The Bobs
Encyclopedia
The Bobs were dubbed the first new wave
a cappella
group in history when they were founded in San Francisco, California
in the early 1980s. Now based in Seattle, Washington
, this genre-bending, eccentric vocal group has maintained a healthy cult following in the U.S. and Europe in the 29 years they have been touring and recording, winning numerous songwriting and vocal performance honors along the way.
and Matthew Stull decided to form an a cappella group when they left their jobs as deliverers of singing telegram
s in San Francisco. Instead of covering
more traditional doo-wop
songs, The Bobs started out with original arrangements of their own songs and songs like "Helter Skelter" (The Beatles
) and "Psycho Killer" (Talking Heads
). Although two of their albums are dominated by cover versions, the overwhelming majority of their repertoire is original, with songs discussing diverse subjects like lunar cattle farming, sleepy bus drivers, bumper sticker
s, laundry, hurricane
-related flooding, graffiti
, Oliver North
, shopping-mall security guards, celebrity autograph
s, synaesthesia
, post office violence, heart transplants, Heaven's Gate, spontaneous human combustion
, turtle
s, rebellious footwear, tattoos, nicknames for genitalia, and felines intent on ruling the world.
Their arrangement of "Helter Skelter" was nominated for a Grammy Award
in 1984.
The Bobs have broken with a cappella tradition several times by including instruments. The majority of the 1995 album Plugged is backed by toy drums. Plugged also made heavy use of studio equipment to make the voices sound more like guitar
s and bass guitar
s. Coaster includes a rock rhythm section on one song. Rhapsody in Bob features their arrangement of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" with pianist Bob Malone
playing most of the original piano concerto as The Bobs become a vocal orchestra. But this original "band without instruments" usually uses just their mouths, hands, feet and "other body parts".
Members of the group are always credited with "Bob" as their middle name. The name is often described as an acronym for "Best of Breed
", an award given out at dog show
s. Another story that the Bobs give is the name was shortened from "The Oral Bobs" in the first months the group performed together.
The Bobs supplied inter-gender wrestling champion Andy Kaufman
with his iconic entrance theme, entitled March & Fanfare. The song was played at the beginning of the Kaufman's biopic, Man on the Moon.
Several anniversary concerts were held in Berkeley, California in January 2006 to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the Bobs. These concerts featured seven of the eight singers who have ever been in the band.
A documentary about the group, called Sign My Snarling Movie: 25 Years of The Bobs (which includes archival material, never-before-seen footage, new band and fan interviews, and footage from the 25th anniversary concerts), was released in summer 2007.
movie For Better or Worse (1996), the Bobs performed most of the soundtrack, including the background music that occasionally interacted with the story. During the 1995 Emmys
they performed a medley of television themes with Alexander.
In 1996 the Bobs provided several original songs for the soundtrack to the children's video game Castle Infinity
.
New Wave music
New Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
a cappella
A cappella
A cappella music is specifically solo or group singing without instrumental sound, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. It is the opposite of cantata, which is accompanied singing. A cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato...
group in history when they were founded in San Francisco, California
San Francisco, California
San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...
in the early 1980s. Now based in Seattle, Washington
Seattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
, this genre-bending, eccentric vocal group has maintained a healthy cult following in the U.S. and Europe in the 29 years they have been touring and recording, winning numerous songwriting and vocal performance honors along the way.
Background
Founding members Gunnar MadsenGunnar Madsen
Gunnar Madsen is an American composer and vocalist. He was the founder and leader of The Bobs before leaving the group in 1991, and has released several albums as a solo artist since then.-Biography:...
and Matthew Stull decided to form an a cappella group when they left their jobs as deliverers of singing telegram
Singing telegram
A singing telegram is a message that is delivered by an artist in a musical form. Singing telegrams are historically linked to normal telegrams, but tend to be humorous. Sometimes the artist is in costume or formal clothing. Singing telegrams are often given as a gift.Western Union, the American...
s in San Francisco. Instead of covering
Cover version
In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...
more traditional doo-wop
Doo-wop
The name Doo-wop is given to a style of vocal-based rhythm and blues music that developed in African American communities in the 1940s and achieved mainstream popularity in the 1950s and early 1960s. It emerged from New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Baltimore, Newark, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and...
songs, The Bobs started out with original arrangements of their own songs and songs like "Helter Skelter" (The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
) and "Psycho Killer" (Talking Heads
Talking Heads
Talking Heads were an American New Wave and avant-garde band formed in 1975 in New York City and active until 1991. The band comprised David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth and Jerry Harrison...
). Although two of their albums are dominated by cover versions, the overwhelming majority of their repertoire is original, with songs discussing diverse subjects like lunar cattle farming, sleepy bus drivers, bumper sticker
Bumper sticker
A bumper sticker is an adhesive label or sticker with a message, intended to be attached to the bumper of an automobile and to be read by the occupants of other vehicles - although they are often stuck onto other objects...
s, laundry, hurricane
Tropical cyclone
A tropical cyclone is a storm system characterized by a large low-pressure center and numerous thunderstorms that produce strong winds and heavy rain. Tropical cyclones strengthen when water evaporated from the ocean is released as the saturated air rises, resulting in condensation of water vapor...
-related flooding, graffiti
Graffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
, Oliver North
Oliver North
Oliver Laurence North is a retired U.S. Marine Corps officer, political commentator, host of War Stories with Oliver North on Fox News Channel, a military historian, and a New York Times best-selling author....
