If you know me at all, you know that I tend to have a somewhat morbid sense of humour. I actually like to think that my humour is quite varied--I can appreciate low-brow humour, high-brow humour, smart jokes, dumb jokes, stupid jokes, dad jokes, puns, even just giving someone "rabbit ears" behind their back. But I do have a fondness for satire and I pride myself on being able to laugh at things that "normal" or even "civilized" people wouldn't consider "funny."
I
find satire and "dark humour" often go hand in hand. It's actually a
wonderful coping mechanism for dealing with hard times. I've tended to
gravitate toward it a lot over the last 25 years or so. In an effort to
stay informed about what's going on, I have to hear about
all these horrible things that are going on in the world around me.
Finding the humour in it makes it bearable. Admittedly, it's become
something of a crutch probably since 9/11. The last few months in
particular have been kind of worrisome and I shudder to think what the
next four years will bring.
This
week's album comes from one of the greatest satirists of the twentieth
century, Tom Lehrer. What's funny to me is that Lehrer considers
himself first and foremost an academic. Though not a full-fledged
professor, he has taught undergraduate math at many prestigious colleges
and universities. A Harvard grad himself, Lehrer wrote a handful of
songs and recorded a couple of albums in the 1950s as a side hustle.
His primary passion is teaching--as such he hasn't recorded a full album
in 60 years. His last recording sessions (that I'm aware of) consisted
of three songs in 1999 that were released on a boxed set of his work
the following year.
I
first became aware of Lehrer's work through Dr. Demento who put two of
his songs--"Poisoning Pigeons in the Park" and "The Masochism Tango"--on
his own anniversary collection. Those songs became some of my
favourites on that set. I thought they were smartly written. The
darkness of the lyrics was offset by the upbeat tempo of the music which
made the whole piece even funnier for me. What still stands out to me
are his amazing rhymes. They are absolutely genius. "It's not against
any religion to want to dispose of a pigeon," "I've never quibbled if it
was ribald," and my personal favourite, "Everybody say his own kyrie
eleison" are just a few examples of his magnificent wordplay. Rappers
should study Lehrer's work.
I
recently acquired that aforementioned 2000 boxed set, The Remains of Tom Lehrer, which includes all
five of his albums in their entirety plus a whole bunch of bonus
tracks, many of which had been previously unreleased. What fascinated
me in listening to some of those songs again was how satirical many of
them really were. Some songs such as "I Wanna Go Back To Dixie,"
"We Will All Go Together When We Go," and "So Long, Mom (A Song For
World War III)" still seem relevant more than 60 years after he wrote
them. Because it's satire, I can't decide if this is a good thing or a
bad thing.
He
stepped away from recording and touring in the 1960s. Over the decades
he has recorded a handful of educational songs for children's
television programs, but he stopped writing political satire, which he
said "became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize." Lehrer retired from teaching at the University of California
Santa Cruz in 2001, teaching his last math class on the subject of
infinity. As an example of how secondary his musical career is to him
(something I actually quite admire), in 2020, Lehrer relinquished the
rights to his songs and all of them are now in the public domain. He
will celebrate his 97th birthday this coming April.
This
week's album was originally released in 1965 and was included on the
third disc of that boxed set. I was immediately taken by the opening
track, "National Brotherhood Week." Again, I was surprised how much the
song still resonates in 2025. It was recorded live at the hungry i in
San Francisco in July of that year. I appreciated the fact that the
audience seemed to be as enamoured of his music as I am. It's nice to
know that there are people out there whose senses of humour are as
warped as mine. Please enjoy That Was The Year That Was.
Until
next week, stay safe, be good to your neighbours, and please remember
that if at first you don't succeed, then skydiving definitely isn't for
you.
Yours in peace, love, and rock and roll!
The Reverend Will the Thrill
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