Jimmy Dean's "Big Bad John": Sequels, parodies, and answer songs

Jimmy Dean's "Big Bad John" has to be one of the most parodied songs in the history of popular music. It spawned more answer songs and spoofs than any other song I can think of. The song was even made into a movie. 

The original release of "Big Bad John" concluded with Dean saying, "At the bottom of this pit lies one hell of a man." That kind of salty language didn't sit well with some radio stations, so a second version was released in which Dean says, "At the bottom of this pit lies a big, big man." After it was cleaned up, the single topped the pop chart for over a month in 1961.

Today on Music Weird, we'll look at the many songs that "Big Bad John" spawned. Chart positions are from Billboard unless otherwise noted.

Dottie West - "My Big John" (Starday 574, 1961)

"My Big John" is an anemic early performance by West on an answer song to "Big Bad John" that tells the story from the standpoint of Big John's Cajun queen. 

Phil McLean "Small Sad Sam" (Versatile 107, 1961) #21 Pop

This parody of "Big Bad John" tells the story of small, sad Sam, a puny weakling who saves himself and leaves everyone else to die in a tragic elevator accident. The following year, McLean released "Big Mouth Bill" on the same label, and although it isn't quite a parody of "Big Bad John," it's obviously derivative of it.

Bob Kayli – "Small Sad Sam" (Tamla 54051, 1961)

This R&B cover of Phil McLean's "Small Sad Sam" was recorded by Motown founder Berry Gordy's brother, Robert Gordy, under the pseudonym Bob Kayli. No video, but you can listen to a sample here.

Don Bowman - "Little Bad Dan" (GNP 170X, 1961)

Another parody, this one tells the story of a football player named Bad Dan. The video used to be on YouTube but has been removed.

Skippy Rope – "Little Herbie" (Octavia 8003, 1961)

Little Herbie isn't big and bad—he's a skinny little guy. The B-side was "Theme from Little Herbie" by the same songwriters.

Marvin Rainwater – "Tough Top Cat" (Warwick M674, 1962)

In Marvin Rainwater's "Tough Top Cat," Big Bad John is hooligan cat named Big Tom. 

Des O'Connor – "Thin Chow Min" (Piccadilly 7N 35028, 1962)

Des O'Connor is an English comedian and vocalist who charted several singles in England in the late '60s and early '70s, including the #1 hit "I Pretend." His politically incorrect "Big Bad John" parody, "Thin Chow Min," wasn't one of his hits.

Casey Anderson – "Sweet Sidney" (from the album The Bag I'm In, Atco LP 33-149, 1962) 

Anderson's intro to "Sweet Sidney" is very similar to the one later used in "Big Bruce." This was the first of numerous gay parodies of "Big Bad John." The excellent Queer Music Heritage website has a discography of gay-themed "Big Bad John" parodies.

Jimmy Dean - "The Cajun Queen" (Columbia 4-42282, 1962) #22 Pop

Jimmy Dean's first sequel to his own hit shifts the focus to John's Cajun Queen. 

Jimmy Dean - "Little Bitty Big John" (Columbia 4-42483, 1962) #110 Cash Box

Dean's second "Big Bad John" sequel, "Little Bitty Big John," is my favorite in the bunch, although the story has several continuity errors. You can't put Dean's three "Big Bad John" songs together to form a coherent narrative.

Patti Page – "Big Bad John" (from the album Patti Sings Golden Hits of the Boys, Mercury MG 20712, 1962)

This isn't a parody or an answer song—it's just a straight cover. But "Big Bad John" seems like a strange choice of repertoire for a pop diva like Patti Page, so I included it. 

Homer & Jethro - "Big Bad John" (from the album At the Convention, RCA LSP 2494, 1962)

Another gay parody that was included on early pressings of the LP Homer and Jethro at the Convention.

The Four Saints - "Big Bad Jane" (from the album The Many Sounds of the Four Saints, Warner Bros. LPM-FSR 6201, 1962)

From the 1962 Four Saints album The Many Sounds of the Four Saints. No audio.

Allan Sherman – "Big Bad Jim" (1962)

Sherman wrote an obscene parody of "Big Bad John" that he performed but never recorded. It has been written about a few times. Billboard mentioned it in its Nov. 3, 1962, issue, and AllanShermanBiography.com devoted an entire post to it and included a snippet of lyrics.

1st Lt. Don Knepp, USMC – "Bad Breath Carl" (U.S.A. 782, 1964)

This no-frills recording tells the tale of Bad Breath Carl, whose breath is so bad it causes a mine disaster. The song concludes with a terrible pun. 

