2.12.24

I’m going to get this out of the way right up front.

I am not a fan of Rick Dees. At best, he’s a hack. At worst, he’s a tremendous hack. (Example 1: “His Cast of Idiots” is a clear ripoff of MAD Magazine’s “Usual Gang of Idiots.” How dare he? Example 2: Dees’s follow up to Disco Duck was Dis-Gorilla. Really, Rick?)

But when I was little, I was obsessed with Disco Duck. It was a 1976 novelty hit released by Dees, a DJ in Memphis, TN, at the time. I was only a year and a half old at the time, but my parents had it on 45. And when I was 4, I discovered it and ruined my parents’ lives for a while, playing it over and over and over.

And over.

The story told in Disco Duck is a tale as old as time. When a man hears funky disco music, he turns into a duck and can’t stop dancin’. Joseph Campbell recognizes this as an archetype of the hero’s journey.

Or was it Achilles in The Iliad that Campbell wrote about? I don’t know. I get them confused.

Anyway, on its own, Disco Duck is a fine record for a late-stage toddler to enjoy. Not to mention a fantastic excuse for said child to practice his definitely-not-Donald-Duck voice.

Practicing while the record plays. Practicing while the record doesn’t play. Practicing in the back seat of the car while Ronnie Milsap plays on the radio. Practicing while sleep should be happening late at night. And so on.

Anyway, it’s been a day, and this bit of happy nonsense slipped through the cracks in my brain.

And now it’s in yours. You’re welcome.

When the music stopped I returned to my seat

But there’s no stoppin’ a duck and his beat