The sad saga of ... Fruitman!

Harvey Comics knows how to make funny books. You know, the kind of comics that your grandparents would bring you when you were in the hospital or when you are recuperating, since one comic is obviously as good as another. And oh so rarely did that ever mean they brought you a proper super-hero comic.  As a jaded, cynical reader of modern comics, I'll readily admit that I've read my fair share of "funny books": I've read Archies, I've read Gold Keys and I've read Harveys. In fact, I still enjoy reading the occasional issue of Sad Sack or Richie Rich that happens my way. Comics are like every other medium; you have to judge them by the standards of the era in which they were made. I can easily give a Sad Sack and the Sarge  a four-star review while the newest incarnation of Justice League gets barely one-star, simply because I expect a lot more from a comic in 2012 than I would've from a comic in, say 1972. Back then, a couple of snickers and some interesting inking or a good text feature made the book worth 20 cents. For $2.99, I'd better not be getting some overblown 90's style artwork and a retreaded Super Friends storyline. But as usual, I digress.

No matter how I look at Fruitman, there is no joy ... no logic ... absolutely nothing to justify Harvey Comics' waste of newsprint when they published this book. I picked a copy up at a flea market a few years ago, simply because the comic had me agog ... there was no way there could be a book this stupid, could there? Three bucks later and it was in my hand.

There was only one issue of Fruitman (officially called Fruitman Special #1), but the character has appeared sporadically as a back-up feature in another Harvey title, Bunny, Queen of the In-Crowd. That title was a Harvey Comics attempt to attract the teen set with an Archie or Minnie the Model-type series. It was a little more successful than many attempts to get into that Archie-dominated market, managing to hang around for twenty-one issues or so. Several of the Fruitman stories from those issues of Bunny seem to have been recycled into this special 25-center.

Fruitman was in reality produce store owner Percival Pineapple. As far as I know, there was never an origin story or even an explanation of how Percival got his unique fruit-powers. Whenever crime reared its angry head, Percival would push the customers out of his story and use his powers to become Fruitman! This, of course, involved transforming himself into different kinds of fruit. He had no proper costume. He was either Percival Pineapple or a fruit, either of which usually wore spectacles. As a fruit, he could apparently levitate himself enough to hop into grocery bags or pockets, spout what I hope was juice at criminals, and occasionally grew small, spindly fruit arms and legs to move around, but that was about it. Watermelons, apples, lemons, coconuts, blueberries ... there was no end to the variations he could transform into, as long as they were fruit. For some reason, crooks and law enforcement officials both assumed that when a crook slipped on a banana peel or was squirted with lemon juice during a bank robbery, it had to be Fruitman using his amazing abilities to stop crime.

The character is a bit full of himself. The first thing he is seen thinking, while standing in his produce store, is that "Heh-heh! No one knows my secret identity!", as if everyone who ventures into the store has nothing better to do than consider if the apple they have picked up for a snack later may be the heroic Fruitman. And he doesn't seem to realize people consider him odd already. When Percival left for his South Seas vacation, passersby remarked on what an odd man he was and couldn't understand how he could afford to do it (he was suspected of stealing money somewhere along the line).

Fruitman did change into a peanut once during that rather disturbing story of his vacation, as apparently the writers assume any item growing from a plant was a fruit. He helped save a native maiden from a tribe of cannibals when a monkey threw him (in the form of a coconut) at the headman. The maiden exhibited a somewhat more-than-normal attraction to the coconut as a result (making me very glad he hadn't changed into a banana) and he later changed into a peanut in order to be closer to the girl (as a peanut earring).

There's gotta be a bunch of websites for this kinda perversion.

I've read the book several times, and I'm still trying to understand Fruitman, and how two grown men, hardened by a life of crime and carrying guns, could be turned into scared little girls by a single lemon shooting juice at them. I get the feeling that prisons in the Harvey Universe were more like the Land of Oz rather than Oz the TV show.

