The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #102174 Message #2068778
Posted By: johnross
04-Jun-07 - 11:49 PM
Thread Name: Worst Folk Song Ever?
Subject: RE: Worst Folk Song Ever?
It might be fun to write -- and not sing except in jest -- a "worst folk song." Seems to me it could have all the faults described in "And I'd Like You Join in the Chorus" or the things that the "Ramblin' Syd Rumpo" character on "Round the Horne" used to do (now heard each Wednesday on BBC Radio 7).
For example:
A spoken introduction that takes longer than it takes to sing the damn song, and that spoils the surprise ending
A long repetitive ballad with a plot that makes absolutely no sense
A gibberish chorus
A crucial character introduced in Verse 2 and then never mentioned until Verse 19
Any song that shifts between two or more languages without warning (such as English and either Gaelic, Welsh, or Coast Salish dialect)
A meter and/or instrumental break that sounds like a dance written by a composer with one leg shorter than the other (apologies to PDQ Bach)
Multiple strained rhymes (like "...her men are all like Abelard, her women like Heloise/All honest virtuous people, for they live in Illinois)