Roger Price & Jeff Harris: The Elephant Record

The audio companion to Price/Stern/Sloan's dry-to-the-point-of-haiku elephant joke compendium The Elephant Book. How do you get six elephants in a Volkswagen? Three in front, three in back.

Here Come the Elephants
Elephants Never Remember
Elephant Hop
Elephant Song Festival
Norman the Short-Nosed Elephant
At Sea
Do Not Play This Band!
Put Them All Together
Elephant Bill
Elephant Lament
On Top of Old Elephant
Tarzan & Jane
Fay Blossom & Daddy
Elephant Hop Again
Famous Elephants in History

LP art & audio

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.

Ludwig & The Klassics: Mumph?

The perfect instrumental underscore to that great lost Blake Edwards movie in your mind. Deathless classical melodies get slapped with a groovy 1966 paint job (that is, both the arrangements and the names are modern; most of the track titles are made-up monikers for old familiar tunes. The data in brackets are mine). None of the instrumentalists or guys on the cover are named; this may well be a Wrecking Crew joint. Fortunately the publishing data on the labels reveals the mastermind to be Joe Saraceno, staff producer for Liberty Records and hit producer of instrumental combos The Ventures, The Marketts, and The Routers. Joe Saraceno and Buddy Prima did most of the arrangements here, with contributions from Sandy Linzer, Denny Randell, and Ernie Freeman.

My Heart Reminds Me
Forgive Me, Beethoven [Chopin, Waltz, Opus 64 #2 in C sharp minor]
Secret Service [Brahms, Hungarian Dance #5]
Ruffles [???]
Camp Capers [???]
Mumph [Liszt, Liebestraum]
A Lover’s Concerto [J.S. Bach, Minuet for Harpsichord in G Major]
Meat Hand Symphony [Rachmaninoff, Prelude in C sharp minor]
Ludwig’s Lament [Tchaikovsky, Piano Concerto #1 in B flat minor]
Snuff [Mozart, Piano Sonata #15 in C]
Symphonic Nights [Tchaikovsky, Symphony #6 “Pathetique” 1st movement]
Harumphfft [Grieg, Piano Concerto in A minor Opus 16]

Music & artwork

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.

毛泽东思想育英雄 (Mao Tse-Tung’s Thought Brings Up Heroes)

Bring the Cultural Revolution into your own home. As far as I can tell, this is a various artists collection.

欢呼中央命令发表 (Hail the Order Issued by the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party)
向门合同志学习 (Learn from Comrade Men Ho)
一切为着毛主席 (Do Everything for Chairman Mao’s Sake)
心中有个红太阳 (Comrade Men Ho Has a Red Sun in His Heart)
学习门合举红旗 (Learn from Men Ho and Uphold the Red Banner)
歌唱支左爱民模范排 (Sing of the Model Platoon in Supporting the Left and Cherishing the People)
英雄的四排钢铁的兵 (The Heroic Fourth Platoon, Soldiers of Iron)
歌唱英雄李文忠 (In Praise of the Hero Li Wen-Chung)
毛主席挥手我前进 (We Advance When Chairman Mao Gives the Signal)
学习年四旺 “斗私批修” 当闯将 (Learn from Nien Sze-Wang and Be Brave Fighters in “Fighting Self-Interest and Repudiating Revisionism”)
千万个年四旺在成长 (Tens of Thousands of Nien Sze-Wang Are Growing Up)
学习张春玉好榜样 (Learn from the Good Example of Chang Chun-Yu)
歌唱英雄吕祥璧 (Sing of the Hero Lu Hsiang-Pi)
学习郭嘉宏高举红旗永远向前进 (Learn from Kuo Chia-Hung and March Forward with the Red Banner Held High)
最大的幸福是读毛主席的书 (The Greatest Happiness Is to Study Chairman Mao’s Works)

LP audio & art & lyrics booklet

The Credibility Gap: A Great Gift Idea / Floats [1979]

...and here's Sierra/Briar's 1979 reissue of The Credibility Gap's A Great Gift Idea, which came packaged with a second, previously unreleased bonus LP, Floats. Every year for much of the 1970s, the Gap would get up early on New Year's Day and trundle over to Pasadena to do a live running radio commentary on the Rose Parade. They'd torture this kitchy river of pace-car-led Americana with fake celebrity interviews, documentary segments, and impressive descriptions of a helium-filled Gary Coleman flying high above the crowd's heads. This LP package had a double-obverse; no matter how you held it, each side was oriented to be the front. Correspondingly, the interior gatefold text flows in two directions, requiring the reader to make a 180-degree flip in the middle of reading. Definitely the goofiest of the Gap albums, this is a personal favorite - and if I had to choose between the 1974 and 1979 Great Gift Idea covers, not only does this reissue cover win, if I were a country it would be my flag.

