After 30 Years in the Vaults, A Long-Suppressed Album is Finally Released, By Prince
Wait I Mean by Bernie Sanders
Wait What the Hell Do I Mean?

For some reason -- and I'm sure it wasn't a good reason -- Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders recorded a folk music album in 1987.

Was it any good?, you don't ask.

Well since you didn't ask I'll tell you.

No. It was not good. It was the metaphysical opposite of good. It was 8-track Hitler.

In the 1980s, facing public panic over references to devils and magic and evil, Dungeons & Dragons changed the alignment system so that "evil" was now represented by "Lawful Bernie Sanders Folk Music Album" and "Chaotic Bernie Sanders Folk Music Album."

At the time, Sanders was a mayor.

Todd Lockwood, a Burlington-based author/photographer/musician, remembers sipping coffee at Leunig's Bistro one morning in 1987 when he came up with the idea of recording then-mayor Sanders at his White Crow Audio studios....

"I was surprised he said, 'Yes,'" Lockwood said. "When I first went to his office he said, 'I have to admit to you this appeals to my ego.'"

I have an ego, but if someone asked me to record an album, I'd say no.

Because of my ego. See, because I don't play instruments or sing, so the whole endeavor would be very embarrassing.

Sanders had the same handicaps.

Didn't stop him, though.

Sanders gave Lockwood a list of songs, mostly from Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, he would be willing to record.

Of course. I'm sure Joni was on the list, somewhere.

It's good to be a Human Cliche. People should work as hard as they can to fashion themselves into a three-dimensional caricature of a one-dimensional socio-cultural stereotype.

The plan was for Sanders to sing relatively straightforward renditions of a handful of them. And that apparently seemed like a good idea to everyone. Until Sanders stepped into the recording booth for the first time.

"As talented of a guy as he is..."

Talented at what? What the hell are you talking about, man?

"...he has absolutely not one musical bone in his body, and that became painfully obvious from the get-go," Lockwood said.

That's all I can swipe. Hit the link to read their solution, and to hear the music -- the aural equivalent of the Katyn Forest Massacre -- that Bernie Sanders made in those sessions.

Is the entire political class actually mentally unwell?

All signs point to yes.

posted by Ace at 04:10 PM

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