BABYFINGERS

Since The Residents release everything they have ever recorded, whether it's good or not, here is another EP full of songs that were meant to be on the "Fingerprince" album, but weren't quite ready yet. As if that ever made a difference to The Residents before. What did they have to get ready, I wonder. Anyway, "Fingerprince" was originally supposed to be a 3 sided album, but since these songs weren't ready in 1977, they held on to them until 1979 and released this EP. The original release was limited to 40 copies, and were sent out to those who ordered "The Third Reich and Roll" Box Sets. Later, a reprinting was made available to members of the W.E.I.R.D. club in 1981. Then a 3rd reprinting was done on pink vinyl in 1985. Eventually, it was added to CD copies of "Fingerprince" after 1988. The question to ask yourself is...."Why?" This question will remain unanswered in order to protect the innocent.

"Monstrous Intro" is a short instrumental with no point. "Death in Barstow" is a good example of where Les Claypool was inspired when he listened to The Residents music. No, it doesn't have any cool bass lines, but you can definitely hear Primus' inspiration in the goofy song with a weird lilting waltz-like non-waltz. It can't be a waltz silly, it's not in 3 / 4 time. "Melon Collie Lassie" is a dark song with stupid preprogrammed percussion and a fake accordion. Talk about tacky, but that's the whole point, right? Again, I must ask, what wasn't ready? If this is finished, I can only imagine what the unfinished version sounded like. Then you get the "Flight of the Bumble Roach". This is definite Avant Prog with the obvious sarcastic wink at the classical classic song "Flight of the Bumblebee", and lots of delirious non-harmony. "Walter Westinghouse" is the only track that cracks the 3 minute mark, approaching 8 minutes of awful poetry and tacky accompaniment. The two obnoxious voices just get more obnoxious as the redneck reader and another reader that sounds like Grover on acid get louder and more obnoxious.

Yes this is bad music at it's finest. It's like your stupid cousins got together, broke out your grandmothers Wurlitzer and made a tape recording 50 years ago. Unless you are a collector, there is no point in looking for this EP, you are better off picking up a copy of "Fingerprince" that has this attached to it. For tacky and awful music, it just doesn't get much better than this. But this EP is not worth the trouble since it has been made obsolete.