The Homer & Jethro Project #42

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#42

September 1960 - RCA 47-7790 - Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini / Please, Help Me I'm Falling

A their parting shot to 1960, Homer and Jethro took on the unlikely and impossibly irritating Bryan Hyland hit "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini" about a girl who was embarrassed by the swimsuit that she chose to go to the beach in. Apparently its lack of modesty didn't occur to her when she was purchasing it in the first place.
It's when you hear the terrible crap like the original here that you realize the impact that Elvis' army stint and Chuck Berry's jail time had on the wretched state of popular music at the time.

 Dark days.
It was still a full two years before Dick Dale and surf music would revive the ailing corpse of rock and roll (only to have a bunch of limeys water it down again two years after that)

The B side is a song that would eventually be included on the next Lp. We'll pick it up now.

February 1961 - lsp 2286 - Songs my Mother Never Sang

Another Lp. Another Jack Davis cover. The originals as I am aware are linked.

For this one Chet Atkins decided to leave some of the studio chatter in with the music as an illustration of what he had to put up with. Chester was a patient man.
(The Connie Francis number that kicks things off still makes me laugh.)

Among My Souvenirs
Sweet Violets
Come Here Little Wifey!
The Tattooed Lady
Please Help Me,I'm Falling
How Come There's No Dog Day?
I Love Your Pizza
Don't Jump Off The Roof Dad
Will You Love Me When
She Was Bitten On The Udder By An Adder
In The Shade Of The Old Apple Tree

February 1961 - RCA 47-7852 - Are You Lonesome Tonight / I Love Your Pizza

As another bonus to go with the Lp our boys had another dig at Elvis with a stab at "Are You Lonesome Tonight" but the song itself is another much older tune.

The song itself goes back to 1927 when the Canadian tenor, Henry Burr recorded it.



There's not much more to say about it.

The Homer & Jethro Project #41

Jeebus, we're into May already. Time flies.

#41

February 1960 - RCA 47-7704 - El Paso-Numero Dos / That's Good, That's Bad

A month after dropping the live record our boys took their first swipe at "El Paso" which had been a big hit for Marty Robbins the previous September. They'd have another go at it a bit later on a Western Themed lp, but to my ears, they nailed it the first time.

B side is a bit that as near as I can figure was originated by future Hee Haw star Archie Campbell about the relativity of what is good or not in today's modern society called "That's Good, That's Bad".

It's interesting that there was a time when it was perfectly acceptable to do somebody else's comedy routine. At least Archie gets credited and hopefully made a few bucks in royalties for this B side.

June 1960 - RCA 47-7744 - Sink the Bismark / He'll Have to Go


If you've got a better memory than I then you may remember Johnny Horton from H&JP #39 and his penchant for doing songs based on history.

Well, since the Battle for New Orleans was a winner he opted for something a bit more in recent memory and wrote one about the German warship, the Bismarck and the Allied effort to sink it early on in WWII. Even more puzzling as to why there needed to be such a song is that it became a Top Ten hit. "Sink the Bismarck" was not one of Horton's finest moments except for maybe his bankbook.

Homer & Jethro adapt the song from it's inspiring true tale of the hunt for the deadly menace of the Atlantic and to one that is more likely truer to their war time experiences.
We won anyway.

For the B side the boys take on Jim Reeves dreary doormat/cuckold fetish classic "He'll Have to Go".

It never ceases to amaze me that way that some of these alleged sad and romantic classic songs take a seriously toxic relationship and immortalize it in a gilt frame of backing vocals and strings.

For fuck sakes Jim, grow a pair and dump her already.

The Homer & Jethro Project #40

Like a biblical flood we have reached at last the forty post mark

And it's a live one.

Literally so.

January 1960 - lsp-2161 - At the Country Club

So here we are at the dawn of the 1960s and all the tumult that would come and Homer & Jethro kick it off with a live record.

This is one of the first ones of theirs I heard and I think that's one of the reasons I became a fan in the first place. Comedy as a rule tends to have a short shelf life. Topical stuff that's hilarious one year is passe the next and sometimes the things that seemed funny twenty years ago are just cringe inducing watching in later years. (I'm looking at your "M.A.S.H." and "Cheers") This one for the most part still works. A lot of it has to do with timing and delivery. They honed their chops and their schtick over years and years of live work and seem to generally be enjoying themselves.

Perhaps you'll enjoy yourself too.

For this particular record I've taken the liberty to split it up into individual tracks with songs and comic interludes between songs. That way you can just listen to the musical portions without the talking bits if you so choose. It just seemed like the polite thing to do.

Listen and absorb. Soak in it a bit. Let words and phrases from it seep into your normal conversations. It's good for you