Just to show everyone that the writers at Harvey knew what decade they were in, the Fruitman Special also contained the first (and probably only) adventures of two other hip superheroes: Super-Hippie and Captain Flower. Yeah, they were both inspired by the Flower Power Generation, and neither deserves much mention. But, in the interests of being complete as a warning, here goes:  Super-Hippie was a a regular hippie who transformed into a super-hero by donning a thread-bare sweater with "SH" on the front and a towel around his neck. He apparently worked for the Intercosmic Peace Corps, as his story had him journeying to Mars, where a bad woman was making things decidedly non-groovy. Captain Flower was a flower boy at a somewhat-hip coffee house who sniffed a couple of broken posies to get his incredible abilities. He had a lot of difficulties in his minor task of trying to get lost business back from a competing coffee house across the street that installed an electric sign (powered by a 'Lectric Man).   When sixty-year-old men write adventures of "groovy" twenty-something characters, it never turns out well.  As anyone who's watched the LSD-themed episodes of Dragnet can readily attest. 

Ernie Colon's omnipresent Harvey Comics art is featured on several of the stories here. The artwork is the only saving grace of the whole comic, if you enjoy cartoony art-styles. The Super-Hippie artwork is somewhat akin to Donald Simpson's, in fact. 

There's nothing else to recommend about Fruitman Special #1. Don't buy it. Hell, don't even download pirate copies of it. There's nothing good that will come of it. Get some Brother Power, The Geek or Sonic Disruptors or Arrgh! comics instead. 

And this ends our Public Service Announcement for this week. Next week, a look at two iconic fictional rock 'n' roll bands: The Pussycats and the Sundance Kids!

M. F. Enterprises, Part 2

As I said in my previous post, M. F. Enterprises had a lot going for it, but unfortunately it was a little late to the starting gate. Having a major golden age creator like Carl Burgos working for you was a major feather in your cap, and I think perhaps they let Burgos get away will a little too much. Considering how many of the characters in this Captain Marvel's universe were either uninspired or blatantly used the names of preexisting comic book characters, it doesn't appear the stories were given a proper editorial going-over before they went to press.

The Number One offender was, of course, their star attraction, Captain Marvel. You learned a little (and probably more than you wanted to) about this pretender to the crown of the Big Red Cheese. Combine him with his young sidekick Billy Baxton, and it's probably a good thing Fawcett Publications comic division had gone belly-up about a decade earlier. This was legal fodder that would make lawyers drool.

Most folks know Plastic Man. Even if they don't, it's the first name that pops into your head when you think of stretchy characters. Okay sure, maybe children of the seventies think of Stretch Armstrong first, but that's not the point here. Jack Cole's comic masterpiece was still a very fond memory in the heads of kids and comic book creators back in 1965. There's no way anyone could've thought that was an original name any more than they could've forgotten someone had already used Captain Marvel. It seems though that someone must've said something somewhere along the line, as M. E. Enterprises' Plastic Man got a name change to Elastic Man by the time of his second appearance in Captain Marvel Meets the Terrible 5 #1. This particular Venusian menace just stretches, and has none of the witty repartee of the original hero. 

The cover of Terrible 5 #1 also proclaims the names of two other characters that had previous histories: Dr. Fate and Dr. Doom. National Periodical Publications (soon to be known as DC Comics) had the rights to the name "Doctor Fate", having published the adventures of a sorcerer super-hero by that name in the pages of More Fun Comics and All-Star Comics through much of the forties. The character has gone threw many incarnations in later decades and still holds an important place in the DC Universe. M. F. E.'s Dr. Fate was an old guy who used a lot of gadgets. 

Doctor Doom was perhaps an even more egregious name theft, as Marvel Comics was using the character as one of their iconic villains at the same time. Marvel's Doctor Doom was the revenge-filled, armored master of the land of Latveria, and sworn enemy of the Fantastic Four. M. F. E.'s Dr. Doom was an international criminal who led the devious organization known as B.I.R.D. Yeah, I know. So much for panache. Doom himself looked very similar in appearance to DC Comics' second-team villain Ira Quimby, the scientist-criminal known as I.Q., who was noted for elaborate schemes that he forgot to double-check and would end up being captured because of a dropped decimal point. Luckily, in the actual story, he was called Mister Doom, so no axe was lowered for that particular bit of plagaristic perfidy.

