By: Annna
[2001-10-01]
More Songs about Rabbits and, Well, Rabbits
being a new discovery in the Petey songbook
As the regular reader of thingsihate is likely to recall, I discovered a lost recording by the legendary
Blind Mama Pelphrey that made a valuable, if somewhat violent, addition to the
Petey Mythos.
It's often the case with such charismatic figures that they are studied in great depth, while the cause they champion is almost entirely forgotten. At times I felt that I was becoming Petey's Peter, creating a Petey fan club rather than nurturing the values that Petey stood for all his life. Or, rather,
the value: consuming prodigious quantities of rabbit meat.
So I was very excited yesterday to be contacted by the local Goodwill donation department. It seems that they'd been given the unsold remnants of an estate auction, and among the shards of delft and
National Geographics had been several unlabeled reel-to-reel recordings. Unlabeled, that is, except for a
crudely scrawled rabbit head and the fragment "-freez."
Thinking instantly of my fame as a rabbit meat historian, specifically in female ukulele music dealing with rabbit meat, they decided I'd be the best home for the tapes. I picked them up immediately and spent all weekend restoring the oldest-looking tape with Q-tips, various solvents and inadequate ventilation, emerging just before thingsihate's strict midnight deadline with:
Rabbit Meat (1923), by The Pelphrey Sisters [2.77 MB]. A paean to rabbit meat and country living, nowhere in the song is Petey's name invoked.
But his spirit, ah, his spirit is everywhere.
Much like "Deliverance". Yes, I still have not forgotten the putative true meaning of "rabbit meat" ...
Lou am listen to song when Lou at work with DSL.
Folk and filk are taken; one more song, and I think we'll need to name a new genre for songs related to rabbit meat.
I'm going to see if our office can use this as the "hold" music for our phone system.
Just asking, since you're so good at finding these things.
This is a thing I've never known before
It's called "farm-raised" rabbit
This is a meat I've never ate before
And I'm glad to have it
"Farm-raised" rabbit
And I'm glad to have it
Since I've moved to Rogers, Arkansas
(bass line: doodle-ah doodle-ah doodle-ah doo dah doo dah)
The Nadsat word of the day resumes now that I am back from Medford.
Today's word is nazz: n. fool.
One of the best songs yet. Hey, you guys, ask Matie how it's going with her roommate.
I sense treachery.
The roommate dropped out and moved back to San José.
Hey Matie, now that your roommate's gone, do you get the whole room to yourself? I know at UBC if a roommate doesn't show, whoever got there first can spend an extra $500 to get the doubleroom to theirself, which is a pretty good deal cos when it's only one person those rooms can seem a lot bigger. Unless you've got them stuffed full of aquariums. Narf!
Annna, I regret to inform that your Pelphrey Sisters recording is a hoax -- it's just as fake as the Howard Hughes will, the Hitler Diaries, or the Emancipation Retraction. Haha.
Initial suspicions were raised when I heard the chorus: "You're all right in my book / If you'll only cook / That Pel-Freez rabbit meat". Noticing that the alleged date of recording or release was 1923, I was prompted to do a little bit of research; about thiry seconds later suspicions were confirmed, when it was revealed on the
Pel-Freez company website that in 1923 the company was called The H.P. Pelphrey Company, and did in fact not change their name to Pel-Freez until after the Second World War,
at least twenty-two years later. I don't know what kind of whacko would attempt to pass off a clearly anachronistic song as historical legacy, but such has been the case: I guess we've all got a little bit of rabbit on our faces.
This is a matter of interpretation, but I believe the chorus is actually saying: "That Pelphrey's rabbit meat". This would actually place things before Pelphrey had an actual company from which to hawk rabbit.
On a closer listening, I believe Lou is correct. Good ear, sir!
your check is in the mail
Also, his No-Prize.
Your room mate droped out after ten days thats really Impressive
She was CRAZY. I mean she had the mood swings, the passive-aggression, the Jesus, everything. I guess she just couldn't take it. At least I don't have to come home to insanity anymore.
What is it with this website and men from the Twenties who prefer to go by their first two initials, which are H and P?
Yes Lou, I took that into account in my investigation of the historical allegations, knowing full well that I did not posses an authentic copy of the original lyrics myself -- but then, I believe "authentic" to be an inappropriate word, for if you check the testimony of Annna herself you will read of "a crudely scrawled rabbit head and the fragment '-freez.'" Not "-phrey's".
I understand it must be difficult to accept, but we must. Life, as they say, goes on.
The gentleman's name (via Jonas' link) is H.F. Pelphrey. Similar, but different. One wonders what eldritch terrors we'd be referencing if the former had been true - mountainous, shambling, fuzzy-tailed things?
And I have no evidence that the labeling, indeed, the tape is contemporary with the original recording. My guess is that these are mid-'70s dupes of a now-lost master.
Which means there could be more out there. Keep an eye out for me, wouldja?
"Great burrows are secretly digged where the Earth's pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to hop."
Scary indeed.
My endeavour to discredit Annna has been foiled. I relent.
Okay, the Nadsat word of the day is nadsat: adj. teenage.
I was perusing
memepool, as I am wont to do, and made the mistake of clicking the link for Kevin Smith's comic about his wife. Not only is it brain-meltingly sappy and of interest to NOBODY other than Kevin Smith (and I am sure this includes Mrs. Wife), but the combination of his artist only knowing how to draw muscly superheroes and Smith's gently drooping, manatee-like physique generates some of the most eye-scathing graphics ever. This accomplished drawer of bricks puts muscles everywhere, so you get the Weeble shape that Kevin Smith has in real life with muscle bulges on it, and in one panel, he's wearing a crotch purse (I don't know what you're really supposed to call those fanny packs that are worn the wrong way 'round, so it's a crotch purse) and it's just frightening.
even his wife is muscle bound.
...
even the clothes are muscle bound.
Within a page or two, I'd concluded the comic was being self-indulgent as a joke. But then the damn thing kept going and going ... so now I don't know WHAT to think, except I don't care to study it any further.
The Nadsat word of the day is guttiwutts: n. guts.
Every time I hear the word "Nadsat", all I can think of is Dr. Evil's rocket ship.
Today I saw one of my favorite bumper stickers on a pickup truck:
"Unless you're a hemorrhoid, GET OFF MY ASS!"
Which begs the question: why doesn't he mind the presence of hemorrhoids? Wouldn't it be better to say, "Whether you're a hemorrhoid or a tailgater, get off my ass, but for different reasons"?
Careful not to exceed his spirit ally's move,
Lou
It occurs to me this is my fourth word of the day under this article. Today's word is crark: v. to yowl.
Maybe Sean and Koenig Pruess are fighting each other eternally so that neither one can travel to the other's universe and cause the cosmos to unravel?
First, I don't think the question "Why doesn't he mind the presence of hemorrhoids?" is raised: the bumper sticker states "Unless you're a hemorrhoid, GET OFF MY ASS!" implying that the natural place of a hemorrhoid is on one's ass, whereas that is an artificial place for another drive and would he kindly remove himself? So no value judgment is made regarding hemorrhoids and drivers, only a distinction between their natural places. (However, the other driver could argue that is he a tailgater, that subset of drivers that is, by definition, on one's ass, and is therefore in his natural place.)
Second, and this really bugs me, but that's not the proper use of the phrase "beg the question". Begging the question is not raising the question, but entailing one's conclusion in one's premises, kinda like circular reasoning. Coincidentally enough, I just ranted about that, in somewhat more detail, on my fantastic webpage so you should check it out and make me look popular!
Eentairesting. Do you have a suggestion for a better phrase than "begs the question" to indicate that some situation forces the pondering of some question?
A haiku for you:
I just had a bowel movement
I'm loaded for bear
Which makes one wonder...
Which leads one to ask...
Which forces one to question...
Which causes one to think...
Which catalyzes one to query...
Which instigates the inquiry...
And so on and so forth. It's a slow day in Computers 100.
'(The expression is sometimes misused: it does not mean
'raise the question'
, or 'assume without argument'.)'
