Comical tune names

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Comical tune names

14 May 01 - 07:30 PM (#462383)
Subject: Comical tune names
From: Marion

What are the most comical tune names you know?

There's a fiddle tune I know called, "I Buried My Wife and Danced on Her Grave."

I've heard of one - bluegrass, I think - called, "Play Rocky Top or I'll Punch Your Lights Out."

And I'm quite fond of "When Sick is it Tea you Want?"

But I think the award for weirdest tune name would have to go to "The Night We Had the Goats."

Marion

14 May 01 - 07:34 PM (#462389)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: wysiwyg

Dick's Maggot

Carolan's Battle with the Landlady

Smash the Windows

Roaring Jelly

The Growling Man and the Old Woman

~Susan

14 May 01 - 07:49 PM (#462408)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Spud Murphy

Mairzy Dotes And Dozy Dotes and Liddle Lamzy Divey

Spud

14 May 01 - 07:52 PM (#462411)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: kendall

Flop eared mule, Queen of sluts.

14 May 01 - 07:56 PM (#462413)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Matt_R

Old Hag You Have Killed Me!
Venus In Tweeds
Kirrie Kebbuck
'Round The House And Mind The Dresser
The Wee Dollop
Robbery With Violins

14 May 01 - 08:10 PM (#462421)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Karen

'I'm a Cranky Old Yank in a Clanky Old Tank on the Streets of Yokohama with my Honolulu Mama Doin' Those Beat-o, Beat-o Flat-On-My-Seat-o, Hirohito Blues'

14 May 01 - 08:11 PM (#462423)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Snuffy

Take Her Out And Air Her
The Floating Crowbar
The Wet Pussy

And Susan, I reckon Smash the Windows/Roaring Jelly must win the prize for having two stupid names for the same tune

14 May 01 - 09:23 PM (#462460)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Noreen

Upstairs in a tent<
Granny's Gravel Walks

14 May 01 - 09:36 PM (#462463)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Stewie

It's probably bogus, but occasionally cited by old-time groups: 'Feed Your Babies Onions (So You Can Find Them in the Dark'. The Highwoods Stringband used it as the title of their reissue compilation CD.

--Stewie

14 May 01 - 09:56 PM (#462467)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Jim Schiffman

If he can fight like he can love, the Kaiser's in real trouble.

14 May 01 - 09:59 PM (#462469)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Jim Schiffman

With her head tucked underneath her arm, she walks the bloody tower

14 May 01 - 10:16 PM (#462478)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: CarolC

Does it have to be folk? I kind of like 'Dental Hygiene Dilemma'. (Zappa)

14 May 01 - 10:44 PM (#462489)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Matt_R

Are we going for "tunes" as strictly music, or song names as well? Because there are thousands...millions...

14 May 01 - 10:49 PM (#462493)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Frogmore

Ramblin' Hunchback

15 May 01 - 02:03 AM (#462549)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Blackcatter

Drop Kick Me Jesus, Through the Goalpost of Life.

And a few from Jimmy Buffett:

The Weather is Here, Wish You Were Beautiful

My Head Hurts, My Feet Stink, and I Don't Love Jesus

Despiration Samba

Smart Woman in a Real Short Skirt

I used to Have Money One Time

If the Phone Doesn't Ring - It's Me

It's Midnight and I'm Not Famous Yet

15 May 01 - 06:14 AM (#462606)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: fat B****rd

Roger Miller had a couple (that's not the song) "My uncle used to love me, but she died" "You can't rollerskate in a buffalo herd"

15 May 01 - 06:30 AM (#462610)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Mikey Joe

Hold The Maid Down Till I Come At Her
Drag Her Round The Road
The Arrival Of The Queen Of Sheba Into Galway

15 May 01 - 06:59 AM (#462616)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Les from Hull

We have the habit of slightly renaming well-known tunes, so we now have the Jug of Slugs (Jig of Slurs), The Slimy Road to Otago (The Tarry Road to Sligo) and the Kid on the Mountain Bike.

Les

15 May 01 - 07:15 AM (#462622)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Skipjack K8

And there's Varnish Me Foreskin (Banish Misfortune)

Skipjack

15 May 01 - 08:56 AM (#462674)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Dooley

I can't get over you til you get out from under him.

