Your Fat Friend

[imomus]

After a brief and enjoyable hiatus I spent showing friends from France and Greece round Berlin, I've got back to work on 'The 2005 Album From Momus' (provisionally entitled 'The Artist Overwhelmed By The Grandeur Of Ancient Ruins'). This is something of a trifle, but I think you can hear that I'm happy to get back to my studio. The music gives pride of place in the Momus Geo-Musical Museum to a fossil of Schubert, around which dance Indian singers and 1980s 'Classicism-and-Atrocity' synths. The theme comes partly from a piece in Vice magazine entitled 'Ode To The Fat Friend', and partly from the 'Fat Lady' song in the Berlin musical Cabaret. If you download, like and keep the mp3, suggested donation is a dollar or so by Paypal. The song may appear in the same or a different form on the next Momus album. And by the way, thanks so much to everyone who's contributed so far!

Your Fat Friend

Sorry, this track is no longer available. Please buy the CD when it comes out!

Your Fat Friend

She's so fabulous
She's so ludicrous
She's so dangerous
Your fat friend

She's intelligent
An experiment
She's an elephant
Your fat friend

Will you run away with me?
Let's go walking on the sea
Just Jesus Christ and you and me and
Your fat friend

See her fumble, see her flirt
In her massive mini-skirt
She is quite the extravert
Here comes your fat girlfriend

She's so fabulous
She's so ludicrous
She's so dangerous
Your fat friend

I love Coco, you love Jim
Your fat friend she loves him
But he can't love her, he's too thin
For your fat friend

One and one makes three not two
She will stick to you like glue
Don't fuck around with you-know-who
Here comes your fat girlfriend

She's intelligent
An experiment
She's an elephant
Your fat friend

Comments

danke!

[oola.livejournal.com]

beautiful !!!

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

Wow, the comments to the Vice article make me want to kill myself. Bonus!

[thevulgartrade.livejournal.com]

1) Great track. Been listening to Bach lately?

2) Thanks for all of the great songs you've been giving us via mp3. I've been doing my best to start a circle of Momus-lovers here in Chicago, but I'm disappointed how hard it is to find your records here. Call Reckless Records and tell them to re-stock! I hate buying CD's online when I could be patronizing local businesses!

[chickensnack.livejournal.com]

I enjoy this song.

Coincidentally, I put it in my iTunes playlist to listen to it, and when it finished it immediately shuffled to Queen's "Fat Bottomed Girls".

[wankerness.livejournal.com]

WOW, I used to have that book...I really wish I could remember more about it than the title! I'm still too shocked by the sight of that book cover to comment on the song...flashback city.

[wertz.livejournal.com]

I envy your French and Greek friends - and you, for that matter. I've been smitten with Berlin for a decade or so. And, now that I'm stranded in the States, God knows when I'll ever get back.

For what it's worth, the offering here reminds me a lot of my friend, the late Agnes Bernelle (http://www.commex.org/dirkje/pjarchive/bernelle.htm), who's father, Rudolph Bernauer, owned the club on which Christopher Isherwood based the Kit Kat Klub in I Am a Camera. I could only find one of her albums (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000003BT7/qid%3D1085459174/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-8892264-4093757) online, but you might find it of interest, if you don't know her. She appeared on Marc Almond's "Stars We Are" album and her last, produced by Elvis Costello, was pretty impressive. I directed her in a show in Dublin in the mid-nineties and got to know her quite well - I think you'd like her stuff.

PayPal has just disabled my account (long story), so until I get a new one, I'll be unable to make a contribution. In fairness, then, I won't save the download. :(  If it's any consolation, I'll be placing an order for a CD in the next day or two. Forgive my ignorance, but I asked a friend-who-should-know about Momus and he mentioned "Philosophy of..." and "Vodka Jellies". Any recommendations of your own for a virgin hit?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I'm a big fan of (the late) Agnes Bernelle, and was once even introduced to her in an art gallery in London by The Edge from U2 (it was after a Gavin Friday concert)! I love her record 'Father's Lying Dead on the Ironing Board'. I think my favourite song is 'A Nightingale':

'You want to be rich? Well, isn't that what you are?'

For a Momus intro try 'Forbidden Software Timemachine' or 'Ping Pong'.

