Saturday, June 09, 2007

Music and Stories from Original Hit TV and Movie Cartoons


When I first got this, I was intrigued by all the different company's characters on the cover. I figured this would be really good or really bad, and I was right on both counts. The "Merrie Melodies" cut has somebody doing some pretty lousy imitations of Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and the Looney Tunes gang. Then we move to cut 2, "Rocky and Bullwinkle", and it's the real deal here, people! Paul Frees, Bill Scott, and June Foray doing some fun bits and songs with their characters. First Rocky sings "I Was Born to Be Airborne", and then Bullwinkle ("Greetings, record players!") chimes in with the song "I'm Rocky's Pal". Then Boris and Natasha get their own song as well. After that we move to the Fractured Fairy Tale "Little Red Riding Hood". I know I usually complain about a record that just uses the audio from a cartoon, but when the original material is as fun as this, I don't have a problem with it! The Flintstones cut features the original cast singing the show's theme song, with another verse thrown in for the Rubbles. I'm not sure if the Woody Woodpecker song here is the original voice or not, but it's a good effort regardless. I think Popeye's is right too, but it sounds a bit sped up to me. Then we get to the other HB cuts and we're back to poor imitations of the characters.

I'm willing to bet that this is a sampler of sorts for a number of different records. A friend of mine has the Rocky and Bullwinkle record packed away somewhere, and if he ever finds it, I'll borrow it to share here. Anyway, there's some great stuff on this one. I hope you like it!

Here's the track list:

  1. Merrie Melodies

  2. Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle

  3. Boris Badenov and Natasha

  4. Fractured Fairy Tales - Little Red Riding Hood

  5. Meet the Flintstones

  6. Woody Woodpecker

  7. Popeye the Sailor Man

  8. Yogi Bear and Boo Boo

  9. Snagglepuss

  10. Blabber Mouse

  11. Huckleberry Hound
Click here or here or here or here to download!

3 comments:

Craig D said...

That version of the POPEYE theme was released as a "single" (at both 78rpm & 45rpm) by Golden records. The cover art declares that it features Jack Mercer, the original voice of Popeye.

And, yes, it has always sounded this sped-up! Kinda like one of Popeye's nephews did the session.

Thanks for posting this.

alarson17 said...

I love the Rocky & Bullwinkle tracks ... thanks!

Jhhl said...

Those R&B tracks are from a whole Rocky and his Friends album that I'll get around to digitizing at some point. That's why such an eclectic mix: the tracks are from different projects!