Doug Catley with the Fernleafs – "Big Bad Don" (His Master's Voice HR 209, 1964)

A New Zealand release about rugby player Don Clarke. Lyrics and a snippet of audio here. 

Country Gentlemen - "Big Bruce" (Rebel 263, 1966)

The original version of "Big Bruce" seems to borrow from Casey Anderson's "Sweet Sidney," heard earlier in this post. 

Neil Ray – "Big Fanny" (Plantation #2, 1968)

A strange Vietnam War-era parody about a grotesque woman who fights the Vietcong. The flip-side, "The Medic," is also a Vietnam-themed tune but serious.

Steve Greenberg - "Big Bruce" (first version) (Trip 3000, 1969)

Steve Greenberg's hit version of "Big Bruce" was issued twice with alterations to the lyric. It barely inched into the Hot 100. 

Steve Greenberg – "Big Bruce" (second version) (Trip 45-3000, 1969) #97 Pop

Ben Colder – "Big Sweet John" (MGM K14111, 1969)

The parody by Ben Colder, AKA Sheb Wooley, is similar to Homer & Jethro's version.

Hudson & Pickett – "Big Bad John" (from the album The Hollyweird Squares, Dore LP 334, 1972)

No audio.

Bill Stith - "Big Bruce" (Jamie 1417, 1973)

A lackluster remake of the Country Gentlemen/Steve Greenberg tune. 

Rod Erickson – "Big Bad Tom" (Damon DDM 102, 1975)

I couldn't find audio of Erickson's 1975 recording, but here's a video of him performing it live in 2009. This parody is about a cat, like Marvin Rainwater's "Tough Top Cat," which is quoted toward the end. The original version appears to be available on the CD Then, which is available at roderickson.com.

Mechanical Horsetrough – "Ballad of Big Bruce" (1975)

This one is getting pretty far from "Big Bad John," but it's obviously inspired by "Big Bruce." 

Rod Hart - "Big Fanny" (from the album Breakeroo, Plantation PLP-500, 1976)

Hart, known for his gay trucker hit "C.B. Savage," re-recorded the 1968 parody "Big Fanny" by label-mate Neil Ray for the album Breakeroo, on which "C.B. Savage" appeared. Audio sample here. 

Reverend Billy C. Wirtz - "Big Jess" (from the album Pianist Envy, Hightone HCD 8051, 1994)

No audio.

Miscellany

Frank Gallop's "The Ballad of Irving" (1966, #34 Pop) is a parody of Lorne Greene's "Ringo" but references "Big Bad John." Jimmy Dean's "PT 109" (1962, #8 Pop) references "Big Bad John" at the end.

Atrocious fake accents in music

One practice that we should all be thankful has died out is the widespread use of fake accents in music. In pop and folk music, in particular, until the mid 1960s, artists routinely affected Italian, Mexican, Russian, Irish, Chinese, and other accents, often on songs that were filled with cultural cliches and unpleasant stereotypes. 

You can still hear fake accents from time to time in music. Country artists often exaggerate (or fake) their hick and southern accents. Indiepop and indie rock artists, like Guided By Voices' Robert Pollard, sometimes affect fake British accents. Even Britney Spears utilized a fake British accent in the 2012 hit "Scream & Shout." 

Today on Music Weird, we'll stroll down Memory Lane and revisit some of the most atrocious fake accents from the popular music of yesteryear.

Billy Walker – "Viva La Matador"

Country star Billy Walker laid on an awful fake Spanish accent in "Viva La Matador" in 1957. The lyrics (example: "heap big") seem to be a mixture of Spanish-American and Native American stereotypes. 

Mamie Van Doren – "Go, Go Calypso"

"Go, Go Calypso" is Mamie Van Doren's contribution to the calypso craze. I don't think that Van Doren ever recorded a song that I would want to hear more than once.
 

 

Rod McKuen – "Bimini"

"Bimini" is a song from Rod McKuen's first album, Songs for a Lazy Afternoon, which was released by Liberty Records in 1956. Most of the recordings were later reissued on a 1970 Sunset LP titled In the Beginning, but the most awful songs for a lazy afternoon—including "Bimini"—were left off. When McKuen sings straight, he's an acquired taste. Add a fake accent? Forget about it.

 

Wanda Jackson – "Don'a Wan'a"

As a rule, country artists shouldn't attempt foreign accents. 

