Itty-Bitty Review: Banjo To Beatbox - Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer (with Christylez Bacon)

I hesitate to call the DC-area-based duo Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer elder statesmen of the kids music genre because they're neither, you know, elderly nor male. But they've been doing the family music thing for about 25 years now. Which is why it's pretty great that their collaborator on their latest album Banjo to Beatbox is, well, not even 25 years old. Christylez Bacon is a DC-area hip hop artist; here, he adds his beatboxing and rhyming skills to Cathy & Marcy's banjo and folk stylings. On the album's best tracks, like the resetting of the traditional "Soup, Soup," the combination thrills, pointing the way to a 21st century folk music sound. That song, along with with "Hip Hop Humpty Dumpty," takes full advantage of the collaborators' strengths. The other songs here are enjoyable (I also quite like their take on "New River Train"), but those two are the standouts.

You can listen to clips of the album (best probably for kids ages 4 through 9) here. (They're calling it an EP, but at 30 minutes, who knows what "EP" means any more.)

I've always liked Fink and Marxer's wilingness to collaborate outside what somebody else might perceive to be their genre -- their collaboration with Texas polka group Brave Combo All Wound Up! is an excellent album. I don't think Banjo to Beatbox reaches those heights -- it seems a little more stylistically limited to me -- but I hope that Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer continue to make music every now and then with Christylez Bacon because there are parts of this album that are pretty exhilerating. Recommended.

Review: Thank You For Joining the Happy Club - Billy Kelly

Here's a sign of how oddball a CD is: when you cover a Talking Heads song on your kids' album, and it might just be the least weird song on there.

Thank You For Joining the Happy Club is an oddball CD, and I mean that as a high form of praise. It's the debut kids' CD from central Pennsylvania's Billy Kelly, and it's totally winning in its goofiness. How goofy? Try this, a snippet of animation for "People Really Like Milk":

And it goes on like that ("People really like drinking / From a really big thing that goes moo"), getting sillier all the while. It is a novelty song, perhaps, but it is a perfectly-constructed and produced one, possibly my favorite song of the year. The rest of the CD follows that pop-rock template, if not quite reaching those giddy heights. The title track invites you to "tell your dog the join the happy club" (with a perfectly timed woof) while having the background singers provide the "doo-doo-doos" after Kelly sings that "there aren't any dues." While the hyper (and genre-jumping) "I Don't Know!" sounds like early They Might Be Giants, most have the tracks have a warmer, usually joyous Barenaked Ladies vibe, particularly on songs like "Springtime: It's My Favorite" and "(Let Me Tell You) What I Like About You." And, yes, there's a Talking Heads chestnut, "Don't Worry About the Government," which in its straightforward reading is OK for kids, if a bit mystifying for them. (Hey, at least it's not "Stay Up Late.") Kelly and his band, the Blah Blah Blahs, make an appealing sound together; I particularly enjoyed the guitar work, which reminded me a bit of Adrian Belew in spots.

Now, there's no good reason to have two self-referential songs about song construction -- one is plenty for a kids' album (one is probably plenty for any album). And Kelly has a tendency to resort to spelling in his lyrics. (I'll admit, though, that the song title "S-N-O-W-M-A-N (Snowman!)" is pretty funny.) You take the good with the overdone good, I suppose.

The album will be most appreciated by kids ages 6 through 10. You can hear several songs from the 32-minute album at Kelly's Myspace page. For now you can purchase the album here.

Thank You for Joining the Happy Club is an album for slightly older kids, those who enjoy snappy wordplay and goofy imagery. I could see younger kids being puzzled by the hullabaloo and it's a bit too cute by half at points, but I think there are going to be some families who absolutely love love love this disk. Join the Happy Club? Sure, I did -- I might even run for president. Definitely recommended.

Review: My Name Is Chicken Joe (Book/CD Set) - Trout Fishing in America

With about 30 years of recording behind them, Trout Fishing in America have a back catalog that is plenty large enough with which to start doing some interesting things. To wit, My Name Is Chicken Joe, the first book collaboration the duo of Keith Grimwood and Ezra Idlet have done with The Secret Mountain publishing company.

The collection is out this week and it essentially is a "best of" collection of some of Trout's wordier, folkier tracks. The "star," so to speak, of the 11-track collection is "Chicken Joe," which gets its lyrics (about animals with non-sensical names like the cat named "Chicken Joe") illustrated over a couple dozen pages. The illustrations by Stephane Jorisch remind me of gonzo illustrator Ralph Steadman with about 90% less gonzo. (There is no other way to describe them than "cute.") Lyrics to the other ten tracks each get a couple pages of illustration as well.

But we're mostly about the music here. The 11 tracks -- all previously-released -- include a number of excellent Trout Fishing tracks, not just the title track, but also "My Best Day," "It's A Puzzle," and "Fill It Up." For the most part, the selections tend toward the folkier (notwithstanding the rocking "I Can Dance" and the klezmer-touched "Boiled Okra and Spinach"). It's a fine collection, but it by no means is a complete Trout Fishing "Best Of." The collection lacks Trout classics such as "18 Wheels on a Big Rig," "Three Little Ducks," and "The Window," but those are songs that depend upon interaction between Grimwood and Idlet and not so much on the lyrics. Written down on paper, those latter songs wouldn't be so interesting -- it's Trout's classic live stage banter that makes those songs favorites to many listeners. The songs here are songs on which the lyrics themselves take center stage.

