Category: humor

Crappy Album Covers #233 — Men with Chronic Shyness

Look at the guy in the foreground. Now let’s see if I got this right: there’s a lady both in front and behind him; there are nothing but ladies elsewhere in the photo; and all this guy can think about doing is fiddling with the knobs on his sound equipment. I think these girls must come to certain conclusions about guys who fall in love with their gadgets too much. But nevertheless, this is all the International Pop Orchestra could come up with for the cover to their record “An Exciting Evening At Home”.
Musician, producer, and husband of Melanie Ciccone Joe Henry is here with his 1996 recording, Trampoline.The painting gives the feeling like a bed is being used as a trampoline. A bed in a psych ward.

Being husband to Madonna’s sister hasn’t hurt his career. Among the recordings Joe and Madonna recorded together was the single “Guilty By Association”.

Visits: 66

Crappy Album Covers #232 — Puppets and other non-humans

Weela Galez (1913-1995) will apparently be remembered for this album cover, where she is wearing brightly-colored clothes and yelling about the death of her turtle. However, The turtle only died because she hugged it too hard over the death of her dog. Not having learned her lesson, she will now proceed to crush the monkey depicted to death over the death of her turtle.

Discaimer to all PETA activists: No monkeys, dogs, or turtles were harmed in the making of this record or this journal entry. Happy?
Don & Seymour. No tangible info exists on this apparently musical duo.Not even the date of release of this LP, except that the puppetteer’s name is Don Travis.

DON: And for my next number I will attempt to play guitar with Seymour’s face.

SEYMOUR: Hold on a Sec! That’s cruelty to puppets! I’ll sue!

DON: But how do you expect me to play guitar? My hand is already up your —

SEYMOUR: DON! Now, that’s getting personal!

Visits: 57

Crappy Album Covers #231 — Chicks as Marketeers

A staple of CAC blogs is this 1955 record, entitled “Music to Remember Her”, whose cover features the disembodied heads of attractive women. It is a concept we’ve seen before on this journal, with similar creepy results.

Jackie Gleason (1916-1987) was best known for his role as Ralph Kramden in the sitcom The Honeymooners, as well as his role in the 1961 film The Hustler, playing the starring role of pool shark Minnesota Fats. He is less known as a musician, but for over a decade, he lent his talents to his penchant for romantic Jazz numbers, which this particular record is a likely example.
Another frequent flyer on the CAC blogosphere, is Cher’s 1978 Pop/Disco album “Take Me Home”. The main criticism I have read others as saying is WTF about that ridiculous costume she’s wearing.

But slow down a minute. Look at her. She could wear a Glad garbage bag over her body and still look hot. Sorry for breaking ranks with the rest of you guys. I would GLADLY buy the record, pin the cover on my wall, and throw away the vinyl (I hate disco anyway).

That being said, I don’t get much of an impression of this record being a collector’s item, despite the fact that the album went gold, and has Gene Simmons on backing vocals. The gold status is widely considered to be due to the “viking” outfit that Cher is sporting. Remember the Universal Law of Selling Records: scantily-clad women never cause a drop in record sales, even if their presence has little to do with the record’s theme or concept.

Visits: 115

Crappy Album Covers #230 — Riding on the coattails of the famous

To ride on the coattails of the famous, some bands resort to a sexy woman on the cover to attract attention. So, why not have a sexy woman sitting on a pile of money? Sex and money! What’s not to like?

The Nashville Fiddles at least had the decency to put their band name in something a tad larger than fine print this time. In fact, it is more prominent than the person they’re tributing — Johnny Cash.
Beatlerama … “The fabulous new sound from England”. One problem is that not all members of the Fab Four played guitar, and where is the drummer?

This is the second volume of Beatlerama released by a group called “The Manchesters” — their name is there in the fine print in the lower left corner. See it? You might need a magnifying glass.

What sets this tribute album apart is that they didn’t use any scantily-clad ladies this time.

Visits: 213

Crappy Album Covers #222 — CAC Makers with a Few Fries Short of a Happy Meal

The CAC Maker Wildman Fischer, looking a few fries short of a happy meal. http://foodsci.info/other/04_-_go_to_rhino_records.mp3

Somtimes being crazy means you are some kind of mad genius. Sometimes it just means you lost it; you’re off your chumps; a few cards short of a deck ; a few fries short of a happy meal; you’re just plain crazy.