Rosemary Clooney – "Sailor Boys Have Talk to Me in English"

I can't tell if this is supposed to be a Mexican or Russian accent.

Peggy Lee "Manana"

The talented Peggy Lee gave it her all with a fake Mexican accent in "Mañana," a song that was a #1 hit in 1948. In his book Latinos: A Biography of a People, author Earl Shorris described Lee's singing as "a cruel parody of a Mejicano accent," and wrote, "To the Mexican-American veterans of World War II who were, at the height of the song's popularity, attempting to move into the middle class, 'Mañana' was an almost physical barrier to be overcome in applying for a job or a business development loan. No stereotype could have been more damaging than the slothful simpleton portrayed by Lee." 

The Playmates – "Pretty Woman"

The Playmates' fake calypso tune, "Pretty Woman," is especially bad because the accent is so halfhearted. Come on, guys—either do an accent or don't, but don't give us this weak in-between stuff.

No video, but here's a sample.

Nita, Rita & Ruby – "My Man True to Me"

This country vocal trio, of which a young Anita Carter was a member, couldn't make up their minds whether to do an accent or not on this faux-calypso number from 1957. Their pronunciation of "my man" sounds like "mama," which would give the song an interesting twist if that were the actual lyric. 

Red Sovine "Little Rosa"

This one makes me cringe. Years before Red Sovine became the king of trucker recitations ("Teddy Bear," "Phantom 309," etc.), he recorded for Decca Records without great success, apart from singing harmony on Webb Pierce's hit "Why, Baby, Why." "Little Rosa" is another song that Sovine and Pierce recorded together, and it's particularly awful, because it combines Sovine's terrible, annoying fake accent with a maudlin story about a dead girl.

José Jiménez – "The Astronaut"

José Jiménez was actually gringo Bill Dana. "The Astronaut" was a hit in 1960. 

T. Texas Tyler – "A Colored Child's Funeral"

T. Texas Tyler really lays it on thick with the black dialect in his version of this old recitation, but no audio of it exists online, so I'm including Pat Boone's version instead. Pat recorded it under the title "Steal Away" and is more subtle with his dialect, but it's still there. Even for 1956, this recording seems to be in pretty poor taste with its references to "grotesque" negro countenances, etc. The dialect part of the recitation begins at 1:49. If you want to hear Tyler's yet-more offensive version, you'll have to track down the CD Unadulturated Country Songs on Germany's Cattle Records.

"Loco Man" from A Mighty Wind

The fad for awful fake accents in '60s folk music was parodied in the Christopher Guest film A Mighty Wind. 

Shmoo songs of 1948-49

The merchandizing blitz around the shmoo character from Al Capp's comic strip L'il Abner was so excessive in the late 1940s that Capp quipped, "I think they even had shmoo toilet seats." Shmoo appeared on the cover of Time, and a headline in Life announced "The U.S. Becomes Shmoo-Struck." In addition to all of the shmoo toys and novelties in 1948-49, a number of shmoo recordings hit the racks.

The shmoo character was a social satire for which Capp was labeled a radical, because some people thought that shmoos were socialists or were anti-capitalist. Shmoos were happy, whimsical creatures that "willingly, gleefully sacrificed themselves for the good of humanity," as Rodger Brown wrote in Southern Changes. They were delicious to eat, and every part of their blobby bodies could be used to make useful items such as leather, buttons, and toothpicks.

The shmoo craze had mostly run its course by 1950. In 1949, the U.S. Treasury Department officially designated the shmoo as its mascot for a security bond drive. Ads for shmoo novelties continued to appear in trade publications in 1950 but tapered off soon thereafter. In 1950, Atlantic Records acquired the rights to Capp's L'il Abner characters, including the shmoo, for a series of children's records that were to be composed by Leo Israel. Two years later, Atlantic was still saying that the records were forthcoming. As far as I can tell, the songs were never released.

Songs of the Shmoo – no artist (Music You Enjoy, 1948)

• The Snuggable, Huggable Shmoo b/w The Shmoo Doesn't Cost a Cent (SS-100, 1948)
• The Shmoo Club b/w The Shmoo Is Clean, The Shmoo Is Neat (SS-105, 1948)
• Shmoo Lesson b/w A Shmoo Can Do Most Anything (SS-110, 1948)

These were the first three shmoo records, which were issued individually on 7-inch, 78-RPM records that featured Capp's artwork on the picture sleeves (shown at the top of this page). The songs were written by Gerald Marks, the composer of the pop and jazz standard "All of Me," and the orchestrations were directed by Justin Stone, who led the Justin Stone Orchestra. Here's a snippet of lyrics from "A Shmoo Can Do Most Anything":

A shmoo can do most anything because he is a shmoo 

A shmoo can be most anything that you want him to 

If he's in trouble he won't cry 

He knows just how to multiply

Four of these songs appeared again the following year on a 10-inch LP that was released by Allegro Records.

