.

 

Primal tunes for preemie ears

 

 Exotica from before you knew any better

 

I first heard this song on "That's Hollywood", a syndicated 20th Century Fox archival footage show with voice overs by Tom Bosley (Howard Cunnigham making some pocket change in the days before infomercials and Murder She Wrote). There was this humorous short where a herd of cattle were walking around and Tex Avery (famous for his Red Hot Riding Hood and Droopy characters, amongst others) and his studio had animated lips over the cows mouths so they were singing the song. 

I didn't know it was a a hit novelty song on top of all that til after I happened upon it in a 40's collection some years after I'd started University- but I knew almost all of the lyrics by heart years earlier from that singing-cow short.

Cow-Cow Boogie   - Ella Mae Morse

Download   
Cow-cow Boogie  
(3.0 MB file)
 

 

Disney.... Wow... I hope I'm not sued for this...
Whenever a story is told, tradtionally, there's a place in the narrative where we're all shown what the "status quo" is, before things get all upturned and that staus quo gets complicated for the sake of drama.  This song hits at exactly that moment in Snow White. Apart from being kind of a seminal corn-pone down-home hootenany (just listen to that yodelling!)  its probably one of the most consistantly, blissfully happy pieces of music I can remember from my childhood. Those frickin dwarfs are getting down and there's nobody gonna stop 'em!  Dig in, and listen closely for Adrianna Caselotti legitimately cracking up in the middle of the take (right after the gong) so badly that the boys in animation had to work into the piece instead of doing it all over again and for the "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" interpolation right round the point where the boys are clapping their hands and shouting "Hey!". This one brings me tears of joy on a consistant basis. You just can't not be happy listening to this...
 
A Silly Song (The Dwarf's Yodelling Song) 
- Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs 

Download   
The Dwarfs Yodelling Song  
(4.3 MB file)
 
The Jungle Book was the last film that Walt Disney personally supervised and was criticised at the time for being a kind of radio show with pictures, where the animators specificly based their character designs on film footage of the actors who performed the voices.  This was seen as a problem at the time when both Louis Prima and Phil Harris were still alive, but now it gives us a fun look at how they might have been groovin in the recording booth when this track was laid. Watching Louis as both a human then as an ourangatang you can see his trademark hand shaking and side lean and Harris' trademark hand slapping and arm bends... The scat in the middle of this is just astounding. This is probably the single most-covered Disney tune as of 1995, as well, having hit the whole swing / lounge groove straight on its edge.
 
I Wanna Be Like You- Louis Prima and Phil Harris

 

Download   
I Wanna Be Like You  
(3.8 MB file)
 


 
.
 
 
Ready to go back?