When I was a kid I loved those K-Tel compilations like Dumb Ditties and Goofy Greats, and while I've never been a raving fanatic about novelty records as an adult, I do still sometimes get that strange midnight craving for whatever that is in the garbage cans out behind the building where they make the Petula Clark and Platters and Three Dog Night records. I was already familiar with the more famous works of Nervous Norvus (aka Jimmy Drake) like "Transfusion" and "Ape Call," but I'd never heard this, his final Dot single until it was covered by Notorious Sophisticated International Playboy Deke Dickerson. Kory Willis (my boss and musical comrade) and I were so intrigued that we had to track down the original, and to our delight it was truly demented; much, much stranger than Mr. Dickerson's cover would have suggested. While we were spinning it at the house one night, a friend who disdains most music recorded after about 1966 commented "See, this is everything I like about American Music of the 50s. It's a guy playing a ukelele and stomping on the floor, and it came out on a major label."

Speaking of which, Dot records must have been a pretty interesting place to work. On one hand, Pat Boone and the Hilltoppers. On the other, "Love Me" by the Phantom, Sanford Clark, and Nervous Norvous. Wow.

The mellaroonie folks at Norton Records have assembled an exhaustive compilation of the Nervous one's compositions entitled Stone Age Woo: The Zorch Sounds of Nervous Norvus. It includes much biographical hoo-haw and is highly recommended.

"The Fang" is dedicated to the beloved Casey, whose overbite has amused many visitors to our house.