Get the hammer, Mama, there's a fly on Papa's head.

My wife left and took the dog - and I miss him so much

15 May 01 - 09:25 AM (#462690)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Pseudolus

How can I miss you if you won't go away?
Get your tongue outta my mouth, I'm-a-kissin you goodbye
I'm So Miserable Without You, It's Like Having You Here
If I Had Shot You When I Wanted To, I'd Be Out By Now
She Got The Ring and I Got The Finger
You're The Reason Our Kids Are So Ugly

Just to name a few........
Frank

15 May 01 - 11:07 AM (#462745)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Ebbie

Folding Down the Sheets

15 May 01 - 11:14 AM (#462750)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Skipjack K8

The Mudcat favourite still cracks me up.

"Drop kick me, Jesus, through the goalposts of life"

Skipjack

15 May 01 - 11:14 AM (#462752)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Uncle_DaveO

And the ever-popular "I've got tears in my ears from lyin' on my back in my bed while I cry over you"!!!

Dave Oesterreich

15 May 01 - 11:20 AM (#462761)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Micca

There is a tune played by the Committee Band here in the UK that is called by them, " Mike Mullins farewell to his breakfast"

15 May 01 - 04:21 PM (#463027)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Fergie

My favourite is "I can't get over a girl like you, so you'll have to answer the phone yourself" I chuckle just writing it.

15 May 01 - 05:45 PM (#463093)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Marion

Matt, I was thinking of tune tunes, not songs, but it's a free country.

I forgot the combination by Neil Gow (or was it Nathaniel?): "Farewell to Whiskey" then later he composed "Welcome Whiskey Back Again."

Marion

15 May 01 - 06:29 PM (#463138)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Bill D

heard on the radio about 1974..."Johnny Broke MY Heart at Walgreen's and I Cried All the Way to Sears"

15 May 01 - 06:40 PM (#463159)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Melani

"Napolean Crossing the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel" and "The Flight of the Haggis"--both modern tunes by Bob Zentz.

15 May 01 - 10:37 PM (#463314)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST

"four days drunk"

(hm, not a bad way to pass the time, either)

(moniker, handle, nick, screenname omitted to spark fear, paranoia and spaw's INCREDIBLY bad manners)

15 May 01 - 11:24 PM (#463347)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: kendall

Take back your heart, I ordered liver

16 May 01 - 01:23 AM (#463487)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Blackcatter

"four days drunk" is funny?

HUH?

16 May 01 - 01:59 AM (#463510)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Crazy Eddie

"Mary, Hold The Candle Steady, While I Shave The Chicken's Lip"

16 May 01 - 02:06 AM (#463513)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Mike Byers

The Fiddler's Drunk and the Fun's All Over The Cat That Ate the Candle Cock Up Your Beaver The Checking of the Dome Light Five Constipated Men I Danced All Night With a Bottle in My Hand

16 May 01 - 09:03 AM (#463660)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Callie

Dave O: I thought that song was just a rumour!! Glad to know it really exists. Do you have the words, or know anything about it?

Callie

16 May 01 - 03:18 PM (#464052)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Dorrie

i used 2 believe that john ryans was called Wankers polka 4 years love dorrie xxxxxx

16 May 01 - 03:28 PM (#464062)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Captain Swing

The Farting Kraut

16 May 01 - 04:12 PM (#464096)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Jacob B

I've Been Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart

I've Got The Red With Rage, Yellow With Terror, Green With Envy, Purple With Passion Blues

Roaring Jelly Doughnuts/Toss The Cookies

16 May 01 - 07:25 PM (#464242)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: ray bucknell

If I Said You Had a Beautiful Body Would You Hold It Against Me

16 May 01 - 07:36 PM (#464254)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Jeri

We play Varnish Me Foreskin here, as well as Road to Kenny's Garage (Kerrigarrah, or something like it, but spelled right) and Barney the Pilgrim.

Real tune name: You Married My Daughter and Yet You Didn't

17 May 01 - 04:05 AM (#464477)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Peter Kasin

There's a highland pipe tune called "The Butt Of Lewis."

