The influence of Cartoon bands.

Bob Marley and the Banana Splits?
Bob Marley (seated)

Following allegations last year that Avril Lavigne plagiarised the Rubinoos an item on the BBC website notes a striking similarity between the Banana Splits' theme song and Bob Marley's Buffalo Soldier.

Listen to Buffalo Soldier - key lyric "Woy yo yo" - and The Tra La La Song, and there are distinct similarities. But while the Banana Splits came onto the scene in 1968 as hosts of The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, Bob Marley & the Wailers' Buffalo Soldier did not appear until the posthumous release of Confrontation in 1983.

According to the Bob Marley Foundation in Jamaica, the reggae legend would probably never have heard of the Banana Splits, let alone be inspired by them. Spokesman Paul Kelly says he is unfamiliar with the TV show, and nor has he dealt with other inquiries about the Banana Splits.

...." it's reggae - it's got the 'one drop beat' of the bass guitar and drums. The Wo yo yo is just Bob Marley being creative; it is Jamaican slang, an exclamation, a joyful noise the Jamaicans make when they laugh at a joke." he said. The song has a serious message: "In America, the red Indians used to say the black people resembled buffalos because of their dreadlocks - so 'Buffalo Soldier, dreadlock rasta' - and the song is about them being 'stolen from Africa, brought to America, fighting on arrival, fighting for survival' about 400 years ago."

Fleagle in concert

But a musicologist, who asked not to be named for professional reasons, says the songs are "strikingly similar. The main differences are in bars two and six, where the timing and inflection in Buffalo Soldier is more jumpy and Marley sings with a groove, whereas the Banana Splits theme song is "straight". And in bars three and seven, a note is gained in Buffalo Soldier or omitted in The Tra La La Song. "The other difference is in bar four - where the final note goes down to a C in Buffalo Soldier but up to an E in Banana Splits. In bar eight they both go down."

Well there you have it. Will the Bob Marley foundation be required to pay royalties to the creators of a kid’s show? Somehow I doubt it but I wish I could get that damned banana splits song out of my head... Oh oh Chongo!

Shamelessly lifted from
thepoormouth.blogspot.com
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The Bots - The world's first virtual band

THE BOTS
We all know that Gorillaz are the most popular and succesful bvirtual band in the world but the Bots take claim as the first. The Bots have been around since about 1992 and were basically an anti President Bush senior bunch of cyber nerds , when the first Presidential Mix, Bushwack, was released under the name Tone Def. Bushwack utilized The Bots so called revolutionary Presidential Truth Filter, which extracts truthful statements from vast wastelands of presidential obfuscation and distortion.

Later, in about 1996, The Bots employed speech synthesizers to create one of the first downloadable songs on the internet. Smoky, Paul Bot and Fred Bot created the song "Fuck You" in general midi and soundfont format, as mp3 files were still in the future. Through a series of recordings, The Bot Brothers, as they originally called themselves, displayed a bad attitude and an angry sarcasm that was unmistakeable. Years later, Synthia joined The Bots and the band went in a slightly different direction. Her recipe was to add a little bit of sugar to the mix.

Now The Bots claim to be as angry and critical as ever, but it is all filtered through a prism of hope, love, and humor.

Most info gleaned from here.

make up your own mind.

The Motors

I while ago while fishing around on Youtube, I stumbled across this classic Motors track from their self titled first album, the one before they got all emo with the hit airport and album Tenement steps.
I was actually looking for a live performance but this wonderful animation takes the cake for sheer brilliance.
I loves it