American Song-Poem Anthology, The

“Song-Poems”. Holy shit- this is a Brownian Motion wet dream, a gift from heaven. A collection of late 60’s, 70’s songs that are all hilarious and bent for the wrong reasons. “Novelty”, ,”vanity” songs penned by wanna-bes and crack pots, amature song writers, and recorded in one-off studios as a service advertised in pulp mags of the era (“record your hit song!”). Odes to Nixon, Carter, acid, the American bicentennial, unbelievable. Guarenteed to make you gasp in astonishment that people can be so clueless when it comes to music, everything. More so, the realization that studio musicians were cranking these out in all seriousness is chilling. The fine line between seriousness and ridiculousness between the players and the writers and now, you the audience is greyed out immediately. Believe me, though its almost a year away, I already know what I’m playing on album week this year. If anything, check the last track, a cult classic as it was penned as a prank to see just how far these “Song-Poem” services would go (yup, they did it, quite nicely I might add). This is the ultimate “Bad-Ass Mo-Fo” cd, gak!! Better than taking acid and watching Bugs Bunny and the Pee Wee Herman Show.

1) swing, soulful blues, the worst lyrics maybe, um…
2) patriotic ode to bicentennial
3) sesame street pop, about “yellow things”
4) blues, “I’m the other woman” sung falsetto by a male
5) “human absurdity”, late 60’s pop in minor key
6) “smooth music” (!!)
7) bluesy dirty soul
8) oh jesus…god and Nixon, marching gospel
9) minor soul..Christ, Carter
10) “a convertible and a headband” is apparently all I need
11) disco, Crisco, cisco, marisco, frisco…
12) 60’s pop, “rug bug”, catchy really
13) 50’s country western “cowpunching gay boy”
14) upbeat funky soul, about a hospital stay, ER…!
15) a poem written on acid, 60’s cheesy pop
16) anti pornography message once again reveals exactly who the pervert is, nice
17) cheesy one man band organ, about Apollo missions, yeesh- no sense of musicality, verses or choruses or basic songwriting, just text
18) c&w, about a rose business
19) childlike, really weird
20) 60’s psyche garage, , almost “good”, Yo La Tengo covered this
21) 50’s south pacific, about burma, huh?
22) schmaltzy pop, green fingernails
23) vaudville feel, “mr hat” philosophy
24) a love song gone certainly awry
25) upbeat childlike pop, fucking absurd
26) swingy blues
27) jump jazz, “run spook run”, not too PC
28) swingy acid reference, prank song, “a blind man’s penis is always erect”