The songs will be of most interest to kids ages 5 through 9. (The book, maybe a little younger.) You can hear clips of the 33-minute album wherever books/CDs are sold online (or watch this video of the title track). If you're interested, you can also buy the CD just by itself, but with the book barely costing more than the CD, I say go for the book. (I should note that book itself is of high quality -- typically the books in these book/CD arrangements have a pretty cheap feel to them, but not this one.)

Longtime Trout Fishing in America fans will likely appreciate the book My Name Is Chicken Joe because it marries some delightful illustrations to a sweet Trout song, though may be disappointed by the lack of even a single new track. I'd recommend it more to newcomers to the band, who may appreciate the book more for that "best of" quality. Here's hoping, though, it leads to a couple more books (and, by extension, a couple more greatest hits volumes).

Itty-Bitty Review: Goodie Bag - The Hipwaders

Rather than record a full-length follow-up to their fine 2007 collection Educated Kid, the Bay Area band The Hipwaders decided to save a little money and record just an EP, Goodie Bag, released last week. The band packs in quite a bit of music into the 16-minute EP and while there's nothing as completely amazing as the title track to their Educated Kid disk, there's a lot here to enjoy. From the crunchy power-pop snippet "Birthday Ruckus" to the jazzy punk "Field Trip" to the XTC-punk of "Things You Want," the band covers a lot of musical territory and chords you don't hear so much of in the genre. They're not recording "Jazz Odyssey" by any means, but songwriter and guitarist Tito Uquillas likes to write songs celebrating the imagination or creativity -- "My New Camera" or "What's That Noise?," for example -- and the trio's music never fits a cookie-cutter pop mold. Fellow Bay Area musician Gunnar Madsen also makes an appearance on the title track, the goofiest track here.

The album will appeal most to kids ages 4 through 9. You can hear clips at the album's CDBaby page or hear full clips plus lead Hipwader Tito's thoughts on the EP here. As far as goodie bags go, this particular one would be an excellent stuffer at your kids' next party. A tiny but recommended collection of songs.

Review: The Welcome Table: Songs of Inspiration, Mystery, and Good Times - Dan Zanes and Friends

However you feel about Dan Zanes' music, it's hard to say that he hasn't managed to follow his muse in his career as family troubadour. Interspersed with excellent albums designed for the whole family, he recorded excellent albums covering songs from Carl Sandburg's American Songbag and sea tunes. And then he recorded an entire album in Spanish.

Really, the fact that Zanes' latest album is a bunch of gospel and gospel-inspired tunes with the slightly ponderous title The Welcome Table: Songs of Inspiration, Mystery, and Good Times should come as no surprise to any long-term listener of Zanes' music. The biggest risk Zanes takes in recording this album is alienating a portion of his audience who will be disinterested in the Christian worldview.

Or, rather, that's how it might appear to someone who hasn't heard the album. Because if there's one constant thread running through all of Zanes' albums it's a sense of tolerance and equality, and this album is no different. Yes, it's an album that mentions big-G God several repeatedly. And just as Nueva York! may not have been as easy for a listener to "get" if they didn't speak Spanish, if a listener doesn't speak the particular language of the gospel songs, they may find this album more difficult to grasp. (I personally had that problem with Nueva but don't really with this album.) But it's also an album that includes a Jewish song, readings of biblical passages in foreign languages, and several songs that don't mention a higher power at all. It is, in short, a Dan Zanes gospel album in every sense of the phrase.

There are, as best I can tell, 5 previously-released songs here including the title track with the Blind Boys of Alabama, leaving 10 new songs for your listening pleasure. Lots of traditional gospel tunes reworked in Zanes' Americana/folk/rock style, with particular highlights being "Jesus on the Mainline," "Up Above My Head," and "Home In That Rock." I also really liked the Spanish hymn "Himno Guadalupano." They're all lots of fun -- mostly "good times" with only a little bit of "mystery" thrown in. But I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my favorite track here, the album closer "We've Been Down This Road Before," a song about working together through tough times that Woody Guthrie or Pete Seeger would be proud to have written.

Once again, a Dan Zanes album makes a mockery of my insistence of putting age ranges on album reviews, but I think kids ages 5 and up will more easily grasp the social justice (or spiritual) messages here. You can listen to the songs at Zanes' page here. I should also note that the album is a benefit for the New Sanctuary Movement, an organization which "protects immigration workers and families from unjust deportation."

Zanes' passion in his music has always been community -- our "common welfare as human beings," as Zanes puts it in his liner notes. The Welcome Table is another solid album in his musical argument in favor of community and equality. Even if you're not sure the album is for you, if you're a Dan Zanes fan, you're going to find it worth your time. Definitely recommended.