12/20/02’s illustrious band:

Walrus Gumble

Brought to you by Lightbringer.

Walrus Gumble is not to be confused with former morning TV toadstool Bryant Gumbel, and also not to be mistaken for one of yesterday’s wild game recipes. This is a lyric scrap from “Come Together,” a song by immortal Beatle John Lennon. My trusty Internet tells me “Come Together” was released as a single in the U.S. of A. in October 1969, but was not performed in concert by the Beatles.

(Actually, there’s some disagreement as to whether the phrase is “walrus gumble” or “walrus gumball” or “walrus gumboot” or “walrus gumboat” or what. Beatles scholarship is nothing if not an interpretive art. I prefer to think that a gumble is exactly the sound a deep-voiced walrus makes.)

I first heard “Come Together,” like most Beatles music, not as originally recorded, but as covered by other artists. My best recollection of this tune is, predictably, the version sung by a cappella quartet The Bobs, who have either desecrated or rescued it, depending on which way you lean. I don’t consider this piece an example of The Bobs’ best work, but at least you can hear the words.

And Lennon’s words are what make this song great. His psychedelic ramblings allow for infinite explication, the hallmark of good poetry. Read it through your mojo filter and you’ll understand. Anyone who can collect royalties on the observation that “One and one and one makes three” gets a big hats-off from me.

Here come old flat-top
He come groovin' up slowly
He got ju ju eyeball
He one holy roller
He got hair down to his knee
Got to be a joker he just do what he please

He wear no shoeshine
He got toejam football
He got monkey finger
He shoot Coca-Cola
He say I know you, you know me
One thing I can tell you is you've got to be free
Come together...right now
Over me

He Bag Production, he got
Walrus gumboot, he got
Ono sideboard, he one
Spinal cracker, he got
Feet...down below his knee
Hold you in his armchair you can feel his disease
Come together...right now
Over me

He rollercoaster, he got
Early warning, he got
Muddy Water, he one
Mojo filter, he say
One and one and one is three
Got to be good lookin' 'cause he's so hard to see
Come Together...right now
Over me

Come together...yeah
Come together...yeah
Come together...yeah
Come together...yeah

Happy Holidays to all and to all a good night.
The Media Sensation is hereby on vacation until January 2, 2003.