I don’t know about you, but the dog days of August are making me long for some levity. And what better way to bring in some hilarity than to think about the late Boots Randolph’s delightful “Yakety Sax,” a.k.a. “that Benny Hill Show song,” a.k.a. the best way to make any YouTube clip hilarious? Noted “Yakety Sax” enthusiast Jess Harvell and I put together a pair of lists related to the song—namely, a top 10 countdown of artists who need to cover the song soon, and a counterpoint list of 10 artists who should never get within a 25-mile radius of its implied hilarity, for fear of ruining it for all time. The countdowns after the jump.
Feel free to listen to Randolph’s original track as you peruse the two lists:
The Ten Artists That Definitely Need To Cover “Yakety Sax” ASAP:
10. Slayer
9. Tom Waits
8. Rahzel
7. The User (but only if he uses dot-matrix printers)
6. Kronos Quartet
5. Wendy & Lisa
4. Mighty Mighty Bosstones
3. R. Kelly
2. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
1. “Weird Al” Yankovic
OK, so that last one? Something of a gimme. To counterbalance it:
The Ten Artists That Should Stay As Far Away From Boots Randolph’s Triumph As Possible:
10. Dave Matthews Band
9. Grizzly Bear
8. Creed
7. Cat Power
6. James Taylor
5. Baz Luhrmann
4. 4 Non Blondes
3. Mariah Carey
2. brokenCYDE
1. Phish
The countdown to someone digging up a moldy clip of Phish doing “Yakety Sax” starts now, I guess.
Yakety Sax [YouTube]
Mario Paint Composer - Yakety Sax [YouTube]
Actually, I was gonna say, I recently had an epiphany that Phish is, in its essense, several hours of Carlos Santana playing “Wheels on the Bus”–so by extension that moldy clip is most assuredly out there.
I don’t believe they’ve ever straight-up done Yakety Sax, but the bassline in “It’s Ice” at times more or less is the sax line.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LdA6baowGs
Maura,
This has to be one of your best posts ever. All I can hear in my head now is Slayer playing this. The fact that The Bosstones HAVEN’T done this yet is actually quite befuddling.
I can definitely imagine Grizzly Bear ruining “Yakety Sax.”
I’m curious to know what Bjork would do with Yakety Sax.
@cheesebubble: She’d find some way to wear it as a dress.
Oh man would I love to see R. Kelly do this, if only because the Benny Hill-inspired video would be genius.
You don’t really address folks sampling Yakety Sax, but there’s been a number of folks including a ton of dancehall types sampling the “Benny Hill Riddim”. My favorite is easily Elephant Man’s “No Tikkle”.
http://www.imeem.com/juliansdancehallmusic/music/qpts2iYZ/elephant-man-no-tikkle-2008-benny-hill-riddim-elephan/
See Also:
http://www.theheatwave.co.uk/blog/item/benny-hill-riddim/
I was going to nominate The Decemberists as a band that should be allowed nowhere near Yakety Sax.
Chemical Brothers and Pitbull probably should be on the need to remake this list
Then there’s Tittsworth’s b-more take. There must be something in the air…
http://www.discobelle.net/2009/08/17/benny-down-the-hill/
Thanks Throwdini! More pondering led me to Talking Heads and then I happily arrived at Ween! As for the “should nots” - all I could think of was Kenny G.