These are the other rarities that didn't make it to Myths, Legends, and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 2
"I Love the Monster"[]
- After watching "Hot Dog - The Movie," and getting stuck in the '80s musically, this song became a hot dog with cheese in the middle - totally unecessary. The monster part comes from a scene in "The Toxic Avenger" when he's helping to rid the community of criminal scum and the kids have "I Love The Monster" T-shirts on. I always thought this song would have worked better with a 'punk' tempo, but I was out-voted. The middle of this song you may recognize as a part in "Monster's Wedding."
"Why Rock?"[]
- Back when heavy metal kitsch was funny, we wrote this song in about 10 minutes. The Ultra Kyu being well-versed in rock, wrote the music from a metal bumper plate. The lyrics contain many metal clichés in them such as, "quest for fire," "the dark one," "clutch the skull," "seal the fate," etc, etc. If you've never heard of Leather Pyrate, check them out sometime. They really wail, man. This song contains backwards masking messages that can be deciphered on vinyl and at the end of the song, the keyboard creates a frequency that makes you want to play computer blackjack.
"Sequence Erase (Instrumental)"[]
- Personally, and I think most of the band would agree that this song was better without any words. Originally written as an intro to our live show, I think it captures the whole superhero Johnny Quest Big Jim action chop vs. The Forces of Evil pretty well. Our label liked it too and wanted words written to it so that's how it became "Sequence Erase."
"Cold Raw Gold"[]
- "I quit my job to look for cold raw gold" is what i was thinking about trying to make a living being in a band. Frustrated and half-crazy and bitterly disappointed, my brain tried to escape. This is just a sketch of the song. We were going to add guitars, horns and real instruments to make this song a band effort, but I scared everybody when I sang these scratch vocals - I ripped off my shirt and punched myself in the face. A lot of the songs we wrote would start off with synthesizer music on a sequencer, then we'd build the song around it. This one never made it past phase one. I still like it because it's tweaked.
"The Grey Man"[]
- Written about the boredom that can sometimes prevail in an everyday predictable american life, the music and lyrics seem to mirror the sentiment. Despite the saucy sax parts, the song kind of floated down stream into a disposal. An alternative version exists with rapping instead of singing, but no one knows where it is. Let's thank The Ultra Kyu for another strange song. Let's also thank Yes for the "Owner of a Lonely Heart" riff.
"Love Without Anger"[]
- Jim Goodwin, producer of the now-timeless classic, "The Fury of The Aquabats" came to us and told us he was doing a tribute to Devo compilation called, "We Are Not Devo" (as if the world needed another "Tribute To" record or compilation album.) Mark Mothersbaugh apparently hated the chosen title of the record. He preferred "Stick a Fork In It." Anyway, we were a little confused because we felt that by already being compared to Devo so often, an appearance on such a compilation might seem like another lame attempt by a bunch of posers (see the Clash tribute album). It finally came down to the fact that, whatever, we like Devo, let's do it. We couldn't decide what song to do, because of obvious reasons, we like them all. Plus, Don Knotts Overdrive already took "Snowball" (which by the way, is the best song on the comp). We decided on "Love Without Anger", because we liked the video (i.e. The Magic Chicken). We went for the Tex-Mex Mariachi stylee, because we were into that style of music at the time (See, K-Buena). Anyway, here it is. Pick up the compilation and buy Devo records. They're good.
"Ska Boss"[]
- The Skatalites' manager called us and asked us to be on an upcoming tribute compilation, and once again, befuddled by irony, we reluctantly accepted. On one hand, we were honored that such an incredibly legendary band would ask us a bunch of sarcastic hacks to cover one of their songs. And on the other hand, we were totally intimidated to try to do a real ska song. So we didn't do it ska, we did a hack jazz version of "Ska Ba" with a totally stupid intro. We wanted to do something kind of original, and something that our fans would expect from us. Again, it was hard to have so much respect for The Skatalites, and be The Aquabats at the same time. Apparently, they liked the track, but none of the other bands did.
"Return Of The British Knight"[]
- I heard a story about some kids who shot another kid and stole his brand new sneakers, and I was wondering what kind of sneakers they were. I wondered maybe they were British Knights. Then I had a vision of a british knight sporting BK's coming back from the grave to avenge his pointless death. This is the music part of a song never finished. We recorded vocals, but they were scrapped. Maybe this'll end up as a score for a movie about British Knights...?
"Knowledge"[]
- Once again, why ask The Aquabats to be on a Tribute to Operation Ivy record? i just don't get it. Back in '87, I thought Operation Ivy were great, and I still do. I have much respect for what they did and what they stood for, and it continues with Rancid. It was so hard to agree to do this, because how could we be serious about anything? We're not worthy to. Anyway, we decided to do a rap version of knowledge, but it sucked SO bad, it seemed rather disrepectful, not clever. After four hours of recording, we went out and bought a $30 acoustic guitar, and in one half hour did a campfire sing-along version of one of the most sing-alongable covered punk songs ever. Much love to Operation Ivy, and much love to Bill Murray and the movie, "Meatballs" for the inspiration.
"All I know is . . ." ". . . it just doesn't matter!"
