Abubilla Music

Monkey Space Camp: A New SMCC Video

Written by The Saturday Morning Canasta Club

Okay, sometimes we are simply ridiculous.   This is one of those times.  But really fun video.We proudly present our video for Monkey Space Camp, which may or may not actually appear on our third album, depending on crowd abuse received…. It is in honour of all those lost heroes of Space, the Space Monkeys, who lost more of their brothers than any other mammals in space.  And it is in honour of the last Space Shuttle Launch.

Four things you need to know about this video:

1.  It Honours the Un-Sung Heroes of the US Space Programme.

For our younger band members, they didn’t take Jimmy seriously when he wrote the lyrics, as he tried to explain to them that the US sent monkeys to space.   For the older folks, you’ll recall the extraordinary space race that started in late fifties.  The US was shocked by the Soviet success in sending up Sputnik I.  Then, before the US could really respond, the USSR sent up Sputnik II, with a tiny little dog.  The dog, Laika, sadly died, freaking out, in my view, the US Monkeys that had to follow.    Abel and Miss Baker were the first to survive (after lots of deaths prior).  Then the US started to prepare for man in space, but again the Soviets trumped the Americans with Yuri Gagarin’s first flight.   Finally, the US got up a couple sad little monkeys and then followed with John Glenn.  As every American kid knew at time, the US got the first man in space that orbited the earth (Yuri went up and down, but didn’t complete an orbit — rather ‘fine print’ given he was first man in space).  None of us even knew about Yuri.    If you want the full story, start here and then explore — fascinating.    Click here:  The Full Story Begins

2. This is Greg’s Second Abubilla Video, with Major Supporting Role from Hannah

Greg is our video maker partner (VMP in our new corporate speak), who put this together very quickly, grabbing lots of footage of the space programme.  All real footage.   He was helped by Hannah, who spent part of her Saturday searching the web for all the footage.  Watch this space for more on Greg’s first video, Immovable Thing.

3. This Song Should Not Have Happened.  But Mike and Gus just got stupidier and stupidier

This song was completely inspired by the behaviour of our youngsters – Mike and Gus at the 2010 Spanish Jam.  Besides relatively late nights (or slightly early mornings), they invented a game called Body Pong, which involved them running around the pool with two ping pong paddles trying to hit a ball between their hands.  They fell at the first turn 97% of the time.  But they made a lot of noise.  A lot of noise.  We started to refer to them as Monkey boys, then gradually Space Monkeys.   So we wrote some lyrics.  Such a stupid song, it never was a very high priority, but Jimmy forced the issue the last three hours the studio was open.  Mike was fairly incapacitated for drums (after his performance he slept on the studio bed) and Gus was not really understanding the song or lyrics.  His ‘thinking back to space camp’ bit, before the chorus is simply him coming in too early.  The Monkey sounds between the boys was simply normal banter – this was pulled from the off takes to 500 Letters from New York.  They weren’t even trying to sound like Monkeys.

4.  Here are the lyrics, until we get a chance to post them…

Verse 1

I was picked for general fitness, Tend to sit around all the time

I didn’t eat those buttons, Or get tangled in your sewage lines.

I’m circling round the globe, With wires measuring my vital signs

I still can’t eat those buttons, My main job’s not to die.

Chorus 1

I’m thinking back to Space Camp, Monkey Space Camp was quite a thrill

Sucking tubes of Banana goo, And training to sit still

There’s Boo Boo from Morocco, And Sasha from Inverness

Loo Loo  puked during weightlessness, A down right Monkey, A down right Monkey mess.

Verse 2

And I know I’ll be famous.  Parading down 5^th Avenue

But there’s been some recent rumours, They’ll send men to try what we can do

And if I could write some poetry, I’d opine about this endless sky

But I’m really just a Monkey, Trying hard not to die

Middle 8

Monkey Monkey Space Camp, Who thought we’d have such a place?

A Crazy cold war tit for tat, A space race, A monkey space race, In outer space

Chorus 2

I’m thinking back to Space Camp, Monkey Space Camp was quite a thrill

Sucking tubes of Banana goo, And training to sit still

There’s Frankie with his big pink butt, And Coco all chocolate brown

Coco climbed up Space Command And we still can’t get her down.

That’s It. Congrats to all.

SMCC