The Kids of Widney High
July 12th, 2008
Northwest Film Forum
Seattle, Wa

I was recently on the Ipecac Recordings website looking through upcoming Melvins tourdates.  Ipecac is a label co-founded by Mike Patton (Faith No More, Mr. Bungle, Peeping Tom, etc)  and is home to projects for Hella drummer Zach Hill, Mickey “Dean Ween” Melchiondo’s band The Moistboyz, super heavy musical onslaughts from San Diego’s The Locust, and the Patton/Melvins side projects Fantomas and Tomahawk.  Scrolling down through the various Ipecac tour dates, I was shocked  and amazed to see listings for a handy capable vocal group known as The Kids of Widney High.  They were coming to Seattle and it was only two days away.

Widney High is a Los Angeles based High School catering to special needs children from the ages of 13 to 22.  The Kids of Widney High is a group of disabled prodigees and recording artists which stemmed from a songwriting class at the school.  In 1989, after teacher Michael Monagan helped the students create and arrange their own music, the kids released their first original album called Special Music From Special Kids on Rounder Records, which included liner notes from both Smokey Robinson and Tiffany.  It had to have been around 1995 or so when I finally first heard the album and I was immediately sucked in.  At the time I was already beginning my infatuation with the late great Wesley Willis, and the energy and enthusiasm behind the music fit right into my scope of interest at the time.  The first track off of the album, titled New Car, had notes of Rain Man as former student Robert Ross sang about the glory of having a new car in his garage.  “I wash the windows, I vacuum the floors.  I wash the motor, I dry the doors.“  The song Insects warned, “Bees will sting you very hard, all over your body. Bugs are in the trees and they’re watching you” and the song Throw away the Trash discouraged littering wih lyrics like, “I wanna feel proud about my clean school,  If someone throws trash ‘I pity the fool!!’ “.  These songs and their catchy ass hooks have been stuck in my mind for the better part of the last decade and a half. (more…)

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