Don Bowman - Funny Folk Flops

Name: Don Bowman
Album: Funny Folk Flops
Year:1968
Style: Parody, Comedy, Folk
Similar Bands: Frank De Lima, Weird Al, Ray Stevens
"One-Word" Review: tea-bagger-get-off-my-lawn-anti-hippie-unfunny-jokester
Based Out Of: Lubbock TX
Label: RCA Victor 

Cover & Record

Back & Record

Funny Folk Flops (1968)

1. Green Sleeves 2:28
2. Crawdad Song 2:28
3. Under Tremendous Amount of Pressure 2:45
4. Worried Man 2:20
5. All My Trials 2:00
6. Dealyer's Stoned 2:35 /
7. The San Francisco Scene 2:16
8. In the Pine Trees 2:10
9. Messin' Up My Mind 2:50
10. House of the Setting Sun 2:05
11. Tom Dooley Baby 2:00
12. Streets of San Francisco 2:39

Album Rating (1-10): 2.0

Members & Other Bands:

• Don Bowman - Vox, Writing
• Chet Atkins - Procucer
• Felton Jarvis - Producer
• Al Pachucki - Recording Engineer
• Eddy Arnold - Liner Remarks

Unknown-ness: Never heard of this artist. But the cover, with him taking on different stereotypes and forms to produce "funky folk flops" with a "can you believe this?" look on his face, i'm guessing this is not someone who takes these styles or cultures seriously or respectfully, and this is probably a joke / insult album.

Album Review: This is a comic record, which mostly pokes fun at counter culture and flower children via an out of touch sense of humor which would ring true with older folks worryin' 'bout them hippies. Bowman passed away in 2013, but was a disc jockey, singer & songwriter, and comedian. His career genre was country as he was the original DJ for "American Country Countdown" from 73-78, and he apparently helped Waylon Jennings get a start. There is really no singing on the album, it is jut Don saying some rhyming phrases over country-folk music, with elderly lines like "can you believe that, and aw shucks chuckles at his own "unbelievable" realizations. From the loose parody of  House of the Rising Sun as the perspective of a nosey neighbor to a community house of folk singers and hippies, like a redneck tea-bagging trumper's version of Tom Wait's "What is He Doing in There?" to the outright hatred of hippies in the obnoxious "The San Francisco Scene" and "Streets of San Francisco" the album is just as terrible in its intolerance as well as the storytelling. Perhaps they assumed that hippies and their culture was a passing phase, that looking back at the scene would put this album ahead of it's time, alas, it's just grandpa yelling get offa my lawn. Or maybe the prejudice was part of the charm, and this album is trying to show folks how disrespectful people come off? I really doubt it.

Stand Out Track: The San Francisco Scene

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