Published on Dec 10, 1999
Ninety percent of all American music historians will draw a
complete and utter blank at the name Tom Lehrer. Find the other ten
percent, though — perhaps fans of comedy radio show host Dr.
Demento — and their eyes will gleam knowingly and they’ll begin to
snicker. Yes, I said snicker. There is something irreverently
underhanded about Lehrer’s music. In his time, he was a musical
terrorist, planting bombs of songs under the establishments of his
day, and a good deal of his humor still rings true.
Lehrer, a tenured professor of mathematics at Harvard
University, recorded three albums of comedy songs between 1953 and
1966, after which he retired, becoming one of the most celebrated
non-performers in comedy history. His work continues to resurface
periodically, and despite a need in many cases to understand the
historical context in which it was recorded, remains evilly funny.
(Anyone who saw and heard Mandy Patinkin warbling Lehrer’s
“Poisoning Pigeons In The Park” on
Chicago Hope has experienced Lehrer’s backhanded humor and
clever lyrics.)
This CD is a compilation of Lehrer’s first two albums, as well
as four tracks of orchestrated versions recorded in 1960 and one
until-now unreleased track — and it is very, very funny.
“Comedians” (and I use the word loosely) like Adam Sandler and
Chris Rock would do well to sit down and take some copious notes.
Lehrer manages to be hilarious without ever crossing the line of
social taboos, and bear in mind these are Eisenhower-era social
taboos.
As an artist, Lehrer was fond of harpooning swollen egos and
excessively respected social institutions, and he never misses his
targets. Harvard University (“Fight Fiercely Harvard”), academia
(“Lobachevsky”), American small time life (“My Hometown”), and
Christmas mercantilism (“A Christmas Carol”) all get their turn,
and the humor remains fresh over forty years after it was
recorded.
Lehrer was not without social consciousness, and for his time
was a rather outspoken activist. “I Wanna Go Back To Dixie” is a
vicious attack on Southern prejudice, “The Wild West Is Where I
Want To Be” is a barbed commentary on American nuclear testing, and
“We Will All Go Together When We Go” is a scientist’s bitter
commentary on the folly of nuclear weaponry in general. When you
consider his work in its historical framework, it becomes even more
amazing; this was the fifties in America. One didn’t
say such things, or criticize the government.
Finally, there are the songs that are just -funny-. “Poisoning
Pigeons In The Park”, “Masochism Tango”, “The Hunting Song”,
“Elements”, “When You Are Old And Grey”…the list goes on and
on, as do the laughs. Special note has to go to “I Got It From
Agnes”, a previously unissued Lehrer track — and indeed, one can
see
why it was unissued. You can only push fifties taboos so
far.
Despite repeated beseechment, Lehrer has not recorded since
1966, content to teach and remain in academia — as he put it in a
1996 interview quoted in the CD jacket, “I liked high school, too,
but I don’t see a need to go back.” It’s our luck that for a little
while, he
did spend time at the keyboard, and more our luck that Rhino
saw fit to bring out this loving tribute. For anyone who both
enjoys comedy and has some remnant of historical awareness,
Songs And More Songs By Tom Lehrer is more than worth
it.