The Shmoo Sings – Earl Rogers (Allegro, 1949)

• The Broken Down Town of Dogpatch/A Shmoo Can Do Most Anything/The Snuggable, Huggable Shmoo//The Shmoo Doesn't Cost a Cent/The Shmoo Is Clean, The Shmoo Is Neat/Shmoo Music

Billboard, March 12, 1949

In 1949, Allegro Records obtained exclusive rights to re-record the songs from Music You Enjoy, and the new recordings were performed by vocalist Earl Rogers. Rogers was a tenor who recorded classical and children's music for Allegro and later served as the president of the New York Singing Teachers' Association from 1960-62.

Rogers' versions featured backing by the anonymous "Shmoo Band," directed by Daniel Mendelsohn, who also led the Daniel Mendelsohn Orchestra. The two new cuts, "The Broken Down Town of Dogpatch" and "Shmoo Music," were instrumentals.

The record received a lukewarm review in Billboard, in which it was given a rating of 82 out of 100:

An especially attractive cover by cartoonist Al Capp, and the popularity of the L'il Abner strip, in which the Shmoo appears, should sell a lot of these sets. Most of the tunes are undistinctive, and the rendition is mediocre, altho the toy-size rural orking is very cute. One tune, 'The Shmoo Is Clean' is catchier than the rest, and drives home a good point.

"The Shmoo Song" – John Jacob Loeb and Jule Styne (1948)

A song called "The Shmoo Song" was published as sheet music in 1948, but it doesn't appear to have been recorded. It was cowritten by Jule Styne, who wrote the winter classic "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" "The Shmoo Song" includes the following lyrics:

The shmoo is the power of jet propulsion 

The laugh convulsion of Bob Hope or Shmilton Berle 

The rich, foamy lather in your shampoo 

Was caused by Mr. Shmoo 

"The Kigmy Song" – Joe Rosenfeld and Fay Tishman (1949)

A lesser craze for Capp's shmoo-like kigmy creatures followed the shmoo craze, and at least one song about them was published. The kigmy ("kick me") was kind of like a shmoo that liked to be kicked in the butt.

In 1979-80, the shmoo was revived in the animated children's series The New Shmoo. Hanna-Barbera packaged together The New Shmoo and The Flinstones as Fred and Barney Meet the Shmoo. Here's the theme:

Josephine "Jodi" Ann Bancino, country-pop songwriter of the '50s and '60s

Anita McCune, Betty Sue Perry, and Jodi Bancino

I decided to write about Jodi Bancino after seeing this photo of her in The Tennessean. The caption said that it pictured Anita McCune, Betty Sue Perry, and Jodi Bancino in 1961 preparing for WSM's Country Music Festival. The three songwriters, it added, "became pen pals when each started writing songs for Sure-Fire Music Co. in Nashville." (Betty Sue Perry, incidentally, was the oldest daughter of country star Loretta Lynn.) 

I knew of Bancino from Joe Dowell's song "Little Bo Peep," which she wrote. Dowell briefly mentioned her in his interview with Music Weird. The first of his three-part interview is here.

Sure-Fire Music Co. was owned by the Wilburn Brothers, a country music brother duo that scored a big hit in 1959 with a remake of the murder ballad "Knoxville Girl." Although Teddy and Doyle Wilburn were the brothers who made up the musical duo, their older brothers Leslie and Lester shared ownership in Sure-Fire Music. Doyle and Teddy originally started the company with steel guitarist Don Helms, who was their neighbor at the time, but the Wilburns' other brothers joined when the company got too big for Doyle, Teddy, and Helms to manage alone. Helms and the Wilburns also owned the Wil-Helm Talent Agency in Nashville.

The Wilburn Brothers with Loretta Lynn

Loretta Lynn was Sure-Fire's biggest star, and the company owned most of the copyrights for her songs. After both of the Wilburn Brothers died, she sued in 2004 to regain ownership of her songs.

The Wilburn Brothers helped Dowell get his contract with Smash Records, so that was how he ended up cutting Bancino's "Little Bo Peep." Bancino wrote numerous songs for the Wilburn Brothers, including "The Land of Heaven" (with Eileen Maultsby), "No One Knows Better than Me" (as Jodie Bancino), "Someone Else's Love," and "Look Down." 

