Tom Smith (filker)

Last updated

Tom Smith
Tom Smith.jpg
Smith in 2005
Background information
Born Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S. [1]
Genres Filk
Instrument(s)Guitar, vocals
Website www.tomsmithonline.com

Tom Smith is an American singer-songwriter from Ann Arbor, Michigan, who got his start in the filk music community. He is a fourteen-time winner of the Pegasus Award for excellence in filking, including awards for his "A Boy and His Frog", "307 Ale", and "The Return of the King (Uh-huh)", [2] and was inducted into the Filk Hall of Fame in 2005. [3]

Contents

Career

His nickname, "The World's Fastest Filker", [4] comes from numerous instances of "instafilk", [5] i.e., quickly-written or improvised songs. He has improvised entire concert sets, and his album Badgers and Gophers and Squirrels Oh My: The 24-Hour Project, inspired by Scott McCloud's 24-Hour Comics Day, features seventeen songs written in twenty-four hours. In May 2006, he released the album The Last Hero on Earth, a comic opera which has twenty songs, all written in one day, to the same plot. [1]

In August 2006, emulating Jonathan Coulton's Thing a Week, he began iTom, a project where he released a new song every week for a year, and continued sporadically after that. So far, he has collected four albums of those songs. [6]

He has parodied Christine Lavin songs [7] with her blessing. He authored the official song for Talk Like a Pirate Day. [8] [9] [10] He wrote "Enterprising Man" for the animated parody video Babylon Park: Grudgematch, as well as the official Transylvania Polygnostic University theme song for the comic Girl Genius by Studio Foglio. [11] [12]

Smith performs frequently at conventions across the United States, and has also performed in Canada and England. He has been featured frequently on Dr. Demento, [13] Public Radio International's Sound & Spirit, [14] and other radio programs. In 2007, he joined with comedy musicians such as Rob Balder, The Great Luke Ski, Sudden Death, Worm Quartet, and others in The FuMP (The Funny Music Project). Smith has appeared in concert with Dr. Demento and on the same bill as Chick Corea. [15]

In 2005, "A Boy and His Frog" was the subject of a mini-arc in the Something Positive webcomic. [16]

On June 7, 2008, Smith tore his quadriceps while attempting to take the stage at a Christine Lavin concert, landing him in the hospital and preventing him from performing for the next few months. [17]

Discography

Smith performing in 2008 OVFF 2008 - Tom Smith (3495712926).jpg
Smith performing in 2008

Pegasus Awards

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Filk music</span> Folk music of science fiction fandom

Filk music is a musical culture, genre, and community tied to science fiction, fantasy, and horror fandom and a type of fan labor. The genre has existed since the early 1950s and been played primarily since the mid-1970s. The genre has a niche but faithful popularity in the underground.

The Brobdingnagian Bards are a Celtic music group from Austin, Texas, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leslie Fish</span> American musician, author, and activist (born 1953)

Leslie Fish is an American folk musician, author, and anarchist political activist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Hayes (musician)</span> Musical artist

Frank Hayes is an American musician prominent within the science fiction/fantasy genre and culture known as filk. He is also an authority on information technology and, as senior news columnist for Computerworld magazine, has contributed numerous writings on the subject for more than two decades.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ookla the Mok (band)</span>

Ookla the Mok is a filk band fronted by Rand Bellavia and Adam English (b.1970). The two met as undergraduates while attending Houghton College in 1988, and the majority of their performances have been at science-fiction conventions or in their hometown of Buffalo, New York. The band is named after a character from the Ruby-Spears Productions cartoon Thundarr the Barbarian, created by Steve Gerber.

Marcon is a full-spectrum fantasy and science fiction convention based in Columbus, Ohio, and was on Easter weekend in 2013 but moved to Mother's Day weekend starting in 2014. It is now operated by the Columbus-based Science Oriented Literature, Art, and Education Foundation, a non-profit educational corporation. The name was originally short for "March Convention," with the convention mascot the "March Hare," affectionately named "Marconi". After the date of the convention moved away from March, the name was re-designated as "Multiple Alternative Realities Convention".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Degville</span> Musical artist

Martin Degville is the lead vocalist and co-songwriter of the British new wave band Sigue Sigue Sputnik, which had a worldwide hit single in 1986 with "Love Missile F1-11" and six other EMI single releases. Sigue Sigue Sputnik was formed with ex-Generation X bassist Tony James.

Lee Gold is a member of California science fiction fandom and a writer and editor in the role-playing game and filk music communities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judge Smith</span> Musical artist

Christopher John Judge Smith, is an English songwriter, author, composer and performer, and a founder member of progressive rock band Van der Graaf Generator. Initially working under the name Chris Judge Smith, he has been known simply as Judge Smith since 1994. After Van der Graaf Generator, he has written songs, stage musicals and operas, and from the early 1990s on he has released a number of solo CDs, including three "Songstories".

