Lyr Add: Automation (Allan Sherman)

Subject: Lyr Add: AUTOMATION (Allan Sherman)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 12:15 AM

AUTOMATION
Words, Allan Sherman. Tune: Fidenco Dante Marchetti, "Fascination."
As recorded by Allan Sherman on "My Son, the Nut" (1963)

It was automation, I know,
That was what was making the factory go.
It was IBM. It was Univac.
It was all those gears going clickety-clack, dear.
I thought automation was keen,
Till you were replaced by a ten-ton machine.
It was that computer that tore us apart, dear.
Automation broke my heart.

There's an RCA five-oh-three
Standing next to me, dear, where you used to be.
Doesn't have your smile, doesn't have your shape,
Just a bunch of punch cards and light bulbs and tape, dear.
You're a girl who's soft, warm, and sweet,
But you're only human, and that's obsolete.
Though I'm very fond of that new five-oh-three, dear,
Automation's not for me.

It was automation, I'm told.
That's why I got fired and I'm out in the cold.
How could I have known when the five-oh-three
Started in to blink, it was winking at me, dear?
It thought it was just some mishap
When it sidled over and sat on my lap,
But when it said "I love you" and gave me a hug, dear,
That's when I pulled out its plug.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Automation (Allan Sherman)
From: GUEST,Gerry
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 09:08 AM

Do you know that lyrics to just about everything by Sherman are available at
http://dmdb.org/sherman/
?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Automation (Allan Sherman)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 11:44 AM

No, I didn't. Thanks for the info. I could have saved myself some typing.

However, I see the site in question commits some howlers like "parody of 'Comin' Thro' The Rye' by Nellie Melba." I looked her up: Nellie Melba was an Australian opera singer who died in 1931. Regardless of how well known she might have been in Australia, I doubt that Allan Sherman had her performance in mind.

Anyway, it annoys me when any performer, rather than the songwriter, is given credit for a song, even when a certain performer seems to "own" a song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Automation (Allan Sherman)
From: GUEST,Gerry
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 09:31 PM

Jeff Morris, who maintains the site, welcomes corrections by email at the address given there. Nellie Melba was famous well beyond Australia.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Automation (Allan Sherman)
From: jeffp
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 10:29 PM

Indeed. She inspired both Peche Melba and Melba Toast.