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The Title Trackers

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This time out we have fun with the Los Angeles-based satiric rock trio the Title Trackers.

The Title Trackers
Lost Title Tracks

(Self released)
12" LP with bonus CD of full album

Move over Weird Al! Here's a well-done album that parodies some of the biggest names in classic rock. Here's the premise: True to the band's name and the name of the album, the Title Trackers have chosen 10 very famous albums that didn't have title songs per se, to parody by writing their own title tracks and performing these songs in the recognizable style of each respective album. So Tom Petty's Full Moon Fever inspires "Full Moon Fever Gone to Our Heads" which is sung in a nasally tone that mocks Petty's voice and that's also topped off with an audible bong hit in the middle of the song that references Petty's often glassy-eyed appearance. Similar treatments are worked up for the Rolling Stones' Exile on Main Street, Billy Joel's Glass Houses and the Doors' Morrison Hotel, and the album's A-side ends with the tongue-in-cheek Springsteen send-up "The Trackers Send Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J." The B-side kicks off with the band skewering U2 with "Chopping Down the Joshua Tree;" to really enjoy the jab listeners should consult the enclosed lyric sheet on this one as the words ("Re-micturating, re-defecating!") take a good poke at Bono's well-known sense of self-importance. Johnny Cash, the Who, the Clash and Bob Dylan are parodied on the remainder of the album. Lost Title Tracks is clearly a novelty release but that doesn't mean it is sloppy or a throw away; fans of a certain age (those born in the last few decades won't get it) will enjoy turning their friends on to this sublime use of satire.

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