… the weird turn pro. That one-liner from Hunter S. Thompson adorns a T-shirt that’s popular down in Key West and has been an inspiration to me for many years. I was reminded of it recently when a fellow cover blogger mentioned that he and I had posted different versions of the same song on the same day, except that the version I posted was weirder. While I’ve always posted weird songs, I’ve never wallowed in weirdness for an entire post. Until now.

The Dead Brothers “Besame Mucho” (Emilio Tuero)
The Dead Brothers are a Swiss band that describe themselves as “the one and only Death Blues Funeral String Trash Orchestra.” Their music is an odd combination of traditional musical styles and punk attitude. If Tom Waits fronted an old-timey string band, this is what it would sound like. Between the tuba and the guy singing through the megaphone, it’s definitely weird.

Albert Kuvezin and Yat-Kha “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” (Iron Butterfly)
Albert Kuvezin is one of the most amazing musicians I have ever seen perform live. The things he can do with his voice are absolutely mesmerizing and otherworldly. Here he takes Iron Butterfly’s druggie gibberish and turns it into the soundtrack for a shamanistic ceremony.

Martin Denny “March Of The Siamese Children” (from The King And I)
Martin Denny was one of the pioneers of the “exotica” movement in lounge music. His music tended to feature multiple layers of bizarre percussion, odd sound effects and wild stereo separation. This song is all about the percussion and is regrettably short on the bird calls. Still, I don’t think it’s quite what Rodgers and Hammerstein had in mind.

Dokaka “Ramblin’ Man” (Allman Brothers)
Dokaka is a Japanese human-beatbox artist who has recorded with Icelandic weirdo Bjork. He has a CD out that I haven’t heard but which seems interesting as a concept at the very least. He first made his mark by recording a series of demented covers, mostly of heavy metal and prog-rock classics. So covering the Southern-rock stylings of the Allman Brothers is weird even for him.

Mutsuhiro Nishiwaki “Bohemian Rhapsody” (Queen)
There’s a whole lot of music on the iTunes Store from Mutsuhiro Nishiwaki, but they don’t have any biographical information. I can’t find any information about this guy anywhere. He apparently reprograms music boxes to play unexpected songs. He’s recorded a bunch of songs from movie soundtracks and has released a couple of Christmas albums. “Bohemian Rhapsody” sounds even sillier when it’s tinkling away on a music box.