17 May 01 - 06:08 AM (#464514)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Dave the Gnome

Surprised 'Hens march to the midden' hasn't been mentioned.

In the song rather than tune category I don't know if I believed the guy who told me of 'It's been lonesome in the saddle since my horse dropped dead!'

Cheers

Dave the Gnome

17 May 01 - 09:28 AM (#464584)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Walking Eagle

Another vote for Drop Kick Me Jesus through the Goal Posts of Life. Also Does Your Chewing Gum Loose Your Flavor on the Bedpost Every Night?

Us dulcimer nuts in the Brandywine Dulcimer Fellowship are actually thinking about adding DKMJttGPoL to our playbook!

17 May 01 - 12:31 PM (#464752)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Jacob B

Dave, that's not a song title, but a line from The Cowpuncher's Lament, which is in the database here.

17 May 01 - 04:19 PM (#464977)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST

Maggots in a Sheep's Head

Squirrel Heads in Gravy

Mudsharks on Acid (a friend made up to play in a fiddle contest)

18 May 01 - 12:04 AM (#465223)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: ddw

One of my current favorites is Sylvester Weaver's "Me And My Tapeworm"

david

18 May 01 - 12:31 AM (#465238)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: catspaw49

"You Dun Stomped on My Heart (and you smashed that sucker flat)"--John Denver

"You're the Reason Our Kids Are Ugly"--Kacey Jones & Delbert McClinton

And then let's get to the late and great Frank Zappa:
"Weasels Ripped My Flesh"
"Prelude to the Afternoon of a Sexually Aroused Gas Mask"
"My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama"
"Latex Solar Beef"
"Lonesome Electric Turkey"
"Half A Dozen Provocative Squats"
"Cletus Awreetus-Awrightus" (really)
"Dinah Moe-Hum"
"Nanook Rubs It"
"Don't You Ever Wash That Thing?"
"The Illinois Enema Bandit"
"Broken Hearts Are For Assholes"
"Why Does It Hurt When I Pee"

....and about a hundred others....Ol' Frank knew a good title when he thought of one!!!!

Spaw

18 May 01 - 01:04 PM (#465668)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,marsh-man

"She was only a moonshiners daughter, but she always made me liquor". The Rev. Billy C. Wertz

18 May 01 - 04:47 PM (#465838)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,mkebenn@work

'Spaw, I'd forggoten "Dinahmo Hum" thanks, Mike

19 May 01 - 08:47 AM (#466174)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Nathan in Texas

For the record, "You Dun Stomped on My Heart (and you smashed that sucker flat)was written by Mason Williams and recorded by John Denver

19 May 01 - 09:07 AM (#466181)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: catspaw49

Yeah Nathan, I know......Thanks! But where did he get the line anyway?

Spaw

19 May 01 - 09:18 AM (#466186)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: gnu

Spaw ....and about a hundred others.... ? Got to be more than that !

19 May 01 - 12:04 PM (#466254)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Blackcatter

Zappa:

Ship Arriving Too Late To Save A Drowning Witch

19 May 01 - 10:56 PM (#466601)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Gypsy

King of the Fairies!

20 May 01 - 03:27 AM (#466679)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Peter Kasin

A Donegal fiddle tune: If There Weren't Any Women In The World.

20 May 01 - 10:34 AM (#466766)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Dunc

A tune written for the birthday of a lady who was reluctant to divulge her age...

Joy Mortimer's Twenty First Twenty First Birthday

21 May 01 - 10:24 AM (#467156)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler

I'm not an expert in what's funny (as you'll know if you've read my "jokes" in varous postings) but what folows is not my view but that of a columnist in the UK Independent

They're not clever and they're certainly not funny
Comedy records can be irritating and juvenile but rarely make you laugh.
Steve Jelbert names the guilty

18 May 2001
When Frank Zappa titled a live album Does Humor Belong in Music? and putting aside the equally pertinent question: does Frank Zappa belong in music? he raised an important point. For the two have rarely met to good effect. Ask most people what they associate comedy songs with, and the answer will rarely be "laughter".

No, it will be suppressed memories of smug Richard Stilgoe sitting at a piano, his facial expression saying, "Punch me," to a disgruntled nation, or Jasper Carrott (real name Rupert) singing about his "Funky Moped", or Joe Dolce, an American domiciled in Australia (possibly because of extradition arrangements) topping the charts for ever with "Shaddap You Face". Or the Goodies.

