My niece and her husband are in town. They produce a web comic and their life is a constant whirl of comic conventions, one of which is this weekend in Chicago.Which is why they’re crashing at Casa de Freak. They were describing an epic upcoming international tour that made me want to take up a career as a web comic artist myself.

Gary Schneider “Sweet Georgia Brown” (Ben Bernie)
Most folks are familiar with this song as the theme song of the Harlem Globetrotters. It sounds quite a bit different when it’s played by my pal Gary Schneider on his Magic Whirlitzer. Mr. Schneider is a wonderful, charming man with a great self-effacing sense of humor. Corresponding with him is one of the great joys that has come from doing this blog.

Razorlight “An Englishman In New York” (Sting)
Becky and Frank will be starting out in New York. Frank is not really an Englishman, he’s from New Zealand. But there are surprisingly few songs out there about being a Kiwi in New York.

Julie London “Yummy, Yummy, Yummy” (Ohio Express)
From there it’s across the pond to London for Team TKT. I believe that it will be their first European show. They probably won’t get a chance to meet Julie London while they’re there so they’ll just have to enjoy this loungy cover of the bubblegum hit.

Dolapdere Big Gang “Big In Japan” (Alphaville)
While I was driving my guests to the divine Hot Doug’s for some encased meats my iPod coughed up two consecutive covers of “The Final Countdown.” One of them was by the Big Gang and that made this song an easy choice to honor the Japanese leg of their trip. Besides I just can’t get enough of the Big Gang’s Turkish Gypsy disco covers.

The Rhonda Harris “China Girl” (Iggy Pop/David Bowie)
Their last stop overseas will be in China to talk to the people who will be printing their upcoming book. Given the nature of Chinese society they’ll probably be talking to a China Guy, but I can’t find any covers of that song.