The Show So Far: First there were two guys talking, then we saw some cartoons, then a fully dressed naval officer jumped into the North Sea, then there were more cartoons, then some guy told us about what happened so far, then …. Oh, wait … that was another show. Sorry.
As some of you may have noticed, we dropped the June 2018 installment of our podcast THIS IS BIG GREEN, which breaks a kind of long hiatus. Still, it’s 2-½ hours of stuff, including eight new songs, so hey … that took some time. We may reside in a hammer mill, but we’re not running a factory here, man. Unless you count the robots Mitch Macaphee plugs together in the basement. (He’s considering establishing an assembly line. Not sure where that’s going, exactly.)
Anywho, if you haven’t listened to it yet, here’s what to expect:
Ned Trek 37 – Return to The Carl. This ludicrous musical episode of our Star Trek parody Ned Trek is based on the classic Trek episode entitled Return to Tomorrow, which had the Enterprise crew come across a dead civilization whose only survivors concealed themselves in glowing orbs and who talked Kirk, Spock, and some random scientist into letting them use their bodies to build android bodies the space aliens could use permanently. The head alien’s name was “Sargon”. In our version, it’s Sagan. The heavy from the planet’s “other side” is played by Edward Teller – he occupies Ned’s body, then calls everybody “puny”. Silliness ensues. Featured songs include:
Light Thing. A doc song, referring to the glowing orb receptacle that held Sagan’s consciousness (as opposed to the bubble gum machine that held Teller’s). Put your childish things away.
Sagan’s Song. Just what it sounds like – a Broadway-like number sung by Carl Sagan in which he lays out his ambitious plan for making the crew of the Free Enterprise smarter than total lunkheads. (Or, failing that, teaching them better table manners.)
Risk Is Your Business. Romney song based on Kirk’s heroic monologue from the Star Trek episode we based this on, only cross-pollinated with what unconsciously approaches a Marxist critique of capitalism. Oh, and sung in a French accent. Don’t ask me why.
Congratulations. Sung by the Nixon android, this touches on the usual Nixonian tropes of resentment, bitterness, self-aggrandizement, etc. Sixties-style “na-na-na” singalong thrown in for good measure.
Teller. A literally incendiary musical rant sung in the voice of Edward Teller while in Ned’s body. Think of it as a love sonnet to the H-bomb. Super.
The Other Side. Perle sings this perky little number about all the advantages of trading with the other side, whatever side that may be.
Fat Captain. A wrenching Sulu song about how Shatner soaked up the limelight at his expense back in the day. Based on a true story or two.
Blow The Man Down. Show-ender by Sagan, mopping up after the mess made during the preceding 90 minutes of ridiculousness. A song of grateful resignation. And yes, you get to hear Carl Sagan singing “dum dum-de-doo.” You’re welcome.
Put The Phone Down. Our typical impromptu back-and-forth gab session starts with a rough rendition of “All Saints Come”, a song off of our first album, 2000 Years To Christmas. It goes downhill from there. Just give it a listen, you’ll see.
My summer pass-times usually include deep archive stuff – you know, threading old reel-to-reel tapes onto antiquated and dysfunctional playback machines, just to get a momentary listen in to what they contain. We have a few of those, and many, many audio cassettes with both stereo and four-track content. We also have Hi-8 DAT tapes from our Tascam DA-88 days (the system we used to record our first album,