The Terrible 5 weren't an actual team, as only a couple of the villains actually met up to face Captain Marvel. Elastic Man got teamed with the unimaginatively-named Tinyman. Much like Quality Comics' Doll Man, DC's the Atom and Marvel's Ant-Man and the Wasp, Tinyman could shrink to small size. Later on, in the next few issues of Captain Marvel, the villain turned to the side of good, joined a circus and then got a law degree and became a District Attorney, working with Cappy M to bring his former felonious mates to justice.

The final villain of the original Five was Atom-Jaw. The character had a metal mandible, though it wasn't atomic-powered; he had just lost his original jaw in an atomic accident. This character was far too similar to the arch-enemy of Crimebuster, Iron-Jaw, seen in golden-age issues of Boy Comics.

The lack of originality didn't end there, as one of Captain Marvel's early enemies was the Bat, a caped hero who looked annoyingly akin to a certain Caped Crusader. The character was revamped into the Ray, with the same powers and intentions as the Bat for the final issue of Terrible 5, which was also the final M. F. Enterprises' super-hero comic book.

I think the blurb on the final issue (and final appearance of Captain Marvel) says it all: "The worst bad guys in comicdom!" The whole endeavor had a lot of promise, but even back in the sixties, comics would just sell themselves: They needed something to bring the readers back to them each month. Unfortunately, M. F. Enterprises didn't have that, and ended up on the wayside like many unimaginative publishers have in the past.

Next week: Truly the worst super-hero ever created in the history of four-color comics. Be here as I save you from having to deal with the monstrous evil known as ... Fruitman!

The Adventures of M. F. Enterprises Part 1

M. F. Enterprises was a strange little publishing house. It was run artist Myron Floss, whose main claim to fame was also running the company that produced the legendary black-and-white horror comic magazine Eerie. That was a somewhat pioneering publication, and a far cry from the output of M. F. Enterprises. M. F. Enterprises actually did have a lot going for it, but for one problem: It came into being about a decade too late, or about three years too early.

The publishing house, to my knowledge, put out a total of four different comic series (for a grand total of 11 known issues). Henry Brewster was a standard teen book of the Archie genre. There was a series called Great West, apparently an anthology title, but I don't think anyone's actually found a copy of the book, so whether or not it actually came out is up in the air. The final two books featured the star of the M. F. Enterprises' comic galaxy: Captain Marvel. But alas, not the Captain Marvel you're thinking of.

I said the company had a lot going for it, and I meant it. Among the creators working there, Carl Hubbell had done a lot of work on Blue Ribbon Comics,  Airboy and Boy Comics in the forties and early fifties. The true feather in the firm's hat was Carl Burgos. Burgos, as most old-time comic fans know, created one of the very first super-heroes, the original Human Torch. He also worked on a plethora of Marvel/Timely, Harvey and Centaur Publications comics in the golden age and the opening years of the silver age of comics. He also created M. F. Enterprises' star, Captain Marvel.

Most folks know there are two Captain Marvels. The original Captain Marvel is remembered now as Shazam! from the TV show of the same name. Young Billy Batson had the ability to change into the World's Mightest Mortal whenever he said the name of an old wizard. For many years, Captain Marvel's Fawcett Publications' comics were the best-selling comics on the planet. After a trademark infringement lawsuit ended his reign, the character (and all of Fawcett's stable of characters) were bought up by the victor, National Periodical Publications (now DC Comics) and has been republished, rebooted and re=envisioned several times since. But in the time between the end of Fawcett and the rise of Shazam!, another Captain sprung out of the woodwork.

The second Captain Marvel is Captain Mar-Vell, a renegade alien Kree warrior who decided to keep the Earth of the Marvel Comics universe safe from his own race. This Captain first appeared in an issue of Marvel Super-Heroes and, much like the original hero, has gone through many series and incarnations. Marvel Comics did do one classy thing and had the actual character die from cancer (in a truly poignant graphic novel) and then remain dead. There have been several characters in the Marvel stable to use the "Captain Marvel" name since then (for trademarking purposes, of course).