, shopping-mall security guards, celebrity autograph
Autograph
An autograph is a document transcribed entirely in the handwriting of its author, as opposed to a typeset document or one written by an amanuensis or a copyist; the meaning overlaps with that of the word holograph.Autograph also refers to a person's artistic signature...
s, synaesthesia
Synesthesia
Synesthesia , from the ancient Greek , "together," and , "sensation," is a neurologically based condition in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway...
, post office violence, heart transplants, Heaven's Gate, spontaneous human combustion
Spontaneous human combustion
Spontaneous human combustion describes reported cases of the burning of a living human body without an apparent external source of ignition...
, turtle
Turtle
Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines , characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield...
s, rebellious footwear, tattoos, nicknames for genitalia, and felines intent on ruling the world.
Their arrangement of "Helter Skelter" was nominated for a Grammy Award
Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
in 1984.
The Bobs have broken with a cappella tradition several times by including instruments. The majority of the 1995 album Plugged is backed by toy drums. Plugged also made heavy use of studio equipment to make the voices sound more like guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
s and bass guitar
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
s. Coaster includes a rock rhythm section on one song. Rhapsody in Bob features their arrangement of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" with pianist Bob Malone
Bob Malone
Bob Malone is a pianist, singer-songwriter, composer and arranger born in New Jersey.Bob Malone grew up in Milton, New Jersey, where he started piano lessons at nine – within a year he could play anything put in front of him – and dreamed of being a classical musician...
playing most of the original piano concerto as The Bobs become a vocal orchestra. But this original "band without instruments" usually uses just their mouths, hands, feet and "other body parts".
Members of the group are always credited with "Bob" as their middle name. The name is often described as an acronym for "Best of Breed
Best of Breed
Best of Breed is the title given to the dog who has been judged the best representative specimen of its breed at a conformation show.Dogs compete in a hierarchical fashion at each show, where winners at lower levels are gradually combined to narrow the winners until the final round, where Best in...
", an award given out at dog show
Conformation show
Conformation shows, also referred to as breed shows, are a kind of dog show in which a judge familiar with a specific dog breed evaluates individual purebred dogs for how well the dogs conform to the established breed type for their breed, as described in a breed's individual breed standard.A...
s. Another story that the Bobs give is the name was shortened from "The Oral Bobs" in the first months the group performed together.
The Bobs supplied inter-gender wrestling champion Andy Kaufman
Andy Kaufman
Andrew Geoffrey "Andy" Kaufman was an American entertainer, actor and performance artist. While often referred to as a comedian, Kaufman did not consider himself one...
with his iconic entrance theme, entitled March & Fanfare. The song was played at the beginning of the Kaufman's biopic, Man on the Moon.
Several anniversary concerts were held in Berkeley, California in January 2006 to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the Bobs. These concerts featured seven of the eight singers who have ever been in the band.
A documentary about the group, called Sign My Snarling Movie: 25 Years of The Bobs (which includes archival material, never-before-seen footage, new band and fan interviews, and footage from the 25th anniversary concerts), was released in summer 2007.
Other appearances
In the Jason AlexanderJason Alexander
Jay Scott Greenspan , better known by his professional name of Jason Alexander, is an American actor, writer, comedian, television director, producer, and singer. He is best known for his role as George Costanza on the television series Seinfeld, appearing in the sitcom from 1989 to 1998...
movie For Better or Worse (1996), the Bobs performed most of the soundtrack, including the background music that occasionally interacted with the story. During the 1995 Emmys
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
they performed a medley of television themes with Alexander.
In 1996 the Bobs provided several original songs for the soundtrack to the children's video game Castle Infinity
Castle Infinity
Castle Infinity is a freeware MMOG for Microsoft Windows developed by Castle Infinity, LLC, an American non-profit organization.The official language of the characters in Castle Infinity is a modification of Esperanto....
.
Discography
- The BobsThe Bobs (album)The Bobs is an a cappella album by The Bobs, released in 1983. The group's music is sometimes referred to as New Wave A Cappella. The vocal arrangement of "Helter Skelter" was nominated for a Grammy award in 1984.- LP :# "Art For Art's Sake" – 2:58...
(1983) - My, I'm Large (1987)
- Songs for Tomorrow Morning (1988)
- Sing the Songs of... (1991)
- Shut Up and Sing! (1993)
- Cover the Songs of... (1994)
- Plugged (1995)
- Too Many Santas (1996)
- i brow club (1997)
- CoasterCoasterCoaster or Coasters may refer to:* A beverage coaster on which to rest glasses of beverage* A Furniture coaster Which stops wheeled furniture moving* Coaster , a regional rail service in San Diego County, California...
(2000) - 20 Songs From 20 Years: The Best of The Bobs (2003) – includes 12 previously unreleased tracks
- Rhapsody in Bob (2005)
- Get Your Monkey off My Dog (2007)
Videography
- The Bobs on [PBS]'s Lonesome Pine Special (1989)
- The Bobs on [PBS]'s Lonesome Pine Special - ISOBOBS (with the dance group ISO) (1990)
- Live at the 20th Century (1998)
- The Bobs Sing! (And other Love Songs) (2000)
- Sign My Snarling Movie: 25 Years of the Bobs (2007)
External links
- Official site
- The Bobs on MySpace
- Gunnar Madsen
- Internet Home of the Friends of the Bobs
- 18 minute radio interview at NPR.org, "The World Cafe", accessed 2010 January 14.
- The Bobs on Facebook