Keep It Under Wraps - a mummy music mix
Oct 31 '09
The Bottom Line Everybody loves their mummy... Here's some music to go with the Halloween season.
Amongst all of the classic movie monsters, the Mummy occupies a unique grammatical niche. The various mummies that have appeared on film throughout the years have all presumably been specific pharaohs or high priest from ancient Egypt, and we're led to believe that there are lots of different mummies out there. With even the slightest of grave robbing trespasses, any of a number of those undead menaces could rise up to wreak havoc at a moments notice. Despite the vast recruitment pool, mummies that appear in film are often referred to as The Mummy, when it fact it is simply A Mummy. That pesky definite article always seems to come along as part of a package deal.
Think about it - Dracula is simply A Vampire, not The vampire. Any given werewolf is just A Werewolf. Zombies... well, it wouldn't be right to say A Zombie, since they always attack in hordes, but no one would ever call any of then The Zombie. The Creature from the Black Lagoon appears at first to bear the same lexical saddle, but that creature was a one-of-a-kind anomaly. There are enough mummies in the world to populate a small army, yet they're always referred to as The Mummy whenever they appear on the silver screen.
Mummies happen to be on my mind right now since I happened to be involved in a mummy-themed Halloween Party, and I've been tasked with assembling a suitable mix of music to play in the background, much like I had done in previous years with my zombie music mix and my werewolf music mix. Turns out that mummy-themed music isn't as easy to find as other monster-themed songs. I don't know if it has anything to do with mummies' unusual definite-article-specificity, or if it's just that mummies don't have the same modern day hipster cachet that zombies, vampires, and werewolves have. Whatever the reason, I had to do some serious digging to find enough songs, but perseverance saw me through and I managed to get everything together just in the nick of time. So here, for your musical amusement and amazement, is my Mummy Music Mix for Halloween 2009.
Hidden in the Sand by Tally Hall
My Halloween mixes have never aimed for creepy and scary, opting instead for clever and kitschy. This song would never fit for the opening of a scary mix, but its gentle ukulele arrangement backed by the sound of ocean waves and its classic crooner harmonies. And given that classic mummy movies always seem to be set back in the early 1900's, this little vaudevillian sounding ditty opens things up just right.
♬ we were playing in the sand
and you found a little band
you said you fell in love with it
hadn't gone as I planned ♬
Curse of the Mummy's Tomb by World Party
We shift to a noticeably darker tone with this song, but it's much more of a classic rock world weariness than a cheap thrill horror movie scare. A catchy guitar riff full of twang and reverb drives the song along as Karl Wallinger speak-sings his way through all sorts of pyramid-explorer imagery. The lyrics may all be metaphor for stuff that doesn't actually have anything to do with mummies, but focusing on the surface of things is certainly good enough for our purposes.
♬ buried deep within the mountain
in the Valley of the king
there's a passage way that leads there
where the wind whistles and sings
of a time so long forgotten
but it seems like yesterday ♬
Wrap It Up by The Fabulous Thunderbirds
It just wouldn't be one of my Halloween mixes without some punny wordplay thrown in. I know that these Texas blues rockers never intended this most recognizable of their hits to have anything to do with Halloween, but creating a mix of mummy music without any reference to wrappings would be criminally negligent.
♬ well, I'm gonna treat you like the queen you are
bring you sweet things from my candy jar
you've got tricks you ain't never used
give it, give it to me it won't be abused ♬
Bag of Bones by Here Come the Mummies
A short cursory listen to this song probably won't reveal how much of a novelty piece it is. The smooth, soulful strains, filled with a wall of horns and smolderingly heartbroken harmonies, could have come from any of dozens of forgotten Motown acts from back in the sixties. Stop to consider that the band is an eight-piece outfit in which all members perform on stage in fully mummy wrap costumes, and all of a sudden they're not so easy to take seriously.
♬ without love
we ain't nothin' but a bag of bones
we just be carrying on in a lonely world
in an empty shell ♬
The Ancient Egyptians by Poi Dog Pondering
World beat jam band Poi Dog Pondering have delved into plenty of foreign sounds over the years, but despite this song's title, they cleave rather tightly to the sound of americana folk music for this one. Throughout all of the fiddle and mandolin rhythms of the song, though, there remains a heartfelt desire to return to the simpler times of ancient history.
♬ all around the world, a long long time ago
people would walk, where ever they had to go
they didn't have car keys, and they didn't have roads
they didn't have those ugly convenience stores, or Texacos
in fact, all around the world, a long long time ago
people would walk, where ever they had to go. ♬
The Mummy by Little Tibia and the Fibulas
Imagine if you will... a band made of Ritalin-deprived, attention-deficit stricken rockers who think that mummies are really cool, but who don't actually know anything about Egyptology, and who only know how to play surf rock. This is the song that they'd probably come up with if left to their own devices. The lyrics are pretty inane, but what's most striking about the song is the frenetic chittering noises that fill in the background, sort of like the noise that you'd expect a mummy to make if you'd never actually seen a mummy movie. Nothing about this song makes any sense.