[wertz.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the recommendation - consider at least one of them ordered (I checked the local Virgin Mega-Store today and neither was in stock). Heh, I also knew Gavin vaguely - though I knew another former Virgin Prune, Binty (later of the short-lived Princess Tinymeat), somewhat better. I also knew The Edge professionally, having done a bit of design work for U2's Zoo TV tour - as well as finding myself at a number of parties at Bono's place outside Dun Laoghaire. Dublin was a bit of a village in that respect. Though, if this is anything to go by, the whole damned world is becoming something of a village...

Aaanyway, thanks again - I look forward to it.

agnes bernelle

[(Anonymous)]

I am doing research on Agnes Bernelle - as I am developing a dance/theatre piece inspired by her work and life. I stumbled upon this posting and thought I'd take a chance and see if you would want to communicate more with me about Agnes. I am interested in the show you directed and your experience working with her.
I may be contacted via suddenlydance.ca
thank you,
David Ferguson

Phatgirl Quim

[(Anonymous)]

Doesn't the song owe as much to Dave Brubeck or the Swingle Singers--and, heavens forbid, "Puttin' on the Ritz" Taco--as it does directly to Bach or Schubert?

That's not to say I don't find it romping good fun!

Cheers...

Another Chubby Chaser

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, lots of Swingle Singers action in our house when I was a kid. It was 'the acceptible face of pop music' for my parents. I'm also very much into the French pop tradition, which draws heavily on jazzed-up classical models: think Michel Legrand or Claude Nougaro. They would never have broken out of Western pitching, though: sample-bending makes this 'jazz' queasily microtonal.

awesome track

[penisenvy.livejournal.com]

your music always amazes me! i love how experimental you have been lately! its so wonderful, im so glad your my fat friend!

[(Anonymous)]

Is Coco and Jim a reference to Bowie in Berlin?

James

[imomus.livejournal.com]

It is. I just happened to be reading this (http://www.bowiewonderworld.com/features/dbuncut.htm) when I wrote the song.

[stanleylieber.livejournal.com]

Youch, thanks for the link. That interview was so much more illuminating than his usual "Really, I don't remember the late 70s at all" routine.

[steviecat.livejournal.com]

Nice picture. I've a Barbapapa seven-inch but mine's sleeveless - found it cheap at a car boot sale.

[sylvia101.livejournal.com]

ah barbapapa! how i loved those books as a child. i wanted to be where they were.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Who's your fat friend ?"

— 'Beau' Brummel, addressing Lord Avanley as he passed on the streets of London with Brummel's estranged friend, George, Prince of Wales.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, I'd forgotten about that! I saw it in some TV drama about Beau Brummel. Bitches in britches indeed!

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Yes. Wonderful, isn't it?

Practicing my slaps,
W

[tailchaser.livejournal.com]

joy!!!!!

delightful lyrics....thank you.

[padmaclynne.livejournal.com]

Thank you! highly entertaining as always. and friday i get paid, so friday you get paid.

[(Anonymous)]

if you could hear it through my ears!
you would fall...like I do!

erik
the netherlands

[(Anonymous)]

la canzone è particolare e, in qualche modo, gradevole, ma niente di più. in un certo senso, sembra che il tuo modo di comporre sia diventato un esercizio di stile, libero da ogni ispirazione, un gioco puramente intellettuale.

è evidente la volontà di percorrere strade inedite, di trovare espressioni nuove, di originalità e ricerca, e questo ti rende ammirevole in termini di visione della musica e di intenzioni artistiche.

però... però penso che tu oggi non riesca a tradurre tutto questo in risultati all'altezza di quanto promesso. spesso risulti tentare vette che purtroppo troppo spesso non raggiungi. nè liricamente né musicalmente.

brel è riuscito ad essere sempre diverso rimanendo sempre uguale, gainsbourg è riuscito ad essere sempre uguale rimanendo sempre diverso.

a me sembra che momus si sia un po' perso.
l'anima delle tue canzoni più belle, sempre presente nei tuoi lavori, mi sembra che ora non trovi spazio.

ma forse sbaglio: forse è proprio ora che momus ha preso il sopravvento su nick.

fede