#rsrh Ah, Wisconsin recall singers. Bad #wirecall singers. Bad, Awful, Horrid singers…

You want to know what the most glaringly obvious thing is about this Reason.tv video?

It’s that Wisconsin progressives can’t write songs worth a tinker’s dam.  Gentlemen, for the love of God:  if you havetostuffalotofwordsinrealfastineveryline of your song, stop what you are doing.  Write down the lines.  Cut the lines until you no longer have to stuff.

…Hold on.  I feel a rant building up.

Allrighty then.  Let’s boogie.

Let us start by pointing out to would-be propagandists what you are not doing.  You Are NOT performing at the BadgerCon Friday Night Filksing.  You Are NOT demonstrating your interesting new picking technique as part of your series of instructional YouTube videos.  You Are NOT engaged in convincing your fellow Wisconsin progressives about how great it would be to get Scott Walker recalled.  What You ARE Doing is attempting to produce agitprop designed to persuade people to agree with you, and the First Rule Of Agitprop is that it must be attractive to the people that you are trying to persuade.

This. Has. Consequences.

  • If you cannot sing nearly as well as you can play a musical instrument, or vice versa, bring in a vocalist/musician to help.  If you can neither sing nor play an instrument, get someone who can do those tasks to perform the piece.  If you have no friends, stop engaging in Wisconsin politics and instead acquire some.
  • If you – or your performers – cannot perform the piece without referencing a lyrics sheet and/or score, stop right there.  Practice the piece until you can do it upside down, asleep, and in a rainstorm.  Also: you will not actually be able to hide the cheat sheet by following the next rule, so don’t even try.
  • If you do not conform to mainstream standards of attractiveness – oh, how I will get the hate mail for this one – do not use video of yourself in your piece.  Yes, life is unfair.  …And?
  • Finally: If you don’t want to follow this advice… thank you.  At least, if you’re a Wisconsin progressive; it’s a measure of how low an opinion I have of recall Democrats that I feel comfortable with making this semi-professional critique.

Moe Lane

PS: There’s a reason why pop songs rarely last longer than four and a half minutes, and it’s not because there’s something wrong with the average listener.

5 thoughts on “#rsrh Ah, Wisconsin recall singers. Bad #wirecall singers. Bad, Awful, Horrid singers…”

  1. “I feel a rant building up.”
    …Is that anything like ‘feeling a woot coming on”?

  2. Professor Tom Lehrer preceded you:

    We are the Folk Song Army,
    And every one of us … cares!
    We all hate poverty, war, and injustice —
    Unlike the rest of you squares!
    …
    The tune don’t have to be clever,
    And it don’t even matter if you put a couple of extra syllables into a line,
    It sounds more ethnic if it ain’t good English,
    And it don’t even gotta rhyme! … Excuse me: rhyne.

  3. To Moe Lane: From the bottom of my itty-bitty heart, thank you for illustrating what I could-a become. Mommy was a Union teacher, Union Building rep., and delegate. She tried her hardest, to swing me Liberal. But seeing the utter yokels she hung out with did the job, as far as where I was comfortable.not to mention they were
    cheap-a–es and she was always buyin’
    Even back in the 70’s, they were kinda putrid……..

  4. “There’s a reason why pop songs rarely last longer than four and a half minutes, and it’s not because there’s something wrong with the average listener.”

    True that.

  5. “…Hold on. I feel a rant building up.”
    …Try adding more fiber to your diet.

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