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Catholic Grapevine Welcome back Nick Alexander! It's been several years since his last parody release but he is back and his latest, I Wanna Be Debated, is worth the wait. I love this album and here's why. It is crackling with excitement and energy, from the vocals right down to the last guitar and drumbeat. If you want to know what Nick is like live, you'll hear it on this album in full force. The themes are great - chastity, eating right, the internet, Lent, the priesthood . . . and they are combined with wonderful song choices such as "Footloose," by Kenny Loggins, "Centerfold" by J. Geils, "King of Pain" by the Police and "I Am the Walrus" by the Beatles, among many others. Most importantly, especially for a comedy album, this project is FUN to listen to. When I am in need of cheering up, this project puts a much needed smile on my face. Thank you. As if that weren't enough, I Wanna Be Debated contains a bonus track: a serious praise and worship song that Nick crafted from the hymn, "Holy God We Praise Thy Name." I loved the classic words and the fact that it did NOT sound like the typical formula praise and worship song. This song truly made me want to worship God. Nick has a great future in praise and worship music. Even the best projects have their flaws. For one, I felt that the subject material of "Suicide Hotline" (set to "I Am the Walrus") was too sensitive to be funny. The arrangement was imaginative and humorous at times, but I still was uncomfortable with the fact that this song dealt with life and death. As creative and funny as most of the lyrics were, some of them sounded forced. Sometimes I felt there were just too many lyrics. Vocally there were flaws too, most of which I credit to being carried away with enthusiasm. Not a bad thing overall! I Wanna Be Debated is just so delightful and fun that I can easily overlook any flaws. It has a permanent spot on my list of CDs to take with me to that desert island someday. CatholicTeens.com Five Stars (out of five) Have you ever felt like Catholic music is just boring? Monotonous? All the same? Have you ever found yourself bored with the run-of-the-mill praise and worship songs that you hear at Church or at retreats? Don't worry…you're not alone; rather, you are actually suffering from an ailment I refer to as "Not-having-enough-fun-with-God-itis." There are a few things that cure this dastard-disease—and one of them is certainly Nick Alexander's new CD: I Wanna Be Debated. Nick Alexander is billed as the "Catholic Weird Al." (For those of you who are too young to know who Weird Al is, he was a musician in the 90's who parodied different popular songs. He was known for his juvenile, squeaky-clean humor that ranged from poking fun at an elf in Santa's toy shop to the life of an Amish.) As such, his mission is to bring us closer to Christ through laughs and smiles. With his third album, Nick does just that with his unique blend of Catholicism, pop-music and outright-goofiness. While some of the original songs may be before our time—how many of us can really appreciate Footloose?—the enthusiasm and humor that they bring require no preconceived memories. The title track—I Wanna Be Debated—is like a Catholic evangelical anthem about a man standing on a street corner begging for someone to debate theology with him. Similarly, Ichthus (from the original Footloose) is probably the funniest song on the album: "Getting back to my roots/ichthus/preaching eternal truths/read the Creed/summed up in a word that's in Greek." Keeping the homage-to-all-things-80s rolling, Nick offers us Nicene Creed, a parody of ABBA's Dancing Queen. This song is easily to most clever on the album, taking the listener inside this profound profession of faith that recited every Sunday at mass, but is almost always brushed aside as mere words. Nick knows his audience (the youth) and, as such, he has given us some songs that you are sure to know. Love that Someone Right sends up the famous Summer Nights from the movie Grease. Advocating chastity and resisting temptation, this song is a fun and holy. Priest is probably the most contemporary, taking its cues from the song Superman (It's Not Easy) by Five for Fighting. When I first heard this song, I actually got tears in my eyes. It tells the story of the humblest of men who is struggling to fulfill his vocation amidst a world that aims to insult and harm him. It is a must-listen for any guy who is discerning his calling to the priesthood. All in all, I Wanna Be Debated is a pleasant, enjoyable Catholic CD that effortlessly weaves Eternal Truth with external-laughter. While you may not connect automatically with some of the songs, it is undoubtedly true that the sheer-stupidity of the humor will have you holding your belly and smacking your knee. And you know what Pope John Paul the Great says about stupidity: "Stupidity is also a gift from God, but one mustn't misuse it."
Reviewed by Crosswalk.Com Silly Songs From the King of Catholic Comