Saturday, February 12, 2011

The Wayback Machine: Saturday mornings greatest hits



Most of us could never forget saturday morning cartoons, waking up, grabbing cereal,or maybe you were at a sleep over waking up in front of the TV. if you did forget what the fuck is a matter with you, stop reading this put your pj's on and go put on some Scooby Doo.Anyways I could never forget them to be honest. Now my generation had a few great ones but they tied in with after school cartoons mostly such as all Nicktoons and WB cartoons. The truly great ones I wasn't around for.

The original runs of Scooby Doo, Josie and the Pussycats (yes a gay imitation) were before my time, but most of them played repeats and I would watch religiously. Actually come to think of it I still watch my cartoons every week, I'll never grow up. I digress though one of the best things about some of these shows was the theme songs. Even growing up my music taste was on the rock side and I'll never forget the day my brother Greg brought home "Saturday Mornings Greatest Hits" a compilation of cartoon theme songs.

The compilation stretches 19 tracks and covers most my favorite old school shows. It kicks off with Liz Phair and material issue covering "The Banana song (TRA LA LA LA)" it's easily the poppiest I think she has ever done and it made it on to my running mix last year permanently. The next is "Sugar Sugar" by Mary Lou Lord and Semisonic, it perfectly captures the fun 60's groove of Archie. Next up is the king of Cartoon theme songs I'm talking of course about "Scooby Doo Where are you?" performed by Matthew Sweet, i must of played this a bunch as a kid and then again when I rediscovered it when I was 16. I swear I will never grow up.

After Scooby we of course have his gay imitation "Josie and the pussycats" performed by Juliana Hattfield and Tanya Donnelly (who? oh who cares its fucking good). After that the album dips out til the infamous Ramone's cover of "Spiderman". I honestly swear was there anything Joey Ramone couldn't do. Towards the end the album it gets a lil obscure for me but there is one amazing crown jewel, and that is Sublime's cover of "Hong Kong Phooey". Now I do not care for Sublime at all but this is a fucking winner and i can't even believe I'm saying that but yea love it! I feel that kids today are gipped when it comes to the opening theme song, its neat to see them immortalized as full songs, it makes them feel more competent even as low-art. While it just seems that todays cartoons are to sell crap and be cash cows!

Anyways while researching this I found the music videos made for this compilation featuring Drew Barrymore drunks 90's ass, Enjoy!