‘OH MY GOD’: Are you ready for Bernie Sanders’ foray into folk music? [audio]
Bernie Sanders' album sounds like Lou Reed by way of the Rocky Horror soundtrack. Amazing.
— Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) September 17, 2014
The year was 1987. Musician Todd Lockwood decided that what the world really needed was a Bernie Sanders folk album. And the rest, as they say, is history.
I heard Bernie Sanders sing a cheap-drum-machine-reggae version of “This Land is Your Land,” and nothing was the same http://t.co/8sFzH6Yf8d
— Tyler Machado (@tylermachado) September 17, 2014
More from Seven Days:
“As talented of a guy as he is, he has absolutely not one musical bone in his body, and that became painfully obvious from the get-go,” Lockwood said. “This is a guy who couldn’t even tap his foot to music coming over the radio. No sense of melody. No sense of rhythm — the rhythm part surprised me, because he has good rhythm when he’s delivering a speech in public.”
So they had to come up with a plan B. Lockwood decided to turn the event into a “We Are The World”-style recording session: He called in a couple dozen Vermont musicians to serve as backup singers, while Bernie more or less read/preached the key lyrics with as much rhythm as he could muster.
…
The resulting album was among the more popular ones that the label produced that year. They sold a few hundred cassette tapes at record stores throughout Vermont, Lockwood said — many to conservatives who bought them as gag gifts.
Well, duh. What else could you possibly do with such a sonic abomination?
Senator Bernie Sanders talking his way through famous folk songs is the new soundtrack to my life.
— Casey Graham (@cgrahamophone) September 17, 2014
Yikes. That’s depressing.
oh my god this Bernie Sanders album OH MY GOD. http://t.co/vYbWM6Boiu
— Abbie (@zeroanaphora) September 17, 2014
If you think "This Land Is Your Land" is a song that cannot be ruined, you haven't heard Bernie Sanders sing it. https://t.co/h2NeZmljwT
— Ruth Graham (@publicroad) September 17, 2014
Excuse me, I'll just be at my desk, weeping tears of laughter. Thanks for the chuckle, @Davis7D. http://t.co/V86m93BiTw
— Katie Flagg (@k_flagg) September 17, 2014
We’re weeping, too.
***
Related:
Leave a Reply