Department of Puppet Audio / Part 1
Today let's visit the tasteful and clever arrangements of Sam Pottle along with his various songwriting partners, during his tenure as music director on Sesame Street from seasons six through nine.
My two selections are from the Grammy-nominated lp The Sesame Street MONSTERS! (1975).
FUR features the full Broadway blitz of Pottle styling and fantastic lyrics by David Axelrod. As well as this lp appearance, it came out as a single in 1976. The words are included herein in full for your furbulous edification:
Fur! I am covered with fur / From my snoot to my spur / I'm a furry fella./ Fur! When you stroke it I purr / When you poke it I grrr / It's maroon and yella. / Fur! Keeps you warm when it's brrr / Don't you wish that you were / Fairly bursting with fur, fur fur ! / Yes, fur is beautiful / fur is clever / furthermore I'll love it forever / Fur! Unforgettable fur. // Now you may find fur too frightful but / I'd never switch / I find my fur delightful but / boy, does it itch./ You may see fur as horrible / I say no sir / To me my fur's adorable / and I'm covered with FUR! (I kinda grow it) ...(repeat second verse)
And one of my favorite slow, bluesy ballads from Sesame Street (more in upcoming posts): I Can't Help It, written with Joseph A. Bailey and David Axelrod. This one has a lovely melody that sounds so familiar that I can't figure out if it's copped from some tin pan alley song from the 'teens or not. If so- I want to know what it is. This lp has a terrific cover and is full of great material. A good place to start a Sesame Street album collection. Actually I could virtually throw out all of my others, if only this one had Bert and Ern. Many of the lps in the SS series have only a handful of songs I want to hear more than once but this one is paced so well I always tend to leave it on until it's done. In a future post we'll explore the Vic Flick/Sesame Street connection. In the meantime, enjoy these gems.
The tune reminds me of "Kids" from Bye Bye Birdie, sung by Paul Lynde in the show and movie. Not from the 20s, obviously, it was an early marker of what became an unfortunate trend to ricky-tick faux 20s songs in 60s musicals, culminating in Jerry Herman's "Hello, Dolly" and later pastiches.
Going back to the 50s, this all arises from the evil influence of Mitch Miller, whose "Sing Along" records and TV show always had that infernal banjo plinky-plink under the unbearably square arrangements. (Mitch Miller, evil? He's the man whose horrible A&R choices for Sinatra in the early 50s almost sank Frank's career.)
Of course the Muppets take this melange of influences and turn it into something wonderful. It's why we love them.
Posted by: woid | May 02, 2009 at 07:34 PM
Hmmm, yup- "Fur" reminds me a lot of "Kids", hadn't thought of that, it's the OTHER song, "I Can't Help It" that seems to be based on a 'real' song somewhere...
Posted by: Mindwrecker | May 02, 2009 at 08:07 PM
I bet you are thinking of "Ich bin von Kopf bis Fuß auf Liebe eingestellt", aka "Falling in Love Again."
Posted by: Goyim in the AM | May 04, 2009 at 02:08 PM
Cut Mitch Miller some slack wold. He did one kick-ass version of Give Peace a Chance
Here's Sesame Street's own Bob McGrath on a 1963 Mitch TV show.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaWf51mj9pA
Posted by: Dominick | May 04, 2009 at 04:22 PM