Carl Burgo's Captain Marvel was a conglomeration of both the Captain Marvels (even though Mar-Vell hadn't been created yet), Burgo's own Human Torch, and apparently a bottle or two of absinthe somewhere along the line. This Captain Marvel was an android from an unnamed planet. He was created to repel many invaders at once, but the first time he took to the air, his planet was engulfed in a catastrophic war and destroyed. He wandered the stars for a short while until coming upon Earth, where he became quickly earned a professorship at a college (using the name Roger Winkle) and spent his time grading papers and going on adventures to protect the Earth, often aided by his young student sidekick and trying to graciously spurn the amorous advances of a colleague.

Well, right there you have major elements from the origins of the Human Torch and Superman. Add into the mixture that Captain Marvel used a special word to activate (and deactivate) his powers and that his young sidekick was named Billy Baxton, and you've almost got the original Big Red Cheese. The absinthe comes in when you get to Captain Marvel's powers. He can fly, has laser-beam vision, and can split his body up.  Whenever he says the world "Split", Captain Marvel and separate all his body parts (or just one or two) at their joints. The average joe super-villain could be minding his business robbing your average jewelry store and sudden be caught in a fusillade of arms and legs. If Cappy M says the word "Xam", his body parts come back and reunite.

While derivative, this little concept might've had some wings if it had come along during the "camp" craze of 1966-1968, but as it stood, with all the talent behind it, Captain Marvel was a Golden Age hero in a Silver Age. Burgos had a lot of creativity in the stories, but they still had the joie de vivre of your standard Golden Age story, in an industry that was beginning to feel the first pangs of growth as an art form.

And if using the name of a legendary super-hero wasn't enough, using the names of several for super-villains is even worse, as we'll see in Part 2.

So be here, Same Bat-Time, Same Bat-Channel!

The best of Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention

Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention have been my favorite musical act for most of my adult life. There's just something about the complexity of the music, the intricacy of the composition, the irreverence of his lyrics and the complete disregard for popular music trends that I've always found appealing. I could (and often do) listen to Zappa and the Mothers for hours on end, as you can always notice something different with each listening, and you can virtually listen for a week without repeating an album. Frank was very prolific in life, and his family trust keeps pushing out new compilations out of his tape vaults with regularity.

I'm not going to say Frank Zappa was some god of some sort. I've yet to see any modern performer that can be called that (sorry Clapton fans). The title track of Weasels Ripped My Flesh is the single most grating and maddening piece of noise that was only rivaled by Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. Zappa had lots of idiosyncrasies that a lot of people found annoying and didn't seem to deal with people on a personal level with much alacrity, and tossed a lot of people to the side of the road without a lot of conscience. I've read quite a few books on the man, his relationships with his musicians and his work, and the best that can really be said that Frank Zappa was indeed a man like any other. But as a musician and particularly as a composer, he was one of the best that the 20th Century had to offer (to paraphrase one of his lyrics).

Here are the five albums (sort of) that I think are his very best, and are most representative of what Frank Zappa and the Mothers were about.

Uncle Meat (1969)
It is so very hard to decide on whether or not Uncle Meat or We're Only In It For the Money is the better album, but I have to give the former the upper hand in the contest. Uncle Meat is 90% instrumental and features some truly classic cuts ("Dog Breath", "King Kong", "Cruisin' for Burgers"), as well as the final vinyl appearance of the iconic Suzy Creamcheese. It has a near-symphonic range of sound, from Paducho-inspired garage rock to the orchestral arrangements of the various parts of "King Kong". And a few bars of "Louie, Louie" played on the Royal Albert Hall pipe organ don't hurt the production.



