Hide Away Folk Family
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| song name | Hide Away Folk Family |
| artist | They Might Be Giants |
| releases | They Might Be Giants, Then: The Earlier Years, Best Of The Early Years |
| year | 1986 |
| first played | February 3, 1987 (81 known performances) |
| run time | 3:21 |
| sung by | John Flansburgh; John Linnell sings back up |
Trivia/Info
- In an interview with Spex Magazine from February 1988, John Flansburgh was asked about the lyrics of the song: "In a way, it's about fear, but in a pretty abstract way. The fear is not properly identified. It's a kind of something-is-going-to-happen-but-you-don't-know-what song. Folk songs usually have a story, omitted, and only the atmosphere remains."
- In the same interview, Flansburgh reveals that he stole the title of the song from a friend of the band:
To tell the truth, I stole the title. A friend of ours did a performance called 'Frieda' where she put a Barbie doll head on her head so that it looked like a two meter tall Barbie doll, and in an interview she was asked to do that Indicate the title of their future hits. One of them was ‘Hide Away Folk Family’. I asked her permission to use the title, she said, ‘No’, and then I wrote the song after all.
- John and John on the "Astrology report" bridge from the Then: The Earlier Years liner notes[1]: "To achieve the odd vocal rhythm of the astrology report... Flansburgh's voice was blasting in his headphones on a 2 second delay, a technique inspired by a visit to Boston's Museum of Science, while the 'backwards' singing at the end was carefully worked out and rehearsed." Flansburgh would describe the experience as "highly disorienting" on Tumblr in 2023.[2]
- John Linnell on the "backwards" singing heard in the song's outro in a 1996 interview with Pitchfork: "It's just me and John [Flansburgh] singing forward. We're just going 'nyahp, nyah, nyip, nyahp,' that's all it is."
- Linnell on the keyboard used for the song: "On that last chorus, there's a backward Casio CZ-101 as well as the forward accordion. So some funny synthetic elements are blended into the accordion, although on that particular song it all becomes a single sound."[3] This keyboard was also used for the song's synthetic 'whistling' sounds[4].
- From The Early Years Handbook: "The 'Sadly, The Cross-Eyed Bear' of 'Hide Away, Folk Family' fame is, in fact, a Catholic-school pun. In an old hymn, the line 'Gladly the Cross I'd bear' is sung—mutated by Sunday school smartasses into 'Gladly, the Cross-Eyed Bear'. In keeping with the song's disconsolate tone, the bear's name was changed to 'Sadly'." This is a popular example of a mondegreen.
- When performed live, the audience is ordered to "scream as if you're in Hell!" during the bridge. This is one of the few audience participation bits that has persisted over the band's career.
- Lesley Down is a British actor and singer who starred in a number of films and TV programs from the 1970s and 80s.
Song Themes
Animals, Backwards, Clothes, Death, Doors, Long, Long, Not In Major Or Minor, Oblique Cliches Or Idiom, Paranoia, People (Real), Plans, Puns, Reading, Relatives, Religion, Supernatural, Sleep, Spoken Word, Transportation
Videos
- Watch it on
- 1987 performance taped by Joy Farm from the Gigantic (A Tale Of Two Johns) DVD - Watch it on – Recorded live on June 17, 1990 at the Town and Country Club, London UK
Current Rating You must be logged in to rate this. You can either login (if you have a userid) or create an account with us today. Hide Away Folk Family is currently ranked #373 out of 1020. (183 wikians have given it an average rating of 8.50) |
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