by Caspar Babypants
If you don’t already know Chris Ballew by his wonderfully
ludicrous nom de song Caspar Babypants, you may remember him as the guy who sang
that “Lump” song from the ‘90s. The former Presidents of the United States
frontman has revived himself as a refreshingly different and wildly
entertaining children’s musician. His latest CD, Sing Along! is high on my
recommendation list of literal kid pop.
There are lots of acts out there crafting fantastic rock,
folk, bluegrass, and even calypso music for young audiences. But one of the
great things about Caspar Babypants is that his songs genuinely sound like
children’s songs — he’s got a cover of “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” and “Ring Around
the Rosie” on this album, for Zanes’s sake! — and yet, they remain unalienating
to adults. There’s a happy poppiness to all of Sing Along’s tracks, and many —
especially the pumping “Spider John,” the rousing “Long, Long Dream,” and the
uber-catchy “Wild, Wild Time” — will make you do just what the album’s title
asks of you.
The original Babypants tunes are the highlights of the CD,
but I also personally love when Ballew layers his POTUS alt-rock sound onto
children’s classic, as he does with a quick-picking, driving guitar riff behind
“Pussycat, Pussycat.” And I can’t let this review end without a mention of “Sun
Go,” Mr. Babypants’s hauntingly lovely acoustic duet with one of my other
favorite kids’ singers, Frances England. It’s the kind of family music that may
be squarely aimed at the lower age end, but remains happily appealing to those
on the upper end as well.
Best for: Young kids who want their music to sound like it’s
intended for them; former Presidents of the United States fans; classic
kid-tune revisionists
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