Billboard, May 19, 1962

Although Bancino primarily wrote for Nashville, she placed some songs with pop and rock artists, including the Crickets (the R&B group, not Buddy Holly's group; the song was "Dreams and Wishes" ), Joe Dowell ("Little Bo Peep," video below), Rory-O ("Make a Wish"), and Timi Yuro ("Look Down").

She also wrote "I Don't Hurt as Much," which appeared as the B-side of T. Tommy Cutrer's twist remake of Jim Lowe's "The Green Door." The two Billboard clippings shown here mention her song.

Billboard, May 26, 196

Jodi Bancino died in September 2010 at the age of 92. Her obituary mentioned her songwriting career (my bold):

Bancino, age 92, went home to be with her Lord and Savior on Thursday, September 9, 2010. She was preceded in death by her husband, Carl, sister, Rose Jeluso, brothers, John and Sam Geluso. She will be lovingly remembered by her sons, Andy (Sharon) Bancino [died March 7, 2011] of Grandville, John (Rosetta) Bancino of Bradley, MI; eight grandchildren; 15 great grandchildren; six great great grandchildren; sister, Ann Valentine; brother, Frank (Francis) Geluso; many nieces and nephews. She was very proud of her gifted ability to be able to write songs that were produced and published in Nashville, TN by the Wilburn Bros. of Sure-Fire Music. To this day at 92 years of age she still received royalties for her music played around the world. We would like to thank the staff at Railside Living Center of Byron Center for her excellent care and friendship the past 9 years. Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated 10:00 a.m. Saturday, September 11, 2010 at Our Lady of Sorrows, 101 Hall St. SE with Rev. Theodore Kozlowski as celebrant. The family will greet relatives and friends Friday from 6 to 8 p.m. at Ronan Vanderpool Stegenga Funeral Chapel and one hour prior to the Mass at church. Interment Woodlawn Cemetery. 

Jonathan Winters' brief foray into music (1958)

Music Weird previously wrote about Joan Rivers' unusual early-'60s pop single. Comedian Jonathan Winters also made one pop record early in his career. He recorded many comedy albums over the years but didn't record another "song" until 2006, when he cut the recitation "Old Folks."

Our story begins in 1958. Gerry Granahan's group, Dicky Doo & the Don'ts, had a new record out called "Nee Nee Na Na Na Na Nu Nu," which was instrumental except for a nonsense vocal interjection. Granahan had scored two previous hits that year with Dicky Doo & the Don'ts' "Click-Clack" (the first-ever release on Swan Records) and a solo recording, "No Chemise—Please." In a wise promotional move, Granahan's group named themselves after Dick Clark's nickname for his son. Might help them get on American Bandstand, eh?

Billboard, April 28, 1958

Comedian Jonathan Winters at that time had been a disk jockey in Ohio and New York and had appeared on some television shows. He was making a name for himself with his zany humor and ad libs, and increasingly moved into straight comedy. Because of his growing popularity, Coral Records signed him to a "long-term contract," Billboard reported in 1958. 

The contract turned out to be short-lived. His first and only record for Coral was a cover of Dicky Doo & the Don'ts' "Nee Nee Na Na Na Na Nu Nu." Because the nonsense title was like something from outer space, Winters' version was credited to "Jonathan Winters with the Martians."

The Dicky Doo record didn't have a space theme at all, so Coral must have been trying to out-market it by cashing in on the martian craze with Winters. Some people claim that Robin Williams took his extraterrestrial Mork character's "nanu, nanu" from "Nee Nee Na Na Na Na Nu Nu."

The flip-side of Winters' record was the similarly space-themed cut "Take Me to Your Leader," another song by the writer of "Nee Nee Na Na Na Na Nu Nu," Eddie V. Deane. Deane, who was a comedian too, would go on to write the Mike Douglas hit "The Men in My Little Girl's Life" and the "Big Bad John" parody "Small Sad Sam."

Billboard gave Winters' record a favorable review but noted that Dicky Doo & the Don'ts' version had a head start. The Dicky Doo record was reviewed in Billboard a month earlier, and, predictably, the group appeared on American Bandstand. As a result, Dicky Doo & the Don'ts' version charted nationally, but Winters' version didn't chart even regionally, as far as I can tell. 