We're Only In It For the Money (1968)
Some folks, along with Frank Zappa himself, have said that this album was the final coffin nail in the Flower Power movement. That's debatable; I personally consider the travesty that was Altamont to be the end of the "Peace and Love" era. This album definitely heralded the end the Los Angeles Freak Movement, though a lot of people apparently didn't listen. This album, with the often-banned Sgt. Pepper-inspired cover, has some of the most poignant and powerful lyrics that Zappa ever wrote.  Much like many of the topically-inspired songs on Freak Out, many of these songs sill have the same relevance today, particularly "Mom and Dad" and "Flower Punk" (which many folks think was about Kent State, but is instead about an earlier tragedy).

Joe's Garage Acts I, II & III (1979)
While a lot of people may have become aware of Frank Zappa's work through the drive-time novelty hit "Valley Girl", the first song that ever caught my ear was the radio single of "Joe's Garage", a simple tale of a neighborhood rock band that practiced in a garage. Little would one expect that buying the full album (and the double album of Acts II & III), one would be delving into a world of Catholic girls, crew sluts, Scientology, 1984, German sex toys and eventually prison and prison sex. This is surreal humor for the ear ... the musical equivalent of listening to Bob and Ray, but with adult language. And there is some of the best guitar work ever heard on a Zappa album (or any album for that matter). "Watermelon in Easter Hay" quickly became my second favorite piece of music of all time.

Electric Aunt Jemima (1968; released in 1992's Beat the Boots II Boxed Set)
First off, this is a bootleg album, and Frank Zappa had little to do with it, other than reissuing it under his own label in the Beat the Boots series to get a measure of vengeance against the pirates. The recording quality is not up to Zappa's usual standards, but the performance is one of the best ever recorded, at least in my opinion. This live album is almost totally instrumental, and really shows the versatility of the Mothers of Invention.

London Symphony Orchestra Vols. I & II (1983, 1987)
The two LSO albums really showcase Frank Zappa as a true modern composer, and while they were released five years apart, I'm considering them as one double-album. While he was never happy with the performances he got out of any orchestra he paid to perform his music, you wouldn't know by the quality of the recordings on these two albums. Several of the tunes (notably "Bogus Pump" and "Strictly Genteel") have been heard in other forms on other albums and in other Zappa projects (the two mentioned were the opening and closing numbers of Zappa's motion picture, 200 Motels) and really come to life in the hands of a properly conducted orchestra.



Honorable Mention:
Bongo Fury (1975) 
This is one of my single favorite albums of all time, and features a collaboration between Frank Zappa and Captain Beefheart. The two recording legends were often at odds with each other, but when they got together, it was audio magic. Zappa produced Beefheart's (whose real name is Don Van Vliet) iconic Trout Mask Replica, and both have worked together on each other's projects over the years. This particular concert tour and album was spawned because Beefheart was having legal disputes with his former record label and wasn't legally able to record anywhere. He sings several songs and recites two poems. The album was also notable for what having I think was the first song to mention the U.S. Bicentennial being used as a marketing ploy, the first appearance with Zappa by drummer Terry Bozzio, and being the last album to feature a proper line-up of the Mothers of Invention.

I highly recommend anyone check out any of these albums.

Rambling Holiday Thoughts

I suppose a lot of folks get sentimental this time of year. I don’t often get maudlin and start sniffling about things, but I do occasionally think about my situation and how lucky I am to be where I am today.

The holidays are supposed about family. For most of my wonder years, I kind of had a family, but it was never quite right. I’m not talking an abusive horror story or anything like that here, but it didn’t have the stereotypes that a classic American family was supposed to have. I grew up with my mother, my grandfather and grandmother. My grandmother died of liver cancer back in 1973 or so. I recall her illness as being rather long, but there didn’t seem to be a lot of pain (for her) involved in it. My mother was mildly mentally-retarded and died of a heart attack in 1980. She was 41 and had been complaining of what I later learned were classic cardiac symptoms. She died while being forced to exercise at the hospital. I went to live with my grandfather, who took care of me (and whom I took care of in his later years) until he had one too many strokes and finally had to go into a nursing home, where he died at the age of 96. I was working at the answering service used by the nursing home, and I took the call hat he was failing early one morning.