“Go to Rhino Records(Live) on Westwood Boulevard! Go to Rhino Records on Westwood Boulevard!” If you sing the above lines multiple times in a music-less, out-of-tune voice while clapping your hands, you have a good idea of the “music” that lay within this 1969 double LP. Rhino didn’t exist in 1969 you say? No problemo! We have a YouTube video from 1969 below, produced by Zappa himself.

Double LP. Lord have mercy. Frank Zappa himself was the talent scout that got this guy signed on to the Bizarre record label.

It is likely to be mostly due to his association with Zappa that this used double LP has sold on Amazon for $84.00. A true collectors item, since Frank Zappa’s estate is expressly not considering releasing this on CD. Must have had something to do with the time that Fischer was allowed to hang out at Zappa’s house and started to make an ass of himself and trash his house. I guess if Zappa were alive, he wouldn’t release it on CD either.
Sometimes being a mass murderer means you can sing birthday tunes. This is John Wayne Gacy (1942-1994), otherwise known as Pogo The Clown.

So I now stand corrected. In this article, where I write a short article about him, I claimed that he never made records. But I found this one.

This record cover shown was found on Myspace.com. A birthday record with piano accompaniment by Lucille Adams. There is a serial number on the upper right that says “JWG-33-1994”. I would suppose the the “JWG” in the serial number (Pogo’s Initials) would make that a vanity pressing. “33” are the number of people he murdered; and “1994” was the year he was executed by lethal injection.

Wildman Fischer, from the aforementioned double LP, on YouTube:

Visits: 669

Crappy Album Covers #210 — Music From Space

Not much info on this record, or on who did the recording. The cover of “Soundproof: The Sounds of Tomorrow Today” gives the air, not of a futurstic vision of music, but rather the kind of music composed by aliens. If that is the sound of tomorrow, then it is a future dominated by an alien takeover, where we have to put up with their crappy music, and crappy album covers.For that reason alone, I would find out where the rebels are hiding and join them.

I think that the group (or series) might be called “The Sounds of Tomorrow Today”, because of this next LP …
What can be crappier than a cliche space scene than an album which depicts Santa being fired out of a cannon which he couldn’t possibly have fitted in, and being sent into orbit? In addition, the rocket launcher thingamagig they have there looks like it’s floating in the sky.Once again, “The Sounds of Tomorrow Today”, offering us an album entitled “Adventure in Carols”. Not much info on this one, either.

Visits: 74

Crappy Album Covers #202 — Suggestions for New Year’s Eve

Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve, and of course, you may find yourselves  in need of party records that would be suitable for the occasion.

How’se about a Knees-up Party for New Year’s Eve? Well, you can rest easy, since it just means a party or dance, and it was derived from the 1938 Harris Weston and Bert Lee song called “Knees Up Mother Brown”. This song title does in fact appear on this recording. In other trivia, England’s West Ham Football Club calls its website by this song title also.

And also, the revellers on the album cover look pretty harmless.
Any record with clowns on the album cover certainly qualify as a suggested record for New Year’s Eve.

While David Rose didn’t appear to have too many hits in this 1954 recording, these were mostly original compositions. Later, he would compose a song called The Stripper, which became the cliche go-to song for sexually suggestive movies and television scenes with humorous effect. The Stripper was intended as a B-side to the single for Ebb Tide. In this case, it was the B-side that charted #1 on Billboard in June 1962 and reached gold status.

Visits: 131

Crappy Album Covers (sidebar) — The (belated) Furr Shrine

Fans of this blog may recall that venerable, but enigmatic group of CAC makers from who-knows-where called Furr. As you can see clearly, they are pretty derivative, and the cover shown here dates back to 1977  (so I was close), according to this CAC blog.

Also, according to the same blog, some visitors categorized their music as bubblegum. Hmm… sounds believeable.

But their song titles (these guys have a track listing!) still sound like titles pulled out of the Kiss reject bin: “Sister Honky Tonk”, “Wow, yeah”, and “Goin’ Down the Road” are examples.

But if we are to believe their other links to Amazon (which I don’t), they are now called “The Furr”, hail from Winnipeg, and have a current 2007 demo released on places like Amazon and CD Baby, entitled “Furr is Murder”. CD Baby has a short bio of The Furr (if they are from Winnipeg, then why does the Canadian Amazon site list them as an Import?). It would appear from their bio that “The Furr” did not exist before 2005. Since this is a 1977 album, either the bio is wrong and they’re all old geezers (I wouldn’t want to be a geezer in all that getup), or we are talking about two different bands.

