No Bath Today + Too Cute To Spank [CD]

Remember those Tune Mammals cassettes you sang along with in carpools in the 80’s? Well, they’re back, remixed and remastered for another generation.

The Tune Mammals — the singing Stevens family — had its origins around 1983 when Bill was in nursery school and he and we decided to write a song for his class. That song was “The Worst Little Boy in China” on a Mother Goose poem. So we began politically incorrect and stayed that way. Soon the band consisted of the Bills, mom Carolyn and Katie, then Becca in a basket on the stage, and eventually Becca out of the basket and a member of the group. The Tune Mammals played concerts and appeared with orchestras around the southeast for about a decade until Bill’s voice changed. We also made an award-winning movie, Boyd’s Shadow, represented here by the Sweeping Song, and a musical, The Rematch of the Tortoise and the Hare, excerpted on this CD.

All three children went on to careers in the arts — Bill as a performer, composer, and recording studio owner; Katie as a ballerina and then a visual artist; and Becca as a singer and composer with the Becca Stevens Band and many other collaborations.

People still tell me that they treasure the Tune Mammals cassettes (yes, cassettes!) from 30 years ago, so I hope these remixed and remastered CD’s will entertain yet another generation of carpools.

TRACK LISTING

1. No Bath Today
2. Emily's Aminals
3. The Old Fiddler and His Cow
4. The Darling Baby
5. The Worst Little Boy in China
6. The Big Boy Blues
7. Never Sneeze with Food in Your Mouth
8. Worms up My Nose
9. Josh the Pig
10. I'm Confused About ...
11. I'm Sorry
12. Sad Sam the Centipede
13. Too Cute to Spank
14. The Pitiful Plight of the Middle Child
15. My Boy Bill Talks Backwards
16. A Mother's Lament
17. The Family That Travels Together Unravels Together
18. We Are the Perfect Family
19. When I Grow Up
20. Sweeping Song
21. Baby Talk
22. A Song About a Gerbil
23. Late for School
24. Rematch of the Tortoise and the Hare
25. Goodbye