Billboard, May 5, 1958

That lone single ended Winters' musical career on Coral Records, and a couple of years later, he started recording comedy albums for Verve. As with Joan Rivers' pop record, Winters' contribution to the musicality of his Coral recordings is negligible; one side is mostly instrumental, and most of the other side is sung by a vocal chorus.

You can listen to both cuts below. 

Betty Smith's "Hand Jive": The hit that never was

 

The hand jive was supposed to sweep the nation in 1958. The clapping game, which originated in England and was later depicted in the film Grease, was "destined to become the biggest teenage fad in the history of the record business."

So said London Records, the label that released the original version of "Hand Jive" by the Betty Smith Group. Billboard reported that Smith's "Hand Jive" was the hottest selling record in Denver at one point, and London's ads said that one spin of "Hand Jive" in New York had elicited over 1,000 inquiries from listeners.

London promoted the record heavily, taking out full-page ads in the trade magazines to offer DJs free records and free instructions on how to do the hand jive. The clapping game was said to be a great alternative to dancing in spaces where "the dance floor is too crowded" or "where dancing is not allowed." The label issued an entire hand-jive album by Betty Smith, Music For Hand-Jiving, which was accurately billed as the "first hand jive LP."

Smith sang the lead vocal on "Hand Jive," but—despite all of these promotional efforts on behalf of the hand jive—American DJs flipped her record and played the instrumental B-side instead. The B-side was a smoky saxophone version of the song "Bewitched," a tune from the 1940 musical Pal Joey that was originally known by its full title, "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered." The song had been a hit for several artists in 1950, including Doris Day and Gordon Jenkins. Somewhat surprisingly, Smith herself was the saxophone soloist on her group's rendition of "Bewitched." The record reached #51 on the Billboard Hot 100.

A competing hand-jive song, "(Six-Five) Hand Jive," was released in two versions: one by Don Lang & His Frantic Five and one by the Show Brothers. Both groups were British. Neither of these records were hits either.

It would take an American act, Johnny Otis, to break through with a hand-jive song. That song, "Willie and the Hand Jive," was a Top 10 hit on the pop and R&B charts in 1958. Eric Clapton put the song in the Top 40 again with his 1974 remake.

Betty Smith playing her saxophone

As for Betty Smith, she released a few more singles on London, but none were hits in England or the United States. Malcolm Lockyer was the musical director on Smith's early recordings, and she continued to work with him into the 1970s. In 1974, they released an album titled I'm Old Fashioned on the British label Contour Records, which specialized in easy listening and budget recordings.  

G Stands for Go-Betweens: Speed problems

G Stands for Go-Betweens is a lavish—and expensive—four-LP and four-CD box set from Domino Records that compiles the first five Go-Betweens singles, the first three Go-Betweens albums, a live set from 1982, three discs of rarities, and a thick booklet that Robert Forster wrote. (The first 600 copies included books from the library of the late Grant McLennan, and Music Weird is compiling a list of those titles here.) Despite the deluxe presentation, a number of listeners have noted speed problems on some of the tracks. This post will provide details on the tracks that need speed correction.

Archie Moore's review on Sound It Out from January 25 noted the speed problems: 

All of the non-single material from the 1999 release 78 ‘Til 79: The Lost Album appears here, but it’s significantly slower than on that CD, sounding slightly sluggish and tuned-down (i.e. it seems that the slower speed is incorrect and accidental, a tape transfer error, not a correction). It is possible that this has been addressed and/or fixed since I got the digital review copy.

This problem hasn't been addressed, because my standard release copy has the same problems.

The songs from The Lost Album aren't the only ones that sound slow, though. Here's the breakdown:


Life as Sweet as Lemonade  
Tracks 3-22 are slow

Skeletons That Cry  
Tracks 7-11 are slow

I haven't heard from Domino Records yet about whether these CDs will be remastered to correct the speed problems. At the very least, the downloads for purchasers should be corrected, but the best possible outcome would be for the affected discs and LPs to be remastered and replaced. Considering the price of the set and the attention to detail that otherwise went into it, these problems are surprising and upsetting.

If you have additional comments about the speed issues on G Stands for Go-Betweens or run across additional reviews that mention them, please let me know and I'll add them to this page.


Update (March 19, 2015):

Another review has noted the speed issue. This is from Boston Hassle:

Previously heard selections appear here at significantly slower speeds, which begs the question as to whether the Lost Album contained sped-up mixes to make the band sound more sprightly, or if this box set contains slowed-down mixes. Because there can be no logical reason for the latter, we must conclude that we are now hearing the Go-Betweens’ earliest demos at their original speed, and it’s not a flattering discovery.