<i>Dinosaurchestra</i> 2006 studio album by Lemon Demon

Dinosaurchestra is the fifth studio album by Lemon Demon, a musical project created by American musician Neil Cicierega. The album was released digitally through Bandcamp on October 20, 2012. On January 1, 2022, independent label Needlejuice Records announced vinyl, CD, and cassette releases, which shipped on April 14, 2022 and August 30, 2022 (vinyl).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff</span> American sci-fi and fantasy author

Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff is an American sci-fi and fantasy author and filk musician. As an author, she collaborated on several novels in the Batman and Star Wars franchise with Michael Reaves, and as a filk musician, she is a three-time Pegasus Award winner.

"Banned From Argo" is a filk song written and originally recorded by Leslie Fish, released in 1977 on the album Solar Sailors, and later as part of various compilations It won the 2003 Pegasus Award for Best Classic Filk Song.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Logan Whitehurst</span> American drummer

Logan Anthony Whitehurst, was an American musician. His career began as the drummer for the band Little Tin Frog from 1995 until 2000, although he is best known as a founding member of Californian indie rock band The Velvet Teen and as a solo artist performing under the name Logan Whitehurst and the Junior Science Club.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">René Froger</span> Dutch singer

René Froger, is a Dutch singer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aidan Baker</span> Canadian musician

Aidan Baker is an electronic musician from Toronto, Ontario, Canada who has released numerous records both as a solo artist and as part of various side projects, including Nadja, ARC, Caudal and Mnemosyne. He has also written several books of poetry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pongsit Kamphee</span> Thai rock singer and producer

Pongsit "Pu" Kampee is a Thai rock singer and producer popular in the Phleng pheua chiwit genre. Inspired by (Lek) Preecha Chanapai of Carabao and (Nga) Surachai Jantimathawn of Caravan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rob Balder</span> American cartoonist

Robert T. Balder is a professional cartoonist and singer-songwriter. He graduated from Roanoke College with a major in English in 1993 and, after a variety of jobs, entered a seven-year career in IT, starting as a manager of database development, which he left for his current career.

Earthling Society were an English space/psychedelic rock band formed in Fleetwood, England in January 2004 by vocalist/guitarist Fred Laird and drummer Jon Blacow with bassist, David Fyall.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Library Bards</span> American nerd parody band

Library Bards are a nerd parody band based in Los Angeles, California, consisting of reality personalities Bonnie Gordon and Xander Jeanneret. They are known for taking pop songs and re-writing them as nerd-centric parody songs. Topics of their songs include Sci-Fi, Cosplay, Gaming, and Fantasy.

References

  1. 1 2 Sirois, A.L. (July 4, 2007). "The Last Hero on Earth". SciFi Weekly. SciFi Channel. Archived from the original on August 17, 2007. Retrieved August 23, 2007.
  2. ↑ "Tom Smith". Pegasus Awards. Ohio Valley Filk Fest . Retrieved September 3, 2007.
  3. ↑ "Hall of Fame Inductees & Citations – 2005". Filk Hall of Fame. FilKONtario. 2005. Archived from the original on July 5, 2007. Retrieved September 3, 2007.
  4. ↑ Prucher, Jeff (2007). Brave New Words: The Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction . Oxford University Press. pp.  64. ISBN   978-0-19-530567-8.
  5. ↑ Nash, Alanna (March 2006). "Misfit Minstrels". Wired News . Lycos . Retrieved August 23, 2007.
  6. ↑ "MP3 Downloads". Tom Smith Online. Retrieved July 15, 2008.
  7. ↑ "Wish I Couldn't Read Her Mind" (MP3).
  8. ↑ "Talk Like a Pirate Day". Archived from the original (MP3) on November 9, 2018. Retrieved November 9, 2006.
  9. ↑ Paul Majendie (September 18, 2007). "Tomorrow You'll Pay a Buccaneer for Corn?". Reuters . Retrieved September 21, 2007.
  10. ↑ "Arrr Matie! Wednesday is Talk Like A Pirate Day". Ann Arbor News . Michigan Live, LLC. September 18, 2007. Retrieved September 21, 2007.
  11. ↑ "Transpolygnostic University Fight Song" (MP3).
  12. ↑ "Girl Genius Online Comics". March 21, 2007. Retrieved August 23, 2007.
  13. ↑ "The Dr. Demento Show #07-03". January 21, 2007. Retrieved August 23, 2007. (and many others)
  14. ↑ "The Lord of the Rings". Sound and Spirit. WGBH Boston . Retrieved September 28, 2010. (click on audiolink)
  15. ↑ "Concert Poster" (JPEG). sponsored by Subway.
  16. ↑ Milholland, R. K. "Sad Songs Pt. 2". Something Positive . Archived from the original on January 9, 2014. Retrieved August 24, 2007.
  17. ↑ Balder, Rob. ""Mr. Smith Goes to the Hospital" Fundraiser Effort". Partially Clips. Retrieved June 21, 2008.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.