are no son of mine!”
Monty Python did the same thing on one side of Matching Tie & Handkerchief. They called it a “three-sided” record.
And Mad magazine, on at least one occasion, included a flexible, Eva-Tone Soundsheet[sup]TM[/sup] 45 with several (5?) grooves interleaved on one side. The same song was recorded on each, but with a different ending, so you couldn’t tell which one you were playing until the end.
Well, just for balance, it’s not just the old, conservative traditionalists who make cheesey recordings like that. When I was in grade school, there was a huge hit called “Once You Understand,” in which the hippies make their own preachy, whiny version of “Open Letter.”
FOr about three minutes, you hear a chorus of hippies singing “Things get a little easier, once you understand,” over and over and OVER! And as they sing, you hear a bunch of stereotypical evil parents nagging their kids to “get a haircut” or “turn down that loud music” or “I don’t like those punks you hang out with!”
At the very end, mean old nagging dad gets his comeuppance. A policeman’s voice says “Sir, come down to the station to identify your dead son. He died of a drug overdose.”
Well, take THAT, Mom and Dad! The moral: don’t you DARE tell Junior to clean up his room, or he’ll shoot heroin and kill himself, and it will be YOUR fault!
A group called Hayseed Dixie did a CD full of AC/DCs music done with a country flavor called “A Hillbilly Tribute to AC/DC”
I’ve long been a fan of this genre. Have all the Golden Throats, love Esquivel, even have Steve Lawrence & Eydie Gorme’s cover of Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun” which is actually pretty good.
I picked up a used cd just last week that may shed some light on this.
I bought Volume I of Incredibly Strange Music and I must say I’m quite impressed with the Rajput & the Sepoy cover of “Up, Up & Away”, It’s a cheesy sitar cover and you find yourself wanting to help the guy tune his sitar while he’s playing. There are other songs on here, such as Kali Bahlu - “A Cosmic Telephone Call” that will amaze, but Rajuput was worth the $5.95 alone.
Now I’m hoping to run into the other volumes of “Incredibly Strange Music.”
That reminds me: when I was in India, I heard ABBA’s greatest hits on tabla and sitar, being sung in Hindi.
Moving this to Cafe Society with a mention that Lynda “Wonder Woman” Carter once put out a country music album.
I used to go to record/CD shows a lot; huge flea market meets that mostly dealt in rare vinyl and bootlegged CD’s of current artists. Some of the strange records I picked up:
FOR SEGREGATIONISTS ONLY: mid 60’s compilation record of country/folk/bluegrass artists like Johnny Rebel, Otis And The Bigots, and many others…all songs are anti-civil rights and anti-segregation. Song titles include “Move Those N-ggers North”, “In Coon Town”, and “Looking For A Handout”.
THE SON OF MAN: recording of Charles Manson done from his prison cell, playing a interminable 25-minute song.
And a record I don’t know the name of because it’s from a Vietnam pop group with a female vocalist. They cover a few American tunes from Culture Club and Duran Duran, but mostly it’s their own material…they sound like a cross between Abba and ELO, if you can imagine that. I haven’t played it in years, but it was always guarenteed to empty a room at parties faster than a stinkbomb could.
Astorian and jovan will find this of interest:
This inane little ditty (from Dec 1967) was recited by Victor Lundberg someone who founded his own advertising agency.
I am working from memory here but I believe the ending to that “song”, spoken VERY sternly went something like
“… but if you burn your draft card you’d better burn your birth certificate too, because you are NO son of mine !!”
Hey doesn’t that bring back memories?
A group from the late 1960’s the Rotary Connection (which included the late Minnie Ripperton), did some VERY strange stuff. I liked their rendition of “Soul Man” done in Baroque fashion on a harpsichord (synthesizer actually). VERY different but it is really pretty good. (Thanks again to Napster).
I believe one of their last albums was called “Space OPera” which gives you an idea of how unusual they were.
Brian Eno’s done some really bizarre stuff as well. “Blank Frank” and “Baby’s on Fire” comes to mind.
It’s a must hear! I have the double vinyl Spanish import on Munster records…Bomp http://www.bomp.com usually has it in stock. I think it was released on CD too. It has a bunch of cool stuff, including an early sixties song by the coolest MTV VeeJay, J.J. Jackson!
I’m hoping on seeing the Cramps this tour. The new album rocks!
Jon
What a strange coincedence, I hit this thread while listening to William Shatner & Leonard Nimoy’s “It Was A Very Good Year” God that cover is bad… BAD… !
I suggest Manson Family Opera, its a strange spoken-word album dealing with things that would have been told through Manson’s eyes… its really quite bizzare… “I go in the desert, I aint allowed to live in no desert…”
Another vote for Dee Dee Ramone’s rap album.
Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works Vol. II
Mike Patton’s two solo albums are VERY bizarre.
Captain Beefheart - Trout Mask Replica
Alternative Tentacles http://www.alternativetetacles.com has put out some strange stuff over the years, like an album called The Witch Trials…a Throbbing Gristle influenced mess that has Jello Biafra ranting over industrial noise.
Another SF legend was the band Flipper, who did an art damage punk version of “I Know An Old Lady who Swallowed A Fly”, adding the line…“I know an old lady who swallowed a minister, Isn’t it sinister…”
I think I’m gonna give that record a spin.
Jon
Anything by Negativland would qualify.
Okay, Dude, you win, hands down!
I went to the link you posted and heard the song.
God, that thing is creepy on so many levels, I don’t know where to begin(and I consider myself pro-life)!
Chris W