January Birthdays 
“Everybody’s heard about the bird” is a familiar statement for most music lovers.
Although there had been many songs of an “Avian variety,” to quote Family Guy's Peter Griffin, the “Bird” that this treatise deals with is SURFIN’ BIRD, the 1964 national and international hit by The Trashmen’s from the wilds of Minneapolis, Minnesota, some 900 miles from the East Coast; some 1000 miles from the Gulf Coast and some 1400 miles from the West Coast.
Yes, I know there is surfing (sometimes) in the Great Lakes, etc., but does that really count?
The novelty of a Surf Music hit from a bunch of landlubbers of course adds to the charm of Surfin’ Bird, which after all is a considerably up-tempo mish-mash of two hits "Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow" and "The Bird’s The Word" from West Coast combo The Rivingtons, who were equally ignorant of the surfing culture as were The Trashmen.
How The Rivingtons’ two songs become "Surfin’ Bird" is the subject of this book, as is the impact that "Surfin’ Bird" has had on the musical psyche ever since late 1963 when it first hit the airwaves.
All three songs interacted with each other and had been doing so for years, with place, social standing, politics and personal and cultural persuasion being no barrier.
Both "Papa-Oom-Mom-Mow" and "Surfin’ Bird" had most definitely crossed the cultural chasm, being not only performed in a variety of languages around the world, but also recorded and released in languages as diverse as Russian, Finnish, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Italian, etc., sometimes to the point where the original idea, in particular with "Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow," had been irretrievably lost.
Nonetheless, the element of fun had been successfully retained.
This book also endeavours to document all of the different versions, interpretations, parodies, etc. which have found release via vinyl, CD, cassette and digitally, the latter a format that has exploded exponentially when it comes to “interpretations” of "Surfin’ Bird," often at the hands of the “DJ”.
This PDF is an unlocked document and as such, the book forms another in the "PRINT YOUR OWN BOOK" series from CMusic Books.
I trust you will treat this offering in the spirit it is given.
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