The Looney Tunes at Golden Records
After several years of having their cartoon characters appear in records produced by Capitol Records, Warner Bros. for some reason decided to switch to licensing their characters to Little Golden Records, another company that made children’s records featuring popular cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse and Popeye. There are quite a few differences between how Capitol and Golden handled using the Warner Bros. characters, with the most notable being that Golden, rather than actually telling a story with occasional song breaks, instead released records usually only containing one song. It is because of this that I am talking about the Golden series as a whole in this post, rather than briefly talking about each record individually as I had for the Capitol Records posts.
The songs are pretty average for the most part. The songwriting isn’t necessarily awful, but it doesn’t really feel like something that you would hear in a Warner Bros. cartoon. Compare, for example, Golden’s version of “I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat” to Capitol’s. In the Capitol version, the song is entirely performed by Tweety and Sylvester with an appropriately full orchestra backing them up. Even though the song wasn’t composed by Warners own musical directors, Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn, there was a certain feeling that it could be included in a theatrical Looney Tunes cartoon (and, as a matter of fact, it was many years later). The style was a bit different but still retained just enough elements to it that it didn’t feel out of place with the songs featured in the actual cartoons themselves. Even though the Golden version is the same song as written, the orchestra is much smaller, the key is different, and though Tweety and Sylvester perform parts of the song, a lot of it is performed by Golden’s vocal group, the Sandpipers. They’re good singers, but they’re not the kind of group that would perform in the actual cartoons themselves. Although the cartoons occasionally featured a male vocal group, it was usually the Sportsmen Quartet, whose voices were not as low pitched as the Sandpipers, and even they didn’t appear that frequently. The best songs were usually performed solely by the characters themselves, which leads us to the next problem: the voices.
Despite the fact that the labels often stated that the records featured the “original cartoon voices,” this was not the case for most of them. Mel Blanc’s contract with Capitol was separate from Warner Bros. contract with them and further complicating matters was the fact that Golden Records was located in New York, so he does not appear in the majority of them. The Bugs Bunny Easter Song/Mr. Easter Rabbit gives a cover credit to Dave Barry, so it is likely that he performed Bugs on that record. Animation historian Greg Ehrbar says that Gil Mack did most of the voices for these records, and it makes sense considering that Mack was a regular voice artist for Golden, though some of the voices do sound different with each record. Regardless of whether it’s Barry, Mack, or several different impressionists, the impressions are pretty bad and hard to listen to. Ever want to listen to Henery Hawk with an even more annoying voice? Then listen to his self-titled record for Golden. What’s especially baffling is that they were able to get Arthur Q. Bryan to reprise his role as Elmer Fudd for his self-titled Golden record, yet despite the title, most of the song is performed by the Bugs Bunny impressionist!
So, is there anything good about these records? Admittedly, there is a certain charm to the smaller orchestra used in these records. Although it doesn’t really end up working very well, it feels like it could almost work. Unlike the later Warner Bros. cartoons that also featured a smaller orchestra compared to what they were accustomed to, these do make better use of wind instruments. I much prefer this to the more distorted style of Warners later musical director, Bill Lava. I can’t say for certain, but I feel if it weren’t for the rushed songwriting, overuse of the Sandpipers, and the substandard voice performances, this musical style might have been a decent fit for these records.
Mel Blanc did end up performing the character voices for a series of birthday records for Golden that were eventually released on the Bugs Bunny Songfest compilation. Having Blanc perform the voices for these records was much more pleasant on the ears, and it is interesting to note that this does mark rare appearances of the mostly comic book-exclusive characters Cicero Pig and Ollie Owl (although Blanc does voice Cicero, according to Walt Mitchell in Mel Blanc: The Man of a Thousand Voices, Blanc’s voice for Ollie was not used in the final release). Despite Blanc’s excellent performances, the songs themselves are still really dull and are also really repetitive. The previous songs, as rushed as they were, did at least all feel unique; these songs sound way too similar, and the Sandpipers still have a fairly large role on these recordings, once again emphasizing how these don’t feel like true Looney Tunes recordings despite actually having the correct voices.
The Looney Tunes Capitol series may have felt like a slightly watered-down version of the cartoons, but it still retained the fun and charm of the characters, something Golden was not able to accomplish. There are a few songs that listeners may find catchy, but while the Capitol series doesn’t not deserve its obscurity, the same thing cannot be said for the Golden series.
The songs are pretty average for the most part. The songwriting isn’t necessarily awful, but it doesn’t really feel like something that you would hear in a Warner Bros. cartoon. Compare, for example, Golden’s version of “I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat” to Capitol’s. In the Capitol version, the song is entirely performed by Tweety and Sylvester with an appropriately full orchestra backing them up. Even though the song wasn’t composed by Warners own musical directors, Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn, there was a certain feeling that it could be included in a theatrical Looney Tunes cartoon (and, as a matter of fact, it was many years later). The style was a bit different but still retained just enough elements to it that it didn’t feel out of place with the songs featured in the actual cartoons themselves. Even though the Golden version is the same song as written, the orchestra is much smaller, the key is different, and though Tweety and Sylvester perform parts of the song, a lot of it is performed by Golden’s vocal group, the Sandpipers. They’re good singers, but they’re not the kind of group that would perform in the actual cartoons themselves. Although the cartoons occasionally featured a male vocal group, it was usually the Sportsmen Quartet, whose voices were not as low pitched as the Sandpipers, and even they didn’t appear that frequently. The best songs were usually performed solely by the characters themselves, which leads us to the next problem: the voices.
Despite the fact that the labels often stated that the records featured the “original cartoon voices,” this was not the case for most of them. Mel Blanc’s contract with Capitol was separate from Warner Bros. contract with them and further complicating matters was the fact that Golden Records was located in New York, so he does not appear in the majority of them. The Bugs Bunny Easter Song/Mr. Easter Rabbit gives a cover credit to Dave Barry, so it is likely that he performed Bugs on that record. Animation historian Greg Ehrbar says that Gil Mack did most of the voices for these records, and it makes sense considering that Mack was a regular voice artist for Golden, though some of the voices do sound different with each record. Regardless of whether it’s Barry, Mack, or several different impressionists, the impressions are pretty bad and hard to listen to. Ever want to listen to Henery Hawk with an even more annoying voice? Then listen to his self-titled record for Golden. What’s especially baffling is that they were able to get Arthur Q. Bryan to reprise his role as Elmer Fudd for his self-titled Golden record, yet despite the title, most of the song is performed by the Bugs Bunny impressionist!
So, is there anything good about these records? Admittedly, there is a certain charm to the smaller orchestra used in these records. Although it doesn’t really end up working very well, it feels like it could almost work. Unlike the later Warner Bros. cartoons that also featured a smaller orchestra compared to what they were accustomed to, these do make better use of wind instruments. I much prefer this to the more distorted style of Warners later musical director, Bill Lava. I can’t say for certain, but I feel if it weren’t for the rushed songwriting, overuse of the Sandpipers, and the substandard voice performances, this musical style might have been a decent fit for these records.
Mel Blanc did end up performing the character voices for a series of birthday records for Golden that were eventually released on the Bugs Bunny Songfest compilation. Having Blanc perform the voices for these records was much more pleasant on the ears, and it is interesting to note that this does mark rare appearances of the mostly comic book-exclusive characters Cicero Pig and Ollie Owl (although Blanc does voice Cicero, according to Walt Mitchell in Mel Blanc: The Man of a Thousand Voices, Blanc’s voice for Ollie was not used in the final release). Despite Blanc’s excellent performances, the songs themselves are still really dull and are also really repetitive. The previous songs, as rushed as they were, did at least all feel unique; these songs sound way too similar, and the Sandpipers still have a fairly large role on these recordings, once again emphasizing how these don’t feel like true Looney Tunes recordings despite actually having the correct voices.
The Looney Tunes Capitol series may have felt like a slightly watered-down version of the cartoons, but it still retained the fun and charm of the characters, something Golden was not able to accomplish. There are a few songs that listeners may find catchy, but while the Capitol series doesn’t not deserve its obscurity, the same thing cannot be said for the Golden series.
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