As a form, pop music is simultaneously juvenile and pompous, a perfectly laudable contradiction but not one that lends itself to real humour. It's often funny Puff Daddy choosing an even dafter pseudonym (P Diddy) is funny; what's left of the deranged aerobics instructor Geri Halliwell is funny; Robbie Williams thinking he's funny is funny but none of those people has planned it thus. As wise old Terry Wogan once told David Icke, "They're not laughing with you; they're laughing at you."

More relevant, no one ever got wealthy in the music business through overestimating the sophistication of the audience. Broad, dumb strokes sell, such as "Star Trekking", "Snooker Loopy" or KLF's shameless "Doctoring the Tardis". Novelty records, rather than outright jokes, prove more palatable. Spitting Image's "Chicken Song", a deliberate attempt to achieve such one-off status by announcing its intention, was more honest but equally awful.

Even such great comic institutions as The Simpsons rarely sustain their sharpness during musical numbers. Oddly, South Park has consistently integrated music brilliantly, largely by bowing to older forms. The full-length movie version was the best attempt at an old-style musical in years, even winning an Oscar. Anyone who has seen Trey Parker's astonishing Cannibal the Musical (it does what it says) will recognise the movies he was brought up on.

This Is Spinal Tap, written by a supremely talented cast with experience of the business and treated with a certain amount of subtlety, was another rare success. Heavy metal acts may appear a soft target, but Britain's Comic Strip team were miles off with their Bad News parody. Similarly, 1978's The Rutles largely based on the collaboration between Neil Innes, a musician who understood comedy, and his opposite number Eric Idle retold the Beatles story superbly, the songs often more perfect than their inspirations.

Today's equivalents are sometimes beyond parody. On Channel 4's fake docusoap Boyz Unlimited, a tongue-in-cheek cover of Dr Hook's, er, steamy "A Little Bit More" was pre-empted when a "real" boy band put out their own version.

There is a handful of genuinely recommendable "humour" records, though. 1985's Texas Funeral by Jon Wayne (a band rather than a person, apparently consisting of veteran C&W musicians playing very badly) is undoubtedly the funniest record ever made. You can find the title track on the soundtrack of From Dawn Till Dusk, but it's just a taster. For a start, seven of the 13 tracks feature the word "Texas" in the title. As he slurs it, Jon's life is a mess of run-ins with recalcitrant Arab petrol-pump attendants ("Mr Egyptian"), randy Mexican cellmates who want to get hold of his "majoshas" ("Texas Jailcell") and women who let him down ("She peed on the carpet, she shot my horse, and now things are going from better to bad to worse"). A quick scan on the internet shows that many Americans consider this definitive cult record to be an autobiographical work, rather than a joke. A follow-up finally appeared recently.

What else is there? Chris Morris's Blue Jam hinted at a new form for sonic humour, and, more prosaically, Birkenhead's Half Man Half Biscuit still persist with their war on pap, last year releasing the brilliantly titled Trouble Over Bridgwater.

Like music, though, humour is subjective. After all, Bob Dylan's songs are pretty funny if that's how you choose to interpret them...

QUOTEThey're not clever and they're certainly not funny Comedy records can be irritating and juvenile but rarely make you laugh. Steve Jelbert names the guilty 18 May 2001 When Frank Zappa titled a live album Does Humor Belong in Music? and putting aside the equally pertinent question: does Frank Zappa belong in music? he raised an important point. For the two have rarely met to good effect. Ask most people what they associate comedy songs with, and the answer will rarely be "laughter".

Like music, though, humour is subjective. After all, Bob Dylan's songs are pretty funny if that's how you choose to interpret them...
QUOTE ENDS

RtS

21 May 01 - 10:27 AM (#467157)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler (slowly going off his hea

...and the brain fairy meant I repeated most of the text in the last post (oh dear, oh dear, oh dear)
RtS

21 May 01 - 12:29 PM (#467209)
Subject: RE: Comical tune names
From: Geoff the Duck

Are you suggesting "the last post" as a comedy title???