Mix Tape was lost! Vol. 37: Morocco 45s

This mixtapewaslost:
a mix of a short stack of 45s I picked up in Fez.

Department of Five Word Poems: xvii.

93.

Aluminum oranges came from nowhere.
-F. Keith Wahle

xvii.

My wives conspiring against me.

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From the Lewis Carroll Blog: "Alice's Theme": Music & Lyrics by Danny Elfman

Over at the blog Mrs Eley-Nelson & I keep up for the Lewis Carroll Society of North America (all of which is about to move to be integrated with the Society's new website, so watch for the White Rabbit), here's my delightful post today gently ribbing Mr Danny Elfman's lyrics:

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Danny Elfman's soundtrack to Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland will be released on CD (an ancient kind of optical disc used to store digital audio) next Tuesday, March 2nd, and there's some short clips at the Amazon store if you desire a teaser. I couldn't help noticing the opening song - with children's voices singing "Oh, Alice, dear where have you been?" - and I found the complete lyrics at a blog called cinemusic.net. I'll include them with that website's charming introduction:

Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, starring Johnny Depp as Elijah Wood The Mad Hatter begins pissing off prickly Lewis Carroll purists on March 5, 2010 in theaters everywhere in eye-popping 3D. Lending musical support is Burton’s constant composer Danny Elfman, AKA film music’s most awesome red head.

Threaded throughout the score is an original song penned by Elfman, called “Alice’s Theme”, and it opens up the Disney Records score album due in stores on March 2 (obligatory Amazon link). Here’s a sneak peek at the song’s lyrics (thanks to the supremely talented LD for these)…

“Alice’s Theme”

Music and Lyrics by Danny Elfman

Oh, Alice, dear where have you been?

So near, so far or in between?

What have you heard what have you seen?

Alice, Alice, please, Alice!

Oh, tell us are you big or small

To try this one or try them all

It’s such a long, long way to fall

Alice, Alice, oh, Alice

How can you know this way not that?

You choose the door you choose the path

Perhaps you should be coming back

Another day, another day

And nothing is quite what is seems

You’re dreaming are you dreaming, oh, Alice?

(Oh, how will you find your way? Oh, how will you find your way?)

(There’s not time for tears today. There’s no time for tears today.)

So many doors – how did you choose

So much to gain so much to lose

So many things got in your way

No time today, no time today

Be careful not to lose your head

Just think of what the doormouse [sic] said…Alice!

Did someone pull you by the hand?

How many miles to Wonderland?

Please tell us so we’ll understand

Alice…Alice…Oh, Alice

(Oh how will you find you way? … Oh, how will you find you way?)

Sing along!

I've never met a prickly Lewis Carroll purist, let alone a pissed-off one, but I would presume they're easily decapitated with a vorpal sword. Or defenestrated with a defibrillator.

Anyway, if you are not familiar with Mr. Elfman, he is the film composer and long-time collaborator with Mr. Burton, the man wrote the iconic music for Batman, The Simpsons theme, and those wonderful songs for The Nightmare Before Christmas. He has done less-than-stellar work for some of Mr. Burton's more recent mediocrities. Elfman is often mocked in the classical world for basically having a team of composers do his work for him, although I sometimes feel this criticism is harsh. (After all, Renaissance painters employed whole crews of apprentices, Dale Chihuly has a studio to manifest his glass-art masterpieces, and George Gershwin didn't do the orchestrations for Rhapsody in Blue (free round of drinks if you can name the composer who did!) Art is not always the product of an agonized solo genius, sometimes she can be more of an architectural designer, et cetera, especially in the film music world. Thus ends this parenthetical rant.)

As dear to my adolescent heart as Elfman's music for The Nightmare Before Christmas is, there's many cringeworthy lyrics (e.g., "I wish my cohorts weren't so dumb / I'm not the dumb one / You're no fun / Shut up! / Make me!") I would pay a large sum of money to hire William Shatner to read the lyrics to "Alice's Theme" as a beat poem accompanied by bongos and upright bass (as he did for Sarah Palin's verbiage). In conclusion, Mr. Elfman should hire a real librettist.

Department of Five Word Poems: xvi.

89.

My elbow is on fire.
-F. Keith Wahle

xvi.

Our rainbows manufactured in Albuquerque.

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Three Years Ago: Music Review: Dr Ralph Stanley in Berkeley on his Eightieth Birthday

Continuing with our celebration of this blog's old age, the series Three Years Ago (started on the blog's three year anniversary, more than a year ago), which re-posts from the history exactly-to-the-minute three years later, will continue on thru this year, digging up from the pivotal year 2007. Now a classic music review:

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Last night, the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley hosted Dr Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys at St. John's Presbyterian Church. The opening act was Laurie Lewis & the Right Hands, from round here, & they were great. Then, when the headliner & the eight men he plays with made their way to the stage, Laurie ran up & announced that it was 9pm here, so therefore midnight “Clinch Mountain Time”, Ralph Stanley's 80^th birthday. In lieu of Mayor Bates, the mayor's senior aide read a proclamation, hilariously & formally worded, that because of his eminent career in the arts, & because he has played in Berkeley so many times for the past five decades, February 25^th would therefore henceforth be Ralph Stanley Day in Berkeley. (I wish I could quote the proclamation here, but other bloggers have also had no luck finding it.) There was a cake, too.

The evening after that was fairly short, it seemed like he only sang three or four of the dozen songs. He let each member of the band do something from one of their solo projects, & introduced each one with an old-fashion Grand Ole Opry MC style, dumb jokes & all. His son & grandson tour with him. His grandson loves Jesus, & also bling, & sang a mediocre gospel tune in three-four about how Jesus is “more brighter” than the stars. Dr. Ralph sang “O Death” from O Brother Where Art Thou, for which he once won a Grammy. It sounded pretty much the same. The music was great, mostly, but there was a bizarre self-congratulatory tone to the whole evening, with Nathan Stanley reading out a long list of awards & honors his grandfather had won, & James Shelton spending fifteen minutes explaining in great detail everything you could buy in the back (including two of the instruments on stage). My favorite musician was Jack Cooke, the “bass fiddle” player, who's been with Stanley for thirty-seven years, & sings upper harmony. He sang a beautiful song with Laurie Lewis about how the cookie crumbles. I smiled at him as he walked up the aisle, & he put his hand on my shoulder as he passed.

You can hear them play "Angel Band", also from the O Brother soundtrack, on the Prairie Home Companion website, here.

...he thinks it "could go in a lot of omelettes"

Mix Tape was lost! Vol. 36

Department of Five Word Poems: xv.

83.

Sometimes, we all go naked.
-F. Keith Wahle

xv.

My wives agree on nothing.

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