♬ mad mummy dance
he's in a trance
all wrapped up in himself tonight
he's the mummy! ♬
Walk Like an Egyptian by The Puppini Sisters
The Bangles never included any links to the undead when they wrote their quintessential eighties hit, but mummies are such an integral part of the ancient Egyptian culture that we can probably just call it an accidental oversight on their part brought on by a hairspray induced delirium. Since their original recording wallows in all of the cliches of mid-eighties pop a little too unashamedly, I've opted instead to include the Puppini Sisters cover of the song, which adds a more timeless feel to the song by marrying a 1940's girl-group arrangement to the eighties sensibilities of the original.
♬ all the old paintings on the tombs
they do the sand dance don't you know
if they move too quick (oh eh oh)
they're falling down like a domino ♬
Mummy by David and Jad Fair
This song is taken from an album ostensibly aimed a children, but it turns out to be one of the creepiest sounding songs on this mix. The music is awfully simple consisting of nothing more than an ominous two note acoustic guitar riff with some random steel guitar noodling lain over the top. The lyrics are pretty standard kiddie fare, but it's the ultra-deep bass tone of the vocals, sung nearly in monotone, that really makes this song sound unnerving.
♬ they broke down the door and tiptoes inside
they were searching for treasure, but now they must hide
the hieroglyphics tell the tale of bad luck turning worse
the pictures tell the story of the mummy's dreaded curse ♬
The Mummy by Benji Hughes
Before things can turn too creepy, Benji Hughes's song brings us back to a laid-back, bubbly pop sound. Over an effervescent but simple guitar riff, Hughes sings the inexplicable tale of having to chose a monster to play the music for the local high school prom, setting up a wonderfully surreal double-meaning in the lyrics of the chorus.
♬ don't get the mummy
when the mummy gets drunk he unravels
don't get the mummy
when the mummy gets drunk he unravels ♬
Square Dance for Eight Egyptian Mummies by Racalmuto
The only all-instrumental track included on this mix, this song does it's best to defy expectations. It's much more of a jazz piece than a square dance, and the only time the music gets close to a sound that could be considered Egyptian is an occasional saxophone line that hints at some middle eastern chord structures. Mostly it sounds like a klezmer band trying to score an old black-and-white silent movie. "Esoteric" doesn't even begin to describe the song, but it's still an awful lot of fun.
♬ . . . ♬
King Tut by Steve Martin and the Toot Uncommons
King Tut is one of the first novelty songs I can remember being exposed to, and its goofy, non-sequiter nature is just as enjoyable today as when it first came out during the "Treasures of Tutankhamen" traveling museum exhibit back in the late seventies. Not even the over-the-top disco bridge halfway through the song can do anything to mar the timeless appeal of Martin's song (which actually made it all the way to number 17 on the Billboard charts when it first came out, making this the most "popular" song on the entire mix here.)
♬ now when he was a young man, he never thought he see
people stand in line to see the boy king (King Tut)
how'd you get so funky (Funky Tut)
did you do the monkey? ♬
Mummy Beach by Hot Lava
While I was searching for songs to include as part of this mix, I was surprised to find quite a few mummy-themed songs that embrace the lo-fi surf-rock sound of the 1960's. Perhaps it's a result of some sort of free association: mummies are found in the desert, where there's a lot of sand, which is also found on the beach, which makes everyone think of surfing and Beach Boys music. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but at least surf-rock is the kind of music that always makes people happy when they hear it.
♬ they're scaring children, having picnics, eating sandwiches
playing fetch, and marinating in their bandages
they stole my spot, they popped my ball, and then they crushed my castle
these stinking mummies are a smelly hassle ♬
Pyramid Song by Radiohead
Lest this mix start to get too goofy as we wind towards the end, we've got some slow, somber Radiohead (which is to say, some Radiohead) to pull us back down and keep us grounded. With its jazzy piano and cymbal rhythms, along with Thom Yorke's mushy vocal delivery, this song helps to lend an air of creepy paranoia to this otherwise mostly frivolous Halloween mix.
♬ I jumped in the river and what did I see?
black-eyed angels swam with me
a moon full of stars and astral cars
all the things I used to see ♬
Only the Stones Remain by Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians
Hitchcock's song is as brash and frenetic as the previous one was soft and introspective, and it's overt connection to mummies and Egypt is just about as tenuous, but on a metaphorical level, it's still a great fit. What could fit better with the theme of ancient mummies rising up after thousands and thousands of years than a song about how little lingers after our own deaths?
♬ they brake your body and drain the life out of it
it sinks into the soil while the soul flies into the air above
and when there's no more tears to cry
there's nothing left to do but laugh ♬
I'm a Mummy (an Old Egyptian Queen) by Douglas Byng
This mix opened up with a vaudevillian-inspired song from the early 2000's, so it's only fitting to wrap things up with an actual vintage recording from the British music halls of the 1920's. Sung in a lilting falsetto and full of double entendres, Byng's song captured the craze for all things Egyptian back in the roaring twenties and married it to the cheeky charm of seedy cabarets back in the day.
♬ throughout every generation and in perfect preservation
I have slept without the aid of soporifics
in an dim Egyptian grotto with a rude Egyptian motto
scribbled all across my bust in hieroglyphics ♬
Happy Halloween, and be sure to also check out my zombie music mix and my werewolf music mix before you head out to celebrate.
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