The one member of my family that I have always held in high respect was my uncle David Reyes, a World War II veteran of Iwo Jima who was an electronics expert and traveled the world for Admiral Television. He passed away in the early eighties, a victim of cancer. I also have an estranged aunt, and supposedly somehow I’m related to the guy who played The Flash on TV, but I have no idea what my actual roots are; though I have been told I am related to the Scottish clan McPherran (or I think more properly spelled McFeran). I never knew my father, as the man I had been told was my dad had been chased away the day I was born and has since died. I’ve also been told that my father could’ve been the postmaster of the town I was born in, but he too has been dead for a long time. That was pretty much it for my flesh-and-blood family.

I came to a personal understanding a long time ago that a family is what YOU make it. Blood ties can only go so far, and there are no entitlements or disenfranchisements because of a few shared or lacking chromosomes. My family has always been a small circle of people who have been important to me, and usually a houseful of pets. I moved to Pennsylvania back in 1998 and married my wife, Elona. She has been my guiding light all this time. I’m not the most expressive guy, but I hope she knows how much I love her and how much she means to me, and especially how happy I’ve been since I she became a part of my life. Like a good married couple, we don’t like all the same things so things can be interesting, and we have enough in common to keep things on an even keel, through the good times and the bad times.

Neither of us wanted children. I have enough trouble explaining to someone how to set up an internet connection much less trying to teach a kid something heavy like the difference between right and wrong. But we have a plethora of furry children; our family currently consists of two small dogs (Emiko and Montagoon) and four cats (Pip, Luli, Maxwell and Liam). And unlike regular kids, we don’t have to worry about sending any of them to college. Unfortunately, as we’ve found in the past few years, they are also not with us nearly as long as a real child, and the hurt often seems to be just as great when they pass on.

Elona doesn’t really have many relatives that we’re in regular contact with anymore, as most of them seem to have different priorities than we do. We tend to keep to ourselves, not because we’re anti-social, but more because few people understand us - our sense of humor, beliefs and values. Our “extended” family still includes a lot of friends instead of “proper” relatives. I’ve managed to keep in touch with a few of my friends from my former life in Wisconsin, and there are a few folks around here that I have become good friends. Dennis Sninsky and his dad Johnny, who run the service station two houses down from here, went out of their way to make me feel welcome when I arrived. It was almost like I walked in the door and I was at home with the gang of old (and young) fellas that hung around the station. Johnny passed on a few years ago, but you can still feel him in the neighborhood. Our postman, Jimmy Purcell, is quite possibly the anathema of all postmen: Our dogs love him. Heck, he was my dog Duncan’s uncle (we bought him from Jimmy’s sister). Jimmy is one of the few people who could lay claim to the title of “Nicest Person in the Known Universe” ... and I wish he would. We also get the occasional craziness of phone calls from my friend Larry in Green Bay, and the more level-headed nostalgia of my pal Jim in Oakland.

I suppose by most people’s standards, this is going to be a horrible Christmas in our household. No tree, no decorations, no presents. Guess what? We don’t care! Any cat owner knows most decorations are a frivolity that will be taken down before you even finish getting them up. And while I wouldn’t mind seeing what effect a tree would have on our beasties, I always thought it was very strange and rather contrary to celebrate the birth of someone who advocated life and peace by violently chopping down and displaying another living thing. And as for no presents, again who cares? We both have everything we need right at the moment. Elona and I have come through a couple of long stretches of financial difficulties. It was lucky I was a hoarder of books and stuff before I came here, because we’ve had to sell almost everything of value we had over the years to pay the bills. There was one moment where we were two weeks from losing our house and everything. I’ve been unemployed since March of 2009, and since May of this year we’ve been a one-income family, getting by on what she makes at her job. I was recently approved for disability and in a couple of months there will be at least that much security in our future.

Like many families in this economy, we’ve weathered some hard times. But we’ve managed to come out of them on our feet. We have a roof over our heads, food in the kitchen, furry creatures next to us on the couch, and there’s always a lot of smiles and laughter in our home. As long as you’ve got the laughter, you’ll always have a family.

