That would be Lloyd Miller of the Brooklyn band The Deedle Deedle Dees. I'm a big fan of the Dees, of course, for many reasons -- they rock, they're lots of fun in concert, and they know how to craft educational songs you'll listen to for purely un-educational reasons (hint: they craft actual stories). Also, they're a great bunch of guys.
It probably won't come as much of a surprise to you, then, that Miller doesn't just write original songs about historical figures, but he's also a collector of old songs. Miller merges those two aspects of his musical life on a set of mp3s he's posted to his Bandcamp page. They're songs from the 2009 edition of his annual Mother's Day singalong. Says Miller:
I recorded these tracks so that my bandmates for the event could learn the tunes. Like all the recordings on this page, these recordings are very raw. But I kind of like them. I thought I might as well put them online so everyone could have them.In days of old (ie, 10 years ago? 5 years ago?), artists like Miller would have held on to them for a decade then released them on a B-sides/rarities collection. Now they get posted online for your free streaming or downloading enjoyment.
I'll re-empasize Lloyd's point -- these are definitely lo-fi recordings (midway through one track on his Nature Babies collection from last year, his phone starts ringing) and shouldn't be considered final products or actual releases. And he has an occasionally uneasy relationship with some of the songs (Miller, on his bluesy "Wheels on the Bus" from Sing Along With Lloyd -- "'Wheels on the Bus' is lame. I never liked it and I still don't. Even so, my daughter only wanted this song before bed for about a year and a half."). But they're still interesting to listen to for various reasons -- the singalong disk is great for parents wondering how to inject a little variety into songs they sing on a daily basis. But it's the new stuff I'm going to post below...
