In the age of Radio Disney, does classic rock & roll still speak to children? One very clever dad decided to find out. Will Hodgkinson from the Times Online (UK) wondered if the current round of Beatlemania was being lost on his kids. He bribed them with toffee to participate in a very unscientific focus group where played them Beatles classics to get their thoughts. We have to say it’s one of the funniest things we’ve read in a long, long time! Here’s a sampling:
Apart from Rowan, who claims only to know about the beetles in her garden, panel members are vaguely aware of the Beatles. “They look like me so I like them,” offers Otto, proud possessor of a mop-top bowl cut.
“They are a rock band from olden times,” adds Isabella. “They did lots of songs,” says Pearl, somewhat unhelpfully, but then Pearl’s musical interests are focused entirely on the soundtrack to Mamma Mia!, so she can be forgiven.
Resolving to give the study session a chronological overview, I begin by putting She Loves You on to the record player. “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah,” sing Lennon and McCartney on their Number One smash from 1963. “No she doesn’t,” Otto says.
“I thought it was quite strange,” comments Rowan when the song is over.
“It’s different from most of the songs I’ve heard.”
Because this is Aerosmith week on The Rockabye Baby Blog, we have to play you this awesome Steven Tyler rendition of a children’s music classic — I love Trash, the theme song of Oscar the Grouch! This recording is from Elmopalooza. Check it out!
And, just because we can never get enough Sesame Street, here’s a super early version, from when Oscar was orange!
Be sure to check out our new release, Lullaby Renditions of Aerosmith, featuring liner notes by Steven Tyler! Dream on, and on and on…
In honor of the release of Here Comes Science, the new kid’s album and animated DVD from They Might Be Giants which comes out September 1, here is a classic video from one of our favorites, the Grammy-winner Here Come the 123s.
John and John present the days of the week, with Never Go To Work:
We’ve given you the best, now here’s the rest! Presented for your listening pleasure, the top 5 weirdest kid’s albums of all time. Take issue with our list? Is this something you can share with the rest of us, Amazing Larry? We wanna know! Leave your suggestions in the comments.
5. Mr. T — Treat Your Mother Right (Treat Her Right)
Okay, this mother-loving rap is actually from a 1984 video starring the mohawked A-Team star and friend of Nancy Reagan called Be Somebody… Or Be Somebody’s Fool! Mr. T did release an incredibly weird kid’s album called Mr. T’s Commandments, which is also worth hunting for at your local used record hut. It is his touching ode to momma that lives longest in our memories, however. Like a twisted embroidery sampler, Mr. T spells out all the ways his mother sacrificed for him:
“M is for the moan and the miserable groan from the pain that she felt when I was born… Mother, there is no other.”
There are no words, just watch. And treat her right, people.
4. Cheech Marin — My Name Is Cheech, The School Bus Driver
This is a fun album by Cheech Marin of Cheech and Chong fame, with a great theme song. We’ve sung this one at the top of our lungs many a time. However, some might be horrified by the thought of a schoolbus driven by the star of Up In Smoke. Sadly this album is out of print. Bring it back! Kids are missing out! To hear the full song clip, which is highly recommended, click on the link in the player below.
3. Chipmunk Punk
Alvin & the Chipmunks get all edgy, if you count Billy Joel as edgy. Which we didn’t, even when we were ten and lipsynched to this album evey day in our bedroom. We were pretty sure that Tom Petty didn’t count as punk either. But who cares? This was our favorite album for a geekily long time. With the legendary ‘munk falsettos of Alvin, Simon and Theodore taking on Blondie, The Knack, The Cars, Queen and other early ’80s rock radio staples, this ridiculous album was kid heaven.
2. Sing with Little Marcy at Home
Little Marcy is a ventriloquist’s dummy who sings Christian children’s songs in a voice so high it makes Alvin, Simon and Theodore green with envy. Do we need to continue?
1. Drumroll please. And the number one sublimely odd kid’s album of all time is…
Ali and His Gang Vs. Mr. Tooth Decay
Yes, Muhammad Ali, the greatest. If he can’t take out dental disease, who can? We can’t describe this weird masterpiece. You must listen for yourselves. You can listen to the whole album online and learn more about it here. At the very least check out this MP3 of the theme song. You won’t be sorry.
We are living in a golden age for kids music, what with They Might Be Giants, Dan Zanes, and the geniuses at Yo Gabba Gabba producing tunes that parents dig as much as their little ones. The folks at lullaby world headquarters spend a lot of time debating our favorite children’s albums, but here our the ones we all agreed on. Our list favors the classics, and is totally unscientific and biased but here goes nothing. What are your favorites? Let us know in the comments.
Of course every kid in the U.S. grows up singing Woody’s anthem “This Land is Your Land,” but Guthrie wrote many more sweet, silly and wonderful songs to entertain his own children that have become children’s music staples. He seemed to sing from a kid’s eye view and his lyrics are simple and enchanting. Highlights include “Clean-O,” all about what fun it is getting nice and clean-o, or “Car Car (Riding in My Car),” which revels in all the joyous sights and sounds of a car ride. You might also want to check out Songs to Grow On for Mother and Child, with the timeless “Why, Oh Why,” a song about all the questions little ones love to ask: “Why can’t a bird eat an elephant? Why, oh why, oh why? Because an elephant has a pretty hard skin. Good bye, good bye, good bye.”
This soundtrack is a generational touchstone that has since become a standard, still rating high on Amazon’s top sellers for children’s music. It’s far more fun than any treatise on gender equality, fairness, decency, and overcoming cultural stereotypes has a right to be. Created by Marlo Thomas and featuring Mel Brooks, Diana Ross, Carol Channing, and Harry Belafonte, how could it not be fun? Highlights: Football great Rosey Grier singing “It’s all right to cry, crying takes the sad out you.” Sure made us feel better when we were wee.
How many of us were West coast jazz aficionados as youngsters and didn’t even know it? Mr. Guaraldi classed up many a Christmas with his timeless soundtrack.
How do we know what a conjunction is, or how a bill becomes a law? Because we watched Saturday morning cartoons, that’s why. Luckily nostalgic adults put the amazingly entertaining and educational songs of Schoolhouse Rock on disc to become a kid’s classic for the ages. Oh, yes!
The very first of many Sesame Street albums was released in 1970, and re-issued many times over the years under different titles, different covers, without the book, etc. Well, we loved all the variations. With the original renditions of “I Love Trash” by Oscar the Grouch and “Rubber Duckie” by Ernie, this one is truly a classic.
Everybody knows how crazy I am about the music from Sesame Street and The Muppet Show. Well, apparently I’m not the only one, as a group of Boston-based DJs and musicians just knocked out “Muppet Mashup,” a ten-track tribute to those great songs that demands a place on your iPod toute suite.
A number of grown-up musicians are dipping their toes into the kiddie pool this year, with varying levels of success. Here’s my quick overview of recent releases.
Rick Springfield – My Precious Little One: Lullabies For A New Generation
The “Jessie’s Girl” singer is long past his teen idol days, with a pair of sons in their twenties. This album, which contains newly recorded versions of songs he wrote for his kids when they were infants, is a far cry from the bombastic arena pop that he’s normally known for. The ten songs are remarkably gentle, sweet, and soothing, and Springfield’s voice works well with the subdued material. I think all parents make up songs for their kids (I know I do), but they’re rarely as memorable as these.
Ziggy Marley – Family Time
Reggae is just naturally kid-friendly music – the relaxed tempos, bouncing bass lines and fun sound effects grab kids by the ears and don’t let go. So it’s no surprise that the first kids’ album from Ziggy Marley, the heir to the throne of reggae legend Bob Marley, would be a success. “Family Time” is solid from top to bottom – almost. The album is full of guest stars, including a great Paul Simon spot, but who had the bright idea to close it out with not one but two Jamie Lee Curtis spoken word pieces? They fall embarrassingly flat and leave a sour taste in the mouth.
Bob Marley – B Is For Bob
Ziggy is sadly less successful on this other project, in which he remixes eight of his father’s best-loved songs to better suit younger ears. While a few of the tracks benefit from the tinkering, the majority of them were better (and just as kid-friendly) in their original incarnations. Most of Marley’s music is sonically fine for kids, so you’re better off going for the originals – or the Rockabye Baby Marley volume. One notable exception on this album is “Jamming,” which adds a crazy, danceable energy to the tune, but it’s not enough to recommend the record.
One of the greatest things about music is its ability to be used as a window to other cultures and languages. Especially in the pre-verbal stage, kids are really open to all sorts of different vocal sounds, and it’s great to expose them to as many as possible. We’ve always been big fans of Africa’s music in our household, with my wife spending a summer in Uganda assisting a group of ethnomusicologists as a younger woman, and here are some of our favorite artists from the continent.
Congolese soukous music is some of the most exciting, infectious dance music ever performed. Anchored by complex, lilting guitar figures, chanted vocals and driving percussion, it’s guaranteed to get even the most surly little bottom wiggling. Kanda Bongo Man is one of the country’s most venerable performers, and you can’t go wrong with anything he’s recorded.
South Africa’s most famous vocal group has released a score of albums, but this collection of traditional Zulu songs is one of their most accessible. 1994′s Gift Of The Tortoise was nominated for a Grammy and features cuts like Kanje Kanje and Thekwane, all laced together with narration from Gcina Mhlophe.
The Nigerian juju master is one of those African artists who has found success on the world stage, and for good reason – his ludicrously infectious music takes from a wide range of influences to create a unique hybrid that is energetic, intense and fun.
One of the most engaging features of African music is the variety of unusual instruments at play. One such device is the seprewa, a gut-strung harp used in Ghanan Highlife music. This 2008 release features guitarist Kari Banaman playing with a number of seprewa masters to knock out an unstoppable plate of danceable jams.
The Nigerian music legend Fela Kuti was one of the most politically volatile musicians of all time, with his uncompromising music bringing him in conflict with the powers that be over and over again. Zombie, one of his greatest albums, was a veiled attack on the Nigerian military oppressors in the guise of an irresistible Afrobeat album. Like most of Fela’s records, it contains just two long songs, but both are absolute classics.
P.S. It’s the last day to enter to win our new Lullaby Renditions of Queen CD! Contest ends today at noon, pst.
Let’s just get the weird stuff out of the way up front – yes, Bruce Haack did release a synthesizer record called “Electric Lucifer.” But before he went all looney tunes on his Moog, Haack (along with collaborator Esther Nelson) recorded some of the most unusual, fresh, and charming kids music ever put on wax.
After dropping out of Juilliard and dabbling in musique concrete pieces and bizarre television appearances (including one where he played a composition for twelve “chromatically tuned” women), he and Nelson teamed up to found Dimension 5 Records, releasing “Dance, Sing & Listen” in 1962, followed by a pair of sequels in the following years.
Haack’s musical compositions are some of the wildest in kids music history, oscillating madly between tripped-out sci-fi synth weirdouts to down-home country tunes. The lyrics are nothing unusual compared to other albums of the day, but Haack’s musical experimentation pushes them over the top. The self-taught inventor built a variety of unique synthesizers out of scrap equipment, and as the 60s wore on he began to find acceptance from the mainstream, culminating with the release of “The Way-Out Record For Children” in 1968. This is no doubt Haack’s masterpiece, fusing abstract, surreal lyrics and stories with progressive electronic music to no doubt fry the minds of the babies of the Love Generation.
Haack died in 1988, but several reissues of his work are available. I seriously recommend you check them out.
Did you know that legendary reggae scion Ziggy Marley just released a kids’ album? Yes, not only can you jam out to the Rockabye Baby! release of lullaby renditions of his father Bob’s songs, but now Marley the younger is making a grab for the ears of the youngsters.
Reggae is great kids’ music (well, the older, slightly cleaner style is – let’s not expose tender ears to dirty dancehall quite yet), and Ziggy’s album “Family Time” is well worth the listen when it drops May 5th.
The “Jessie’s Girl” singer is long past his teen idol days, with a pair of sons in their twenties. This album, which contains newly recorded versions of songs he wrote for his kids when they were infants, is a far cry from the bombastic arena pop that he’s normally known for. The ten songs are remarkably gentle, sweet, and soothing, and Springfield’s voice works well with the subdued material. I think all parents make up songs for their kids (I know I do), but they’re rarely as memorable as these.
Reggae is just naturally kid-friendly music – the relaxed tempos, bouncing bass lines and fun sound effects grab kids by the ears and don’t let go. So it’s no surprise that the first kids’ album from Ziggy Marley, the heir to the throne of reggae legend Bob Marley, would be a success. “Family Time” is solid from top to bottom – almost. The album is full of guest stars, including a great Paul Simon spot, but who had the bright idea to close it out with not one but two Jamie Lee Curtis spoken word pieces? They fall embarrassingly flat and leave a sour taste in the mouth. 
Ziggy is sadly less successful on this other project, in which he remixes eight of his father’s best-loved songs to better suit younger ears. While a few of the tracks benefit from the tinkering, the majority of them were better (and just as kid-friendly) in their original incarnations. Most of Marley’s music is sonically fine for kids, so you’re better off going for the originals – or the Rockabye Baby Marley volume. One notable exception on this album is “Jamming,” which adds a crazy, danceable energy to the tune, but it’s not enough to recommend the record.