Album Review: Weird Al Yankovic's Alpocalypse (2011)

I’ve been a fan of Weird Al Yankovic since the Doctor Demento days, but I’ve noticed that as I’ve grown older, I’ve been becoming more disaffected with his pop music parodies, since I don’t listen to much of that type of music anymore. Alpocalypse is the first album that I believe I have no real investment in, as none of the out-and-out parodies are songs that I’ve ever even listened to all the way through, even once. I’m definitely not an ardent fan of Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus, or Taylor Swift. However, I think Weird Al has improved his work immensely with his musical style parodies.

The album has five out-and-out parodies of actual songs: “Perform This Way”, a parody of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way”; “TMZ”, which uses Taylor Swift’s “You Belong to Me”; “Party in the CIA”, after Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the USA”; “Another Tattoo”, a parody of “Nothin’ on You” by B.o.B. with Bruno Mars; and “Whatever You Like”, a parody of the same song by T. I. They’re all pretty engaging as parodies, particularly “Party in the CIA” and “TMZ”, but as I've mentioned, I don't think I've ever listened to any of those original songs all the way through.

“Polka Face” is the album’s requisite polka medley, and it is pretty good, though it does have two too many songs in it that originally featured Kesha, who I think most people realize is the Avatar of the End of Days.

The rest of the album features songs that are stylistic parodies of various bands. “CNR” is both a celebration of many somewhat-impossible feats attributed to the late Charles Nelson Reilly and a parody of the White Stripes. It’s also my personal favorite cut on the whole album. “Craigslist” is sung in the style of the Doors, and features Ray Manzarek on keyboards. “Ringtone” parodies the layered studio sound of the glam rock band Queen, as the singer bemoans the fact his ringtone is making the entire world hate him. The group Hanson is riffed on in “If That Isn’t Love”, about a guy who’s way too-good of a boyfriend, with Taylor Hanson providing back-up vocals. And “Stop Forwarding That Crap to Me” is a parody of Jim Steinman’s near-orchestral rock opus sound, as the singer pleads with people to stop forwarding emails to him. Weird Al hit all of these styles dead on. Any one of those songs could’ve been snuck into one of the “victims” albums and would’ve fit in quite nicely. Each one made me think as I was initially listening to it “oh wow, that’s a parody of Queen” or “Huh? He’s doing Jim Steinman? Way cool!”

Comedy acts in the recording business, particularly musical comedy acts, are very hard to maintain over a long period of time.  Alpocalypse shows that Weird Al Yankovic has managed to enter his fourth decade of parodying popular music, and shown he still has a level of freshness and inventiveness that warrants people buying his music. And he’s still pretty damn funny, too.

Album Review: "Torches" by Foster the People

I’m trying to find a musical analogy to describe Foster the People’s sound ... at least one that doesn’t sound lame. The band certainly isn’t, but I find it difficult to put a relatable label on this indie pop trio.  The best I can come up with is “Abba meets Gorillaz.” I know that sounds like a pop culture abomination, but it’s the best I can do at the moment.

I first became aware of the band when I saw the video for their debut single “Pumped Up Kicks” on a satellite music channel. It seemed like a sort of polished garage rock at the time, so I checked out the album. Mind you, I am not a pop music fan by any definition of the word. I prefer dinosaur metal, progressive rock and Frank Zappa. There’s something about the album Torches that appeals to me, for some reason I can’t totally grasp. Their music and vocals are layered and somewhat dense, but they still produce a sound that is light and danceable. The lyrics are interesting and rather strange at times. The first single tells the tale of a trouble kid with a gun, while “Helena Beat” seems to be simply about getting through the day.  There seem to be a lot of simple truths covered in this album, and they are related in a way that often catches you off-guard, with the real meaning of the song hitting you on the second, third or even seventh listening. That’s a welcome change from a guitar hook or a drum beat in your face and an auto-tuned voice whining a mindless but commercially-viable chorus.

Foster the People’s sound is what I would have expected had half the good college/alternative bands of the eighties and nineties stayed around long enough to hone their craft and become something truly relevant. This band has reached that plateau with their first album, and quite honestly, this is one of the first good pop albums I’ve listened to in the past thirty years.