Spoken Lyrics Quiz Final Round/Answers
Here's the answers for the quiz:
Edited to add all the answers, and to add one final correct guess. Thanks for playing, everyone!
- Shut up, kid. Get in the back of the patrol car. ( guessed by katre50): Alice's Restaurant!
The only one on my list I don't actually own.
- You don't know how it feels when your son tells you to sell his bicycle to pay the electricity bill. ( guessed by ctate) "One by One", from the album Tubthumping by Chumbawumba.
Re-listening to this album was the reason I came up with this quiz in the first place, because there's spoken bits basically between every track, not to mention stuff in the middle of the tracks, too.
- And now, this is how things stood: the cat was sitting on one branch, the bird on another (not too close to the cat.) ( guessed by off_coloratura) 'Peter and the Wolf' by Prokofiev.
The very first time I heard this piece, I was maybe 7 years old, and my parents had gotten it on an LP with Peter Ustinov narrating. Ustinov intoned, "The cat was sitting on one branch, the bird on another," and I said, "Not too close to the cat!" and then Ustinov said, "Not too close to the cat." To this day, I am proud of that moment.
- "Go after them. Bring that helicopter back down, will ya?" "Luke was proud of his new harmonica. He decided to become an expert." [sheep bleating] "He was a quiet, long-legged skinny man, with a dignified beard and mustache." "He had only a blanket to [something] his nose." "'Tell me,' said he, 'I've got to know. Is there a house for me?'" "What have you got in there, Pinnochio?" ( guessed (and further deciphered) by derspatchel) 'Crazy' from the album Gordon by Barenaked Ladies.
These are pretty hard to decipher, which made figuring them out more satisfying for me. That said, I had only figured out maybe half of the whole quote before listening to it more deliberately so I could quote it for this quiz.
- And I took out his appendix and he gave me a colonic irrigation; yes indeed, you better believe it. And somehow in the middle of it all, the phone got knocked off the hook. And twenty seconds later, I heard a familiar voice. And you know what it said? I'll tell you what it said! ( guessed by amgb2) 'Albuquerque' from the album 'Running with Scissors' by Weird Al.
Yes, Weird Al continues to amuse me. This song is really really long, and it's this big dumb random story and I laugh every time. Sara hates it.
- [woman's voice, broadcast-quality:] "It also left a man's decapitated body, lying on the floor next to his own severed head. A head which at this time has no name." [Man's ridiculously low voice, live-quality:] "I know his name." [later in the song] "I have one thing to say: It's better to burn out than to fade away! There can be only one!" "Gimme the Prize (Kurgan's theme)" from the album 'A Kind of Magic' by Queen
This is the album that's the closest spiritual relative to the nonexistent soundtrack album for the film 'Highlander'. Isn't 'Queen' pretty popular? Nobody got this one, but maybe this is the wrong crowd. Shows what I know about popular music, anyway.
- Nobody in Middle America anyway, that's for sure. [later in the song:] "Do we really need all these musicians?" "Yes we do!" 'Putting it Together' from the Broadway Album by Barbara Streisand.
Nobody guessed this one either, but I didn't expect anyone besides my old roomie to have heard it before. And even that was 15 years ago, so I'll cut him some slack. Some fun stuff here; I *think* Barbara tweaked the song by putting in a lot of the spoken bits to make the song more about putting together the album itself more than, um, what the original song was talking about putting together. (Matthew? Care to enlighten us here?)
- And they were all asking themselves the same question: ( recognized by nothings) 'Born, Never Asked' from Big Science by Laurie Anderson.
ellric, did you get this one? Rick's the guy that got me into Laurie Anderson in the first place lo these ages past, and I still think she's fantastic. Very very interesting to listen to.
Now we get to not-mine. Guys, care to answer/elaborate?
- (from paulobrian): Here's a young one. Hey Rufus, how's the rain on the rhubarb? 'Angel' from the album 'Heaven and Hell' by Joe Jackson 'and friends' (the line itself is apparently spoken by Suzanne Vega. Thanks, google!)
- (from fmi_agent): Speaking as a child of the 70s ... ( guessed by joenotcharles): Mike Watt with Eddie Vedder, "Against the 70's" (or maybe just "the 70's")
- (from fmi_agent): This guy's pretty bizarre, Gus. "Harold of the Rocks," by Primus
- (from fmi_agent): Tiiiiiiiiiiin Roof! Rusted. ( guessed by skeetlj) Love Shack by the B52s [D'oh! I should have recognized this but didn't. I don't actually have the song, mind you, but I've heard it often enough.]
- (from ctate): That disease comes with a hot chick and a puppy! Underwear Goes Inside the Pants by Lazyboy
- (from ctate): He wanted 22 bucks but I talked him down to 17. ( guessed by fmi_agent) "Detachable..." by King Missile.
- (from joenotcharles): Cut it again. "She's Your Cocaine" by Tori Amos
- (from joenotcharles): Hey, what's happenin'? ( guessed by paulobrian) "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye
- (from joenotcharles): I expect you'd like to know about frogmen? "Fish", by Mr. Scruff.
- (from derspatchel): You must be making a lot of sales, piling up good income. (guessed by offcoloratura) "Snowball in Hell" from the album 'Lincoln' by They Might Be Giants
I recognized this last one, but could only remember it was a TMBG song and that I heard it on 'Then'; I couldn't remember the song (or even which disc it was from) to save my life. It's a hilarious bit, though.
Edited to add all the answers, and to add one final correct guess. Thanks for playing, everyone!