Weep Day
From This Might Be A Wiki
| song name | Weep Day |
| artist | They Might Be Giants |
| releases | Then: The Earlier Years, Selections From Then, Mightathon, Podcast 22A |
| year | 1984 |
| first played | July 7, 1983 (2 known performances) |
| run time | 1:50 |
| sung by | John Linnell, John Flansburgh (background) |
Trivia/Info
- This song first appeared on the band's original demo in 1983 and was frequently performed live in the 1980s according to John Flansburgh[1], although very few of these performances have been documented. Flansburgh mentioned in 1996 that "Weep Day" was "just a good song we never put on a record"[2], and elaborated on Tumblr in 2023 that: "By the time we started recording, like some other tracks, ["Weep Day"] probably just felt a little old."[3]
- From the liner notes for Then: The Earlier Years:
The germ for Weep Day was the hyphenated reference to a song on the back of a Bob Dylan record jacket which read "Mr. Tambo-
urine Man." Flansburgh drew disturbing likenesses of both Mr. Tambo and Urine Man and Linnell dreamed up their antithetical relationship and set it to music.
- The Bob Dylan record jacket has yet to be identified by fans or by They Might Be Giants, and when asked about the drawings of "Tambo" and "Urine Man" on Tumblr in 2023, Flansburgh said: "I [still] do have those pictures, but I am not prepared to share them!"[4]
- There are at least two different mixes of this song that are known to exist. The first is from the band's original demo and contains an alternate vocal take from John Linnell, as well as an echo effect on Flansburgh's vocals. The second mix comes from airings of the 1983 mix on Dial-A-Song, which do not cut off the instrumental track during the chants of "Weep! Weep! Weep!" before the outro.
- The Oakland Raiders mentioned in the song are a football team and not a baseball team. Since 2020, they are now known as the Las Vegas Raiders.
- This song was covered by Logan Whitehurst and the Junior Science Club, and released on the album The Mini-Album of Luv in 2003. It was also quoted in the outro of the song "Qualifiers" by hip-hop artist Open Mike Eagle in 2014.
- This song was originally known as "Tropical Island" by fans before its inclusion on Then.
Song Themes
Dancing, German, Islands, Music, Oblique Cliches Or Idiom, Oxymorons, Paradoxes, And Contradictory Statements, People (Imaginary), Puns, References To Other Songs Or Musicians, Screaming, Self-Reference, Sports, Time, Writing, Yes
Videos
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