July 2010 marks the 25th anniversary of my signing a deal with Rhino Records for the wacky little Travesty, Ltd. skit “Rock and Roll Doctor” to be included on the Dr. Demento album Dr. Demento’s Mementos—which lead to it also being included on the Rhino box set The Greatest Novelty Records of All Time and the CD Dr Demento 30th Anniversary: Dementia 2000. Yes, Dr. Demento has been very good to me. (And the Doctor’s recent announcement that he is retiring his radio program after nearly 40 years was greeted with tears at Nutco World Headquarters. This Salon piece pretty much covers the same territory as my 2006 arts feature for City Paper, but offers a nice slide show of great novelty hits.)

Anyway, I took the liberty of compiling all of the royalty statements that have piled up over the years. In short, I have sold 161,301 albums, CDs and cassettes (a surprising number of cassettes, even into the mid-’90s) and was rewarded with $13,216.09 in royalty payments. That works out to about $528 per year. As the egalitarian members of Travesty decided to divide the spoils 10 ways, each of us has earned about a dollar a week during the last quarter century for our comedy work. You’re welcome.

Now it is true that some of those educated shoppers may have purchased the albums for a copy of Dickie Goodman’s “Harry’s Jockstrap” or “Dead Skunk” by Loudon Wainwright III, but I like to think that having that signature sketch in their collection was also a motivating factor.

If you have yet to acquire this comedy gem, you may purchase the original album on which it appeared, Teen Comedy Party, online here. Or, refresh your memory by watching these fan-made versions on Youtube. I have no idea what possessed these people, but am flattered that they took the time.

• Rock and Roll Doctor

• Rock and Roll Doctor

• Rock and Roll Doctor

• Rock and Roll Doctor

When one thinks of classic American surf music, one naturally thinks of Bethesda, Md. At least I do now, after wandering down
Bethesda Avenue of an evening and stumbling upon the Suburban Surfers. The band was set up in the open window at swanky Parker’s Bistro and filling the street with that definitive summer sound.

The group is Landon Banfield (lead guitar), Bill Adkins (rhythm guitar), Rob Fisher (drums), and Tom Phillips (bass), and they not only feature such mainstays of the genre as “Apache” (oddly, a song written and recorded by the British band the Shadows), but also offer suitably retro originals, such as the muscular “Gravitron.”

I must say, I’m quite jealous of Rob’s drums. The kit once belonged to Los Straightjackets‘ drummer Jimmy Lester and was acquired from eBay. Lucky bastard. Anyway, Parker’s has music Thursday through Saturday, another surprise but welcome, and the Surfers are there about once a month. Do check them out, won’t you?

Here Bill and Landon become Santo and Johnny on that gorgeous slow-jam, “Sleepwalk.”

I missed the beginning, but had to record this original/mashup, “Muenster’s Theme.”

As usual, these videos were shot with my PowerShot still camera. Can’t wait to pick up the Canon T2i, so these impromptu vids are more hi-def.. (Videos also available on Youtube.)

So the mystery of “That Thing You Do” continues. As I posted previously, the title song from Tom Hanks’ fabulous film That Thing You Do seems to be in heavy rotation on grocery store Muzak stations. While the fictitious Top 40 hit never cracked the actual Top 10 — a damning indictment of the music industry and popular taste — it is inescapable in the produce aisle.

Last week the tune was heard in a Kroger store in Richmond. You have to listen verrrry closely to this recording to catch it. Kroger’s ceilings are much higher than Giant’s, and the place was much noisier. Even so, the magic hook is unmistakable.

I have an e-mail in to TTYD singer Mike Viola and a tweet to Mr. Hanks seeking comment. Stay tuned…

I’m sure enlightened programmers can explain why 3523697345 is preferable to 3247397568, but I’m more interested in why news of this update didn’t make it my way. It’s not like I don’t pay attention—but do I have to now spend hours on Google’s blogs, too? Hey, I’m already busy enough keeping up with my Twitter updates and RSS feeds about HDSLRs and the end of journalism.

This is also a fair argument against the Cloud. If I installed my own audio player I wouldn’t be victim to the whims of Google. But arguing against the Cloud gets you branded a Luddite. And, hey, I was trying to be all open-source, right? Can’t win.

Always delightful to come upon street musicians, even when the “music” demands ironic quotes. No irony needed for Truusoul, a trio of young jazzbos bringing a quiet groove to the busy corner of Fenton and Ellsworth in downtown Silver Spring. The bass player and guitarist switched instruments after I stopped filming. And is that the tiniest bass drum ever? It looks like a rack tom but it has bass spurs on it. I want one.

Once again, the scene was captured using my trusty Canon PowerShot A590.

I have joined the discussion on vital topics of the day. The nice fellow at Crossing Marketing and IT drew my wrath in a post about ditching cable to save money by getting all his media needs via the seductive teat of the Internet. As so many have pointed out throughout history, when the cost is free, you get what you pay for.

Then I took the usually incisive Bob Garfield to task for his rather blind devotion to the cult of social media. His typically amusing post about a marketing fiasco by T.G.I. Friday’s seemed to jump to a much too simple conclusion, i.e., the customer is always right, especially when said customer is online. I have a different take.

That said, I do recommend Mr. G’s book, The Chaos Scenario for its insight into the current, well, chaos. A must-read for knowledge workers and Internet drudges alike.

Now back to keeping those kids off my lawn…

Obviously, the members of The Axis of Awesome paid more attention than me. Australia’s “most tolerated musical comedy trio” has done some valuable research and revealed the shocking truth of pop music: it only takes four chords to make a hit song. Here is the shameful proof:

On the opposite end of the musical spectrum, here is Jan Swafford’s excellent Slate piece explaining the surprising difficulties involved in simply playing in tune. With many audio examples. Of course, I didn’t understand any of it, but I felt good about myself after reading it.

(Here is the video on Vimeo.)