102: The Best of Lord Buckley, by Lord Buckley

Lord Buckley (USA)
The Best of Lord Buckley (1963)
8 tracks, 51 minutes
Spotify • iTunes (both of those links are actually for a super-compilation of two albums, The Best of Lord Buckley and The Most Immaculately Hip Aristocrat. Both are great, so dig in and dig it!

Lord Richard Myrle Buckley was a quintessential performer, an enduring hero of stand-up comedians and surely one of the coolest and maddest people ever to have hopped on this sweet swingin’ sphere. From working as an MC in the dance marathons and walkathons of the 1930s (a bizarre competitive spectacle that saw people dancing or just walking around a hall for sometimes days at a time), he honed all sorts of comedic talents that took him the length and breadth of the country, even owning one of the hottest clubs in Al Capone’s Chicago. One of his bits was to affect the manner of the English aristocracy – becoming Lord Buckley – and when he fell into the jazz crowd, he developed the language of the hipsters into his character and the persona was complete. He termed his unique turn-of-phrase the Hipsemantic.

It wasn’t just an act, he lived Lord Buckley. Not only did he always talk in Hipsemantic, but his home – wherever it was that week – was transformed into a palace with a constantly rotating cast of comedians, musicians, writers, sex workers, philosophers, dancers, drug dealers, anyone sufficiently groovy. Buckley would hold court among these friends and admirers, performing constantly.

For a man so constantly ‘on,’ it’s a shame there is such comparatively little material in circulation. In fact, the best collections of His Royal Hipness’ work were released after his death in 1960, and this compilation album helped solidify his enduring reputation as a genius in his field. It collects seven of the most well-known entries in to Buckley’s Hiparama of the Classics – retellings of classic tales in the Hipsemantic. It includes both word-for-word translations and hip tales of the lives of historical and Biblical figures. Of the former we get a hip Gettysburg Address and Marc Anthony’s Funeral Oration from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, where ‘Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears’ becomes the wonderful ‘Hipsters, flipsters and finger-poppin’ daddies, knock me your lobes;’ of the latter we hear the stories of Nero, Cabeza de Vaca (‘the Gasser’), Jonah and the whale, Gandhi (‘The Hip Gan’) and, most impressively ‘The Nazz’ – the story of three of Jesus’ most delicious miracles.

I could talk about Lord Buckley all day. It’s an effect that he has, even after so long, that seems to affect those that truly dig him – he seems to invite a sort of excessive fan. Perhaps it’s his uniqueness or the amount of off-the-wall stories from his life that range from the insane-yet-verifiable to the surely, surely mythical…or are they? If you’re interested in the life, times and work of Lord Buckley, I heartily recommend the book Dig Infinity! The Life and Art of Lord Buckley by Oliver Trager. It’s a magnificent work of scholarship piecing together the Lord’s story through many interviews and recollections from those that knew him or were influenced by him, as well as some hardcore archive diving too. It’s a pretty rare book, but you will occasionally find a copy going for a reasonable price on eBay now and then. Immerse yourself in the world of Lord Buckley and become a member of his infinite, extra-temporal court of grooviness.