The Furr are also on Facebook. They have reportedly broken up. But, looking at a recent picture of Matt and Darcy (two of The Furr’s  former members), they don’t look a day over 25. They would have been born 5 years after this album came out. I rest my case.

Visits: 126

Crappy Album Covers #197 — Covers with some e'splainin' to do

Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III, known to some as Desi Arnaz, came to America as a humble but talented musician from Santiago, Chile, and from the early to mid-1930s, held several odd jobs, including bird cage cleaner, taxi driver, and bookkeeper. He later joined Xavier Cugat in the late ’30s, and showed his musical talents. A couple of years later, he formed his own dance orchestra, releasing several albums during the late 30s and throughout the 1940s.

His role as Ricky Ricardo from Cuba in the sitcom “I Love Lucy” featured the song Babalu in the 1951 pilot episode. He had by this time already been married to Lucille Ball in real life. As a bit of extra trivia, the entire series had always been filmed in front of a live audience.
British comedian Max Bygraves wants us to believe that this series, called “Viva! Congalongamax” survived 10 volumes, although little indication of this appears on Wikipedia. What is indicated, is that this is his tenth album with a different title. What is also indicated, beyond doubt, is his love for album titles with long almost nonsensical words such as the title “Singalongamax”, “Discolongamax”, and this one. These may be found among his 63 album titles Wikipedia says he put out.

The Discolongamax album features such dico smash hits as “Get Me to Church on Time”, “You Need Hands”, and “How Ya Gonna Keep ’em Down on the Farm?”. And of course, he sings “Feelings”.
Faceinhole.com allows its visitors to put a picture in place of Max’s on this cover.

Visits: 94

Crappy Album Covers #194 — Cliche Clowns

See this clown? Look how much fun he’s had! Fun, fun, fun! So much fun, the entire circus collapsed around him, and now he’s having no more fun. His former employer sold the junk for scrap, and once in a while he comes over to the junk yard to rekindle old memories. Otherwise, he panhandles on a street corner downtown. No more fun! Boo hoo hoo!If they are going to entitle this record “A Day of Fun at the Circus”, then why in the h-e-double sticks was this picture chosen?
That’s the panhandler from across the street.  At least he bothers to crack a smile, with his album “When The Children Sing” (Cuando Cantan Los Ninos). The ultimate cliche hobo clown, smoking a stogie and looking dapper in his kid gloves, Red Skelton style.No other information was found.

Visits: 95

Crappy Album Covers #190 — I Can’t Count

Album_Cover_Crap_328_Cool_Five Hiroshi Uchiyamada (1936-2006) and The Cool Five are a Japanese group that proves that not knowing how to count is not merely a symptom of brainless white North American schoolchildren anymore, if it ever was. Determined to smash through Oriental stereotypes (after we sing a tune, join us for some Calculus!), the Cool Five have always boldly portrayed themselves as six people. No “Asian fail” for these folks! They get the White fail! 

Even after Hiroshi’s death, they searched around for a sixth member to fill up the Five, and found Kiyoshi Maekawa to join up with Etsuro Miyamoto, Masaki Kobayashi, Masashi Osawa, Ryoma Nishida, and Tetsuya Yamagami.

Since 1969, their total sales nearly exceeded 6 million units. Maybe that’s the only math that really matters.
Album_Cover_Crap_404_purgatorio_com Can’t count to 4. There yuh go. White fail. 

Please God, let the patron saint of mathematicians (whomever s/he may be) come down to these people with their blessings and maybe knock some math sense into them. Amen.

 

Visits: 75

Crappy Album Covers #180 — The standards and the classics

Album_Cover_Crap_331 Elva Miller (1907-1997) made her claim to fame with purposefully bad Ethel Merman imitations where she sung songs from the Great American Songbook out of tune, along with many other kinds of well-known songs.When Mrs. Miller “Does her Thing”, I think the message here is that it is time to run  and hide. You never know what’s in those brownies.
Album_Cover_Crap_324_gyorgy “Hey! Youse guys want to hear some o’ dat long-hair classical music or what? Well, don’t let some schmuck wearing a tux tell you what classical music is; let me tell you. Now, uh, I think my music teacher  told me dat once you hear The Nutcracker, all of the classical music sounds like that. Trouble is, though, my music teacher ran off with my money before I had all my lessons. Dat’s why I dress like a bum. My brudder here got through his lessons, but got killed in an accident with a cabbage truck. We cryogenically froze him in dis position, and so once in a while I take the fiddle from his hand, and fool around with it a bit. Frig it, he’s dead anyway — and I put it back after a while.”

No information exists about Markos and Nadas Gyorgy that I am aware of.

Here is Miss Elva Miller, singing “These Boots Are Made for Walking”. Rather than sounding like Merman, I think that in this song at least, she sounds more like Miss Piggy on the Muppet Show. This is off of her “Greatest Hits” LP:

Visits: 120

Crappy Album Covers #179 — Strange Cowboys

Album_Cover_Crap_327_Gercei_Camargo No idea who this cowboy wannabe is, but Gercei Camargo’s idea of being a cowboy — and a singing one at that — is to wear something strange over his nether region (looks like a kilt with a cushion) and frilly pants over his cowboy boots.
Album_Cover_Crap_333 Sharon McNight’s “Another Side Of” was likely released after 1989. Many blogs I have seen referred to the shirtless cowboy who looks like he is about to spew chunks; and the two dogs next to Sharon who blend into the carpet too well. I can add that her black dress makes her white as a ghost. And doesn’t the set seem a little tilted?

Sharon is (or has been) a Tony award-winning actress on Broadway, and is still performing between New York and her native San Francisco.

Visits: 112

Crappy Album Covers #177 — Hi, mum!

Album_Cover_Crap_329_Woodruff Little information exists on Mr. Woodruff, so I just have to say that he seems to be too young in the photo to know how he feels. Maybe his English teacher told him for the first time to write about something that made him angry or happy or whatever.Nathan feels like wearing a ruffled shirt with a bowtie today, to go with his 5 O’Clock shadow and mutton chops. Maybe for his next birthday, mum will get Nathan an appointment to get a perscription for contact lenses.
Album_Cover_Crap_340 Wally appears onstage in a packed auditorium, then notices his mother in the audience. She doesn’t expect to see him. She thought she was here to see another guy named Wally Whyton. He finally drops what he’s doing onstage, and waves, looking at her straight in the eye: “It’s Me, Mum!”Wallace Whyton (1929-1997) was not only a musician, but also an announcer for several BBC Radio programs over a 30-year period between 1960 and 1990. He was also active in television, having been a TV host on the Grenada network, as well as appearing on several children’s programs.

Visits: 293

Crappy Album Covers #176 — Un-subtle and Cliche

Album_Cover_Crap_322_Supertramp-Crisis-What-Crisi Supertramp could have done better with their fourth album, “Crisis? What Crisis?”, released in 1975. Their artistic skills, which served them so well for songwriting should also be reflected in their choice of album cover. The title and album cover says utterly nothing original, even by 1975 standards.
Album_Cover_Crap_323_Kenny_Loggins Creator of what O’Donnel and Guterman call “The twin towers of movie theme stupidity ‘Danger Zone’ and ‘Footloose'”, Kenny Loggins leaves no cliche unturned. They forgot a third: “I’m Alright” (Theme from Caddyshack). Alive was released in 1980, and at least, unlike Supertramp, the album cover comes by its cliche qualities honestly, without all that bothersome high literary and musical quality that burdens Supertramp.

Visits: 93

Crappy Album Covers #168 — Sucky Latino

Album_Cover_Crap_320_Latino_Love This is Richard Hayman’s 1969 cheezily synthesized “Genuine Electric Latin Love Machine”. Hear synthesized versions of songs like “The Girl From Ipanema”, “The Windmills of Your Mind”, and “Hare Krishna”. 

Wait … “Hare Krishna” is a Latin tune? Naw! And “Windmills” isn’t exactly Latin either, come to think of it. Looks like the robot needs to be re-programmed.
Album_Cover_Crap_295_funniez_net The Pachacamac is an ancient Peruvian site, thought to be nearly 3000 years old. Legend has it that every so often, on a clear sunny day, this dark haired guy in a tank top rises up from the Lurin River nearby and sings Latin hits. 

Of course, it is only the stuff of legend, and no one knows if it’s true.

One blog has Beto Mendez’s nationality as Ecuadorian. The album was produced likely some time in the mid-1960s.

