Sing Along with Mad

by Frank Jacobs, Al Jaffee

Vintage paperback

Genres: Humor, Comics

Mass Market Paperback

First published November 1, 1970

Reviews

[FranklinTV]

This is just an okish book, some of the parody songs I don't know. But i do like the slow mail song sung to the tune of Yesterday.

[Charles]

This book demonstrates the creative genius of the people at “Mad Magazine” and the humor is timeless. When the jokes in the books from Mad are based on current events and politicians it is lost on people of a future generation that do not know and understand the context of the jokes. The humor here is based on events that have changed little in the decades since first publication and are based on humorous lyrics that can be sung using well known tunes.
For example, there there is a song based on the context of Moses leading his people across the Red Sea that is sung to the tune of “Born Free.” The opening line is “Red Sea.” Another standout is one that references Leonardo da Vinci that is to be sung to the tune “There’s No Business Like Show Business” and the opening lines are “There’s no genius but no genius. Like my genius, you see!”
It takes a bit of carrying a tune in your mind while you read, but when you do it you will find the tunes to be catchy and humorous.

[David Macpherson]

I picked up a bunch of mad paperbacks for a quarter each last month, and now I have the delight of discovering how inventive and well made these books are. This is non-reprint one. All of the work was designed for paperback and it shows. Al Jaffee did the art and it is a lot of fun. Frank Jacobs did a wonderful job of putting funny lyrics to well known songs. If there is one thing wrong with a nearly 60 year old book is that some of those melodies are lost to time. So you just need to make a fake melody in your head and have a fun time.

[Rich Meyer]

Rather than the usual reprints of older material, this paperback features brand new comic satire and panels from Frank Jacobs and Al Jaffee. Al has some great, cartoony artwork here, and Frank does a great job on the filksong/song parodies. The casual 21st century reader might find some of the songs a bit dated (the book was published in 1970), but the internet should make it pretty easy for anyone to find the originals to see how good the pastiches are.