Songs That Might Otherwise Pass You By

HALLOWEEN EDITION

Brad Sucks, "Fixing My Brain"

Okay, so it's not strictly a Halloween song, but every time I hear it I imagine Frankenstein singing it, and then I laugh, and laugh, and laugh. This is a great song, and what makes it greater is that the musician obviously isn't in it for the money. While you can buy his music (higher quality), you can also download it for no cost. How awesome is that?

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Brad doesn't suck, though his name says he does

Brobdingnagian Bards, "Monster Mash"

I absolutely love this band (despite the fact that I can't pronounce their name and I had to copy & paste it here). I first heard them at Dragon*Con two years ago--I didn't see them live, though. I just happened to see one of their CDs while I was looking for Emerald Rose (another excellent band) merchandise. I thought the CD Songs of the Muse looked promising, so I bought it, and got two free "Real Men Wear Kilts" bumper stickers. Since I have no car, I put the sticker on a notebook.

More information on the stickers here

I loved the CD so much I listened to it every day for months. I was quite psyched to see them this year at D*C, but little did I know I'd accidentally see them perform before I had a chance to actually go to one of their shows! I went to a live taping of The Signal, the world's premiere (it's true!) Firefly/Serenity podcast* . These two musicians were there just walking around taliking to people. I could tell they were musicians because they said they were, and they had instruments. I thought it was strange that they were at a podcast for a T.V. show, but more unusual things have happened at Dragon*Con. Anyhow, to make a long story no shorter, one of the musicians started talking about kilts. I excitedly started pointing at my notebook with the sticker on it that says "Real Men Where Kilts" (I get overly enthusiastic at Dragon*Con). The musician seemed happily surprised that I had that sticker-- I just thought "wow, that dude really likes kilts". It wasn't until they introduced themselves that I realized they were the Brogdingnagian Bards. How cool! I also didn't know they did filk songs, but I know now, and here's a cover of a filk song from before there was a name for filk songs.

The bards have licensed the song CC (Creative Commons). Please read here to see which CC license they're using. It's important that we abide by the CC licenses if we ever hope for it to become mainstream like the All Rights Reserved copyright. (By the by--I'm not making any money off this, so I consider myself to not be using this for commercial purposes).

*look at the last picture, 2nd row, but in the middle. That's me in the black shirt. Eric is the one looking trapped beside me. I don't see the Brobs in this picture.

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Andrew McKee and Marc Gunn of the wonderful Celtic/Scifi/Ren Faire musical collective Brobdingnagian Bards (I can spell it! At least for a moment...)

Ahhh...I have to add this picture..just because it's so cute!


Marc Gunn with a cat named Jasper

Hallelujah the Hills, "Monster Eyes" (thanks to Village Voice)

I've played Hallelujah the Hills before; in fact, I may have posted this very song. I love the concept. One of my favorite writers, Jonathan Lethem, made a call out to musicians to interpret a fictional song in his latest novel You Don't Love Me Yet. This song is a hybrid, made from the imagination of one of the most strange-prone novel writers we have today and a band whose members are masters at sounding oddly disinterested in their music but engaged at the same time. Like they're maybe stoned, but still very good at what they're doing. The vocalists and back-up singers have almost a yelling, declaration-style of singing--like Wayne Coyne had in "She Don't Use Jelly". So yeah, they kind of remind me of The Flaming Lips, without the bright red hair Mr. Coyne was sporting back then (I know I was sobriety-challenged back then, too, but man--that hair hurt the eyes).

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Hallelujah the...Water Fountain?

Honorary Mentions:

I wanted so badly to post Petra Haden's excellent version of "Thriller", but I realized I didn't have a copy that I could distribute "legally". So here's the stream of it. Listen to it with glee!

Same with Magnolia Electric Co.'s "Werewolves of London". I thought there was a version on Secretly Canadian's website, but I was wrong. Here's part of the song, streaming though. I know--it's like Christmas instead of Halloween! Actually, it's more like Halloween, where you keep getting the bite-sized candy bars instead of full-size. Meh.