The Floats album:

Parade Theme
Minidoc
Parade
Curt
Parade
Fred Cadaver
Parade
Dave Swarts
Parade
Curt
Parade
A Queen's Diary
Parade
Rabbi Korff
Parade
Pasadena
Parade
Dave Swarts
Parade
Mayor of Palmdale
Parade
Curt's Closing Thoughts
Parade Theme

And for additional fun, read along with the 88th Annual Tournament of Roses Program from 1977, where you can peek into a Queen’s diary, thrill to ads for Super 8 highlights from last year’s parade, and bleed your eyes out over concept paintings of all the year’s floats, including that perilously-balanced Bicycle-built-for-too-many from Bank of America.

LP art, "Floats" audio, Rose Parade program

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.

The Credibility Gap: A Great Gift Idea [1974]

Here's the original double gatefold cover art for The Credibility Gap's 1974 Warner/Reprise LP. Now buy the CD reissue on the Collector's Choice label, because "A Date With Danger" will just kill you.

LP art

贫下中农最爱毛主席: 河北省农民业余演出队演唱的歌曲 (Poor and Lower-Middle Peasants Love Chairman Mao Most: Songs by the Peasants' Amateur Cultural Team of Hopei Province)

Boy, the woman second from the right is really smiling. I wonder if it saved her from a struggle session. Another no-nonsense artifact from Mao's Cultural Revolution on China Records.


贫下中农最爱毛主席 (Poor and Lower-Middle Peasants Love Chairman Mao Most)
毛主席穿上绿军装 (Chairman Mao Puts On His Olive-Green Uniform)
看看俺队的好庄稼 (Look at the Well-Grown Crops of Our Team)
誓把大寨来赶上 (We'll Catch Up with Tachai with Great Determination)
征服自然人当家 (Conquer Nature and Be Its Master)
毛泽东思想照俺庄 (Mao Tse-Tung's Thought Illuminates Our Village)
俺社的姑娘就是强 (Girls in Our Village Are Really Capable)
八个大嫂闹深翻 (Eight Sisters-In-Law Take Part in the Spring Ploughing)
种好棉花为革命 (We Grow Cotton for the Revolution)
又是农民又是兵 (We Are Both Peasants and Militiamen)

LP audio & art (including lyric booklet)

The Police "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da" in Spanish & Japanese

The liner notes to the Message in a Box collection say "This is it - everything the Police released", which is a LIE because these two songs weren't included. I want them to REFORM THE COLUMBIA HOUSE MUSIC CLUB so I can return that box set and demand my money back, and I want Sting to GO BACK IN TIME and unwrite this song, and I want a RACECAR and a PONY and a GALAGA.

De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da (in Spanish)
De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da (in Japanese)

7-inch audio & art

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.

Dylan Thomas: Under Milk Wood

The BBC radioplay version of Under Milk Wood featuring Richard Burton has been reissued several times over the years on CD. Meanwhile here's a great hi-res restored scan of the terrific cover art by British illustrator Olga Lehmann.

LP artwork

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.

"Legs" Larry Smith: "Springtime for Hitler" b/w "I've Got a Braun New Girl (In God Wet Rust)"

And what was missing from Mel Brooks' classic original "Springtime for Hitler" that only Legs Larry Smith could provide in 1978? A disco version. (And an appropriately esoteric flip, a power-pop duet between Dolph and Eva.) One of the great 7" 45s emitted from ex-members of the Bonzo Dog Band in the 1970s like heavy metals from art-school-educated uranium.

Springtime for Hitler
I've Got a Braun New Girl (In God Wet Rust)

7-inch audio & art


DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.