Dave Allikas

The following liner notes from my first album, SONGS YOU WISH YOU'D WRITTEN, should do a better job of explaining my music than any details of my checkered past (although those do explain quite a few things as well):

THIS SPACE is filled on most albums with acknowledgements of the musicians and technicians involved. Can’t get off that easy here, as for better or worse I did all the so-called singing, guitar playing, sound production, and packaging myself.

So instead I’ll use it to thank YOU for buying or borrowing this CD. I started writing funny songs because I realized they occupied a special place in many people’s lives. The best ones have known no boundaries of age, race, era, musical style—or musical skill. If like me you grew up in the 1960s, you very likely remember listening to Allan Sherman with your parents. You may have listened to Tom Lehrer with your college friends. The previous generation went bananas for Noel Coward’s witty ditties.

As a record collector, over the years I’ve flipped through thousands of boxes of LPs at yard sales. The majority are always from the ’60s. I can’t count the Herb Alpert, Beatles, and Broadway show records I’ve seen offered for a quarter or a dollar. I can count the Allan Sherman albums I’ve seen: one. This, despite the fact that his first three sold in the millions. After years of hunting in vain, I figured out the reason: Virtually no one who remembers listening to My Son, the Folksinger with their family would ever give it up—or pass it up, if they got there before me. (At least, not that cheap.) Even for someone who no longer owns a record player, just holding the sleeve could bring back precious memories of shared laughter. In some families, that might have been all too rare an experience.

And this ability to stick in the memory is a special quality of songs, comedy and non. You probably can’t recall the plot of Oklahoma, but you can sing at least parts of the main numbers. And while you remember breaking up to that comedian on HBO last month, you’re not sure why. But how about “A Boy Named Sue” from 40 years ago? Hearing a song you like for the first time is a crystal moment that stands apart from the usual verbiage that bombards your brain, and which your grateful brain preserves and replays for you through the years.

So I thought it would be nice if my family and yours had an album of goofy songs that we could enjoy together and—maybe more important—remember enjoying together. And I thought it would be especially nice if I could be the one to provide it.

Whether or not I succeeded is something each listener gets to decide. Humor is subjective. You may listen to this CD once, find it not to your liking, and give it away.

But you MAY keep it till you’re a very old person, taking it out from time to time and smiling as you recall hearing a particular track for the first time with your children, or your mom or dad, or your best friend.

If our shared history is a guide, I’m confident that at least a few of you will. And that’s enough to make it all worthwhile.