Earl Zinger
Put Your Phazers On Stun Throw Your Health Food Skyward
!K7 Records

Earl Zinger's CV is really, really "impressive" reading. Check this: he started as a crooner in the late 1940's in New York, working with a number of songwriters, and was introduced to and befriended writers such as William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. In the early 60's he was introduced to a singer called Robert Zimmerman. Young Robert trusted Zinger's advice and changed his name to Bob Dylan. Later he collaborated with Motown, Atlantic and Stax artists until he went to Jamaica and met up with Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer, Lee 'Scratch' Perry and, later, a young Bob Marley. After returning from Jamaica he teamed up for a brief encounter with the Holland-Dozier-Holland team. Next he met young fellow poet and writer Gil Scott Heron, and was through this friendship introduced to Tom Waits at a concert in Detroit in mid 1975. After a night that lasted three days (!), Tom invited the Earl to play on his forthcoming tour... And so it goes on... Myths and legends. And a good joke. It's prank time!

Earl Zinger a.k.a. Rob ("Galliano") Gallagher has come up with a humorous album for many seasons, even though not all of it holds water. "On My Way Home" is quite chilled and old-school Tom Waits-y. Then comes a dub version of Blur's punchline anthem "Song 2", re-entitled "Song 2wo". Kooly done, and working fine. "Battle of the Mic" is a Beastie Boyish joke, while "Go Round" is the catchiest song (but which musical track is it ripped from?). Gallagher has written most songs (all minus two), and it's a colorful conglomerate of music. Dub, funk, crooner ballads. He's snapping jokes on Ibiza ("Escape From Ibiza" and "Got To Get To Ibiza"), which also has got its place in the Earl Zinger "biography":
"Back in the fourties he had been involved in some experiments to do with MDMA, MDA & MDF. It has been suggested that during his parties on the Balearic island of Ibiza it was he that introduced the drug to some English DJs that had started to go to his clubs..."

However, Put Your Phazers On Stun Throw Your Health Food Skyward is a great title and the album is also partly quite a party.

Copyright © 2002 Håvard Oppøyen