Does Humor Belong In Music 4?

A track from someone who, throughout his career, has pulled no punches. Randy Newman. It’s probably one of those sweeping generalisations that most Americans do not understand irony. Nevertheless……. Newman has been causing a fair amount of stink throughout his career by writing hugely satirical songs about every loaded subject that you can possibly think of. Politics, Racism, Bigotry, Religion – they have all fallen under the Newman microscope at some point or another and all have been treated with an equal amount of disdain and brutal honesty. No doubt his songs have all been taken at face value by some sections of the American public at one time or another. It’s still incredible that “Short People”, a track from his 1977 album “Little Criminals”, caused so many problems upon it’s release that the state of Maryland introduced legislation to make the playing of the record on the radio illegal. Newman has grown to hate the song calling it a “novelty” record but it works in very much the same way that a lot of his funny songs do. They get to the heart of the matter, whilst seemingly pissing a lot of people off in the process. Of course there is far more to Newman’s song-writing than just black humour. These days he his probably equally well-known for his soundtrack scores to such block-busting films as “Toy Story” “The Natural” and “Parenthood”. Indeed he has only released one “proper” album in 16 years, a disappointing return for one of America’s best songwriters. The soundtracks may have brought in a lot of personal revenue for Randy but apart from the odd song here and there, they deprive us of what Newman does best. At times his music resonates with a deep understanding of American musical history that provides a direct link to Stephen Foster’s 1800’s Americana, whilst incorporating just a tad of the musical gumbo of New Orleans. Oh yes and his ballads can break your heart too.

In these days of political correctness and the Dixie Chicks fiasco maybe Newman would find it difficult returning to his old song-writing format anyway. Whilst it may be true that Randy was never too concerned about what people thought about him, there’s certainly no shortage of subject matter to ridicule but none of the major artists seem to want to write about the serious stuff these days despite the dark times that we live in and the farcically frightening Bush regime. Where are today’s protest singers? Apart from Neil Young, who wants to stand up and be counted? Where’s Bob Dylan when you need him? (Don’t reply to that question – making darn good music is the answer)

"Political Science”, originally from his 1972 release “Sail Away” but taken here from "The Randy Newman Songbook Volume 1" album released in 2003, is a song that would cause a whole heap of trouble if George Dubya decided to agree with Randy's rather extreme take on the world order.



RANDY NEWMAN - Political Science (1972)