 

Visits: 84

Crappy Album Covers #167 — Negative Brand Recognition II

Album_Cover_Crap_279_rateyourmusic_com_2001 This is the Manchester-based group, The Chameleons, with their 2001 CD “Why Call It Anything” with the world’s biggest UPC symbol to bugger up scanners all over the world. Behind that is some kind of dorky, clowny smiley thingy with too many teeth but excellent bridgework. 

What galls me is that the band, or some human, … somewhere, had to approve this album cover before it got released. It could have all been prevented, but I would say now that all those involved are covering their tracks, now.
Album_Cover_Crap_278_rateyourmusic_com_1983 “Script of the Bridge” their first album. A nice pencil crayon design that their Grade 12 art teacher would approve of. 

I have this album, and have owned a copy since at least 1984. The contents of this album are very good, and it was re-released last year with an additional bonus CD.

Visits: 75

Crappy Album Covers #166 — Negative Brand Recognition I: Weezer

Album_Cover_Crap_282_thealmightyguru_com_WeezerBlue Uh, yeah, like, we’re members of this band “Weezer”, and, uh, like, buy our record OK?

Weezer is a band that may, on some level, be authentic and earthy (in the grunge sense); but with these album covers, they just look like some guys that just came out of Starbucks to pose for a cover before going back to their lattes.

This is thier first album, self-titled (or to re-use an old joke, maybe they didn’t title it themselves).
Album_Cover_Crap_283_thealmightyguru_com The Beatles had their songs on albums referred to as “The Red Album” and “The Blue Album”, so why can’t Weezer? This is their third self-titled album, referred to as “the Red Album”, released in 2008. No matter how they dress, they still look like they are about to trot back to Starbucks to order their biscottis and doppio macchiatoes in the best fake Italian they can.

The picture-of-band-members-on-a-primary-colour-background aesthetic has, I believe, run its course, Weezer. Consider that artistic avenue explored, and move on. Please.

Visits: 80

Crappy Album Covers #165 — Just Hanging Around

Album_Cover_Crap_275_rateyourmusic_com This is the second CD released by the Toronto-based group Our Lady Peace. The cover features septuagenarian model Saul Fox, a frequent flier on many of OLP’s album covers. A combination of bad lighting and bad retouching makes it pretty clear that he is standing on the floor, giving little cause for the fear and tension in Fox’s expression. There should have been more effort made to produce the illusion of being airborne. And Fox ought to lose the mascara.

Considering that Canada has roughly the same population as California, selling one million albums in Canada alone is a rare achievement, and is awarded diamond status. OLP’s album Clumsy went diamond in 1997.

In the United States, Diamond is awarded by the RIAA for sales in excess of 10 million.
Album_Cover_Crap_265_funkyjunktrunk_com This lady likes to hang around too, although she looks more relaxed, and besides, she seems to have bagged a couple of hunters for herself. And while she doesn’t look like a “big dame”, I am sure most guys won’t mind her size at all. My only fear is that she might end up on some guy’s mantle as a trophy woman.

This is put out by “Sounds of A Thousand Strings”, although there are many blogs and sites selling used/reissued copies of this LP that claim it is by Art Neville, the New Orleans-based studio musician. Not much other reliable information seems to exist, such as what year this album was made. I am getting years in the 1980s and 1990s, likely the year of reissue. However, the depiction of late Nebraskan model/actress Irish McCalla (1928-2002) places this LP solidly in the mid-1950s.

 

Visits: 83

(Adult Content) Crappy Album Covers #164 — How they do it

Album_Cover_Crap_300_guardian_co_uk This is a 2005 album by Coco Rosie called “Noah’s Ark”. We see unicorns having a threesome over here (a slight departure from Genesis). My impression was that this album was some kind of progressive/heavy metal/grunge/experimental album. However, this is far from the case. Coco Rosie plays folk. Freak folk, to cite Wikipedia.Coco Rosie is a French-based female duo Bianca “Coco” Leilani and Sierra Rose “Rosie” Casady.
Album_Cover_Crap_291_rateyourmusic_com_cooked I put the black bars there myself, and consider it an improvement. The band name and title say it all anyway, doesn’t it? Their oeuvre deals mainly with taboo and edgy subjects ranging from drug addiction to necrophilia. Their approach is rarely serious; mostly absurdist. “Jim Seed Collector” is the name of a seven-inch single, released some time back.Smell & Quim are a British experimental group, performing in England as late as 2007.

Visits: 86