Celebrating the birthday of Bret McKenzie of Flight of the Conchords by including a bunch of the duo’s songs on today’s playlist.
Follow Tunes du Jour on Facebook
Follow Tunes du Jour on Twitter
Follow me on Instagram
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 8-11-22
Today’s playlist celebrates the August 11 birthdays of A Tribe Called Quest’s Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Joe Jackson, The Postal Service/Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard, Raspberries’ Eric Carmen, Kris Kross’s Chris “Mac Daddy” Kelly, Tierra Whack, The Regents’ Guy Villari, songwriter Kenneth Gamble, and Mike Douglas; and the August 12 birthdays of Dire Straits’ Mark Knopfler, Sparks’ Ron Mael, Pat Metheny, Kid Creole & the Coconuts’ August Darnell, Del the Funkee Homosapien, Buck Owens, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Porter Wagoner, Joe Jones, Felt’s Lawrence, Tanita Tikaram, Infernal’s Lina Rafn, and Michael Ian Black.
Follow Tunes du Jour on Facebook
Follow Tunes du Jour on Twitter
Follow me on Instagram
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (8-12-20)
Inspired by the August 12 birthdays of Dire Straits’ Mark Knopfler, Kid Creole, Sparks’ Ron Mael, Buck Owens, Porter Wagoner, Sir Mix-a-Lot, Tanita Tikaram, Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Joe Jones, Pat Metheny, Infernal’s Lina Rafn, and Michael Ian Black.
Der Fuehrer’s Face
“Der Fuehrer’s Face” was the first hit song for Spike Jones and His City Slickers, a pre-rock & roll Ylvis. The wacky recording, on which Hitler gets razzed, was written for an Academy Award-winning Walt Disney cartoon originally entitled Donald Duck in Nutzi Land. The song hit #3 on the pop charts in 1942.
I was introduced to the song by Dr. Demento, whose radio show initially existed to present rare old recordings, but morphed into a showcase for novelty records after listeners requested such tunes repeatedly.
Jones’ orchestra is best-remembered for their Christmas evergreen “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth,” written by an elementary school teacher named Donald Gardner, who upon asking his students what they want for Christmas noticed that most of them were missing teeth.
Jones, who passed away in 1965, was born on this day in 1911.Today’s playlist is inspired by him and includes other songs that were popular on The Dr. Demento Show with some stand-up comedy thrown in.