Rx for the Dr. Demento Blues

Some of the names on Rhino Records’ latest compilation album should be familiar to most pop fans: Steve Martin, Weird Al Yankovic and Frank Zappa.

But other names on the two-disc set may only be recognized in connection with the novelty hits they made or to those who have listened to Dr. Demento’s radio shows over the years.

These names include: Larry Groce, whose wry “Junk Food Junkie” was a Top 10 single in 1975; Lonnie Donnegan, whose frisky “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor (On the Bedpost Overnight)” reached the Top 5 in 1961, and Bobby (Boris) Pickett, whose zany “Monster Mash” made it to No. 1 in 1962.

These and 30 other pop novelties--as old as Spike Jones’ 1945 recording of “Cocktails for Two,” but mostly from the ‘50s and ‘60s--are brought together in Dr. Demento’s latest album package: “The Greatest Novelty Records of All Time: The 20th Anniversary Collection.” The package is due in stores Monday.

It was just more than 20 years ago that Barry Hansen, a rock historian who had previously written for various magazines and had compiled retrospective albums for Specialty Records and Warner Bros. Records, started experimenting on a Pasadena radio station (KPCC-FM) with the format that has established him--under the stage name Dr. Demento--as the “dean of novelty records.”

In the lively liner notes on the new set, Hansen says he began concentrating on novelties when he noticed that those records made the request lines light up even more than the doo-wop or rockabilly records that he also enjoyed.

One reason for the initial success of his show, he speculates in the notes, is that radio stations--which had regularly included novelty records on their playlists through the mid-’60s--began looking down on them as rock began to take itself seriously as an art form.

“I’ve always felt that it was no coincidence that the Dr. Demento show first found its audience in the early 1970s, just as people started realizing that they kinda missed hearing those funny songs they used to like,” he writes.

Among the other highlights of the new set, which runs almost two hours: “Time Warp” from “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” album, “Poisoning Pigeons in the Park” by Tom Lehrer, “Surfin’ Bird” by the Trashmen, “Delicious!” by Jim Backus & Friend, “St. George and the Dragonet” by Stan Freberg and “They’re Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!” by Napoleon XIV.

More Memphis Soul: On the heels of the highly recommended but expensive “The Complete Stax/Volt Singles: 1959-1968” box set, Atlantic Records is releasing 12 original Stax or Volt albums in CD for the first time. Remastered from the original tapes, the albums duplicate the original running order and graphics.

The entries--which carry a suggested retail price of $9.98--include Sam & Dave’s “Hold On, I’m Comin’ ,” Booker T. & the MGs’ “Green Onions,” and four Otis Redding albums: “Otis Blue,” “The Soul Album,” “Dictionary of Soul” and “Otis & Carla: King & Queen.” The latter also features Carla Thomas.