"Mucho Gusto"[]
- We were on tour one day in New Jersey, and we were in some kind of Spanish barrio. I was thinking about Sesame Street and how great all their songs are. Somehow, I started singing the chourus, "Mucho Gusto, Como ce llama, etc." It was catchy, so we couldn't forget it. About a year later, we were writing songs for "The Floating Eye..." and CatBoy said, "Hey, remember that stupid song, Mucho Gusto?..." Well, anyway, I had to go somewhere for something, I can't remember, and Catboy ended up writing the verses , singing them, and recording the song with Kyu and Chainsaw while i was gone. It was so funny the first time I heard it, I literally fell down on the ground laughing. I really did. Catboy does a great impression of a pre-teen Ricky Martin pining for his bi-lingual love in a song that should be rewarded for its complete lack of respect for any real music. Catboy didn't want anyone to hear this, because someone who didn't get the joke said that this song was stupid. No duh. Make sure you send this MP3 to all your friends on Napster!!
"Green Ghost"[]
- I was scrolling through The Kyu's Roland computer, when I heard this music and beat, and I wanted to do something with this song. It's unfinished and I don't know if it will ever get finished. So here it is. It's about a rare Japanese toy robot that haunts me in my dreams while I'm surfing.
"The Lonely Horseman"[]
- Sitting around with The Chainsaw when he's holding a guitar, can be a mind-expanding experience. The guy is an incredible guitar player, and very funny. The problem is, he doesn't think he's either. One day, Chainsaw was doing his best "Gothic-Western" chord progression, and singing along just something that came out of his ... beautiful mind. I jumped off the couch, and told him he should record it. He said, "Nah, it's too stupid. No one will get it." I then challenged him to recall any other music we had written that wasn't stupid. He stood up, we walked into the other room and recorded "The Lonely Horseman" on a boombox in one take. The song is now a staple on country jukeboxes all over the southwest, and a funny joke to the rest of the band. We played it live a few times, much to the disbelief of the audience. It was great.
"Giant Robot-Birdhead! (Early Instrumental)"[]
- This started out pretty much as a digital song that didn't really go anywhere. We messed around with it and changed it and messed around and changed it again. It eventually became "Giant Robot Birdhead." The verses were inspired the guitar lick in the bridge comes from a riff we heard from an african song that was in the movie, "When We Were Kings" about the Muhammed Ali/George Foreman fight in Africa. If you're a cadet, you might recognize this music from the "... Look Back" video.
MP3 unavailable
"Doll Art"[]
- A long time ago, when we first started, we used to play a radio show for KUCI from time to time. The now infamous DJ of that program, Tazy Philips, was down with our "wacky vibe" and suggested that we do a cover of the then-popular Hole song, "Doll Parts." Bedazzled by the irony and idiocy of the whole situation, we enthusiastically began to destroy a grunge classic. The original recording of our then-improvised version remains locked away, but this version appeared on a free cassette we gave away to the first 150 kids to show up at a show we were playing in Orange County. We gave the tape away in hopes that some people could walk away without feeling completley ripped off. The now infamous "Bat Boy demo" is now a highly collectable rarity.
"Controller"[]
- We covered Oingo Boingo's song, "Controller", because we liked both Oingo Boingo, and the song itself. We only played it live, and never fully intended to record it. I think this song is about the paranoia of people losing their imagination and creativity at the hands of others. Ironically, this was one of the last songs that The Baron Von Tito played with us before leaving the band. So this is a live version that we found.
There is also a studio version that is featured on Dead Bands Party: A Tribute to Oingo Boingo.
"Todd-1 in Space Mountain Land"[]
- Like stated earlier, many of the songs written in the last few years would be digitally sketched with a sequencer before any lyrics or melodies were added. Thus explains why some songs don't have very good melodies, but that's another story called "The Learning Experience." Anyway, we were playing a show for a computer company called Immersion, and Prince Adam showed up wearing some technotronik members-only type jacket that looked like it was probably made in 1983. It had grids and geometrical stuff on it. I think it said Todd-1 on the pocket. Jaime The Robot remarked that it was probably made in Space Mountain Land. Who was Todd-1? Why was he wearing this jacket with removeable sleeves? Anyway, the music was written on The Kyu's sequencer, and with a little help, from Depeche Mode, this tale of the unknown jacket owner, Todd-1, sends chills up my spine. I mean, what if you got trapped in outer space and all you had was a lousy jacket with removeable sleeves? It's also on the yo check out this ride e.p
The Eltingville Club Theme song Lyrics version[]
- In 2002, comic artist Evan Dorkin created a pilot called "The Eltingville Club" for Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. It was based on four nerdy kids who formed "The Eltingville Comic book and Science Fiction, Horror, Fantasy and Role-Play club". There was a voice cameo by rapper mc chris and an Aquabats shirt appeared in one scene. The show was never picked up, possibly due to the underground nerd knowledge needed to understand the jokes.
- Dorkin, a longtime fan of The Aquabats asked them to write music for it. They recorded three tracks, two of which were used - one for the opening credits (below), and an instrumental song for the end credits.
External Links[]
[1]-This is the main page for the Myths and Legends website. Here, you can legally download MP3 files of the tracks listed above