A new discovery on my part, Raymond Scott is a composer, orchestra leader, pianist, engineer, recording studio maverick, and an electronic instrument inventor. I first heard him in J Dilla’s Donuts with the track “Lightworks” and the cartoony playfulness of early electronics instantly called upon me to seek for more.

We’re living in this silly little modern world, where indie is the new pop, folk is the new black and prog is the new alternative. The fact for instance, that an old song by Mogollar (Les Moguls) is the official Playstation 3 ad shows how people are returning to roots more and more each day.

I know i had said earlier that the next music i reviewed would not be older than my father. I’m now going to eat those words with these pieces from Sonny Lester. Hey, can you blame me for getting a space age pop album named “How to bellydance for your husband”? I know, you would have done the same.

Skipping his WWII days from where he came back

The saying “No job too silly to take seriously” being his motto, Mort Garson wrote many things that would make a normal person shake his/her head and say “get a life, man.” He wrote “The Wozard of Id”, a psychedelic satire with environmental sound effects and Nancy Sinatra (credited as “Suzy Jane Hokum”) as Dorothy.

These gems from the space-age bachelor pad music era are taken from Re/Search’s Incredibly Strange Music, vol.1.

This was undoubtedly the happiest find i had for months. Theatrical (almost like a BBC drama) spoken-word nature documentaries all along tinny claviers, bluegrass melodies, soulful choruses and all sounding like it’s coming from your grandpa’s phonograph.

Solomon Schwartz has taken traditional jewish songs and made them into twist songs, in 1963 should I add. And were it not for the 2004 reissue, these gems would probably be lost. The opening track is the most wellknown Jewish song Hava Nagila. I’m pretty sure only one listen will be enough to first laugh out loud and then repeat the track for at least 3 times in a row.