Silly Sundays - Macy Skipper - Goofin' Off

All right. I've been sitting on this for literally months, trying to write it up. Sadly, I can't find much of anything about Macy Skipper online (apart from his other three recordings which you can listen to here). He's apparently from St. Louis, MO, released just a few singles on as many labels, and lived in obscurity.

I wish he would've recorded more stuff like this -- the other records he put out are more standard rockabilly stuff, which I love well enough, but this just feels so special to me. This is a wonderful slab of nonsense which fits ten minutes' worth of absurdity into 180 seconds. It's consistently dazzling, bewildering, and hilarious. I've listened to it at least twenty times in the last week, and I don't think I'll ever want to slow down. Like the best funny spoken word records, I want to memorize it and perform it at parties.

And the worst part is, I want to write something funny about this record, but I can't come up with anything. Man, I feel so unnecessary...

Macy Skipper - Goofin' Off
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Multiple Mondays: Must Be Santa!

This will absolutely be the silliest Multiple Monday ever, and it's also another oddball one. We're looking at some wildly different (but all closely-related) versions of a call-and-response style of song. (Next week I can put up a regular MM post, I think.)

So, sometime in the last four hundred years (estimates vary and historians are widely divided on the genealogy of the song), German-speakers came up with a call-and-response song named "Schnitzelbank." It's known in America these days as a drinking song heard at Oktoberfests all around the country.

First, we'll hear a traditional Oktoberfest version from Schwarze Schafe, then a kiddie parody from The Biscuit Brothers. Bill Haley and His Comets rewrite it and rock it up as "Rockin' Rollin' Schnitzelbank." Next, the version probably best known to Americans under 35 and not of German heritage, the version from Animaniacs.

Okay, so in 1953, Mel Blanc recorded a holiday version of "Schnitzelbank" entitled "Ya, Das Ist Ein Christmas Tree" which is an excuse to showcase his incredible voice talents. And that was in turn parodied decades later by Joel Kopischke as "Stupid Christmas Song."

Somewhere in the middle of all this mess, our patron saint, Thurl Ravenscroft, added his own version of the song, a silly love song called "Oh You Sweet One."

Now, finally, we come to the point. At least by 1961, which is when Mitch Miller committed his version to tape, we got around to hearing "Must Be Santa." It retains the structure and polka style of "Schnitzelbank" but changes the tune a little and the lyrics a lot. Now it's all about the fat man in the red suit. (I know, I know, I'd never have guessed I'd post a Mitch Miller track on this blog, but it really brings out the call-and-response aspect, and I don't have another good classic take on the song.)

I'd intended at this point in the post to write a long review of Bob's album, but it's been done other places by better, more knowledgeable writers and this post is already a leetle long. So, let me just say this: it's not a particularly good Christmas album, and it's not a particularly good Dylan album. (Bob is one of those people like Tom Waits or Lou Reed, who has the ability to make sweet pretty music but doesn't do so very often. He doesn't try to make any of these songs particularly pretty, and most of them were written to be pretty.)

It is, however, all for charity. A good charity. There's no buy link today, just a link to donate to that charity. "Must Be Santa" is the best track on the album, largely because (in my opinion) it doesn't express or try to inspire reverence for the holiday which means a lot of different things to a lot of different people (and has meant several different things to Bob over the span of his career, I'd bet).

Then, after Bob finishes up, we have the triumphant return of Glenn Campbot, with his ladyfriend Linda Ronbodt, singing "Must Be Giftbot." I love me some singing robots. As always, I recommend the zipfile.

Zipfile

1. Schwarze Schafe - Die Schnitzelbank 1 2
2. The Biscuit Brothers - Schnitzelbank 1 2
3. Bill Haley and His Comets - Rockin' Rollin' Schnitzelbank 1 2
4. Animaniacs - Schnitzelbank 1 2
5. Mel Blanc - Ya, Das Ist Ein Christmas Tree 1 2
6. Joel Kopischke - Stupid Christmas Song 1 2
7. Thurl Ravenscroft - Oh You Sweet One 1 2
8. Mitch Miller and The Gang - Must Be Santa 1 2
9. Bob Dylan - Must Be Santa 1 2
10. Glenn Campbot and Linda Ronbodt - Must Be Giftbot 1 2

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Johnny Cash - A Day In The Grand Canyon

Forty-eight years ago, Johnny Cash released an album entitled The Lure of the Grand Canyon. It contained a new recording (by king of the thrift store conductors, Andre Kostelanetz) of Ferde Grofé's Grand Canyon Suite, with added sound effects and followed by this long explanatory track from Johnny.

This album has been out of print for decades, and I haven't been able to find the whole album, though this track was reprinted in the Bear Family's awe-inspiring collection of box sets.

This track is over 10 minutes long, and almost 20 MB in size. Download with care. Before this week of posts is over, I hope to upload some of my own sound recordings from the recent trip. Stay tuned!

Johnny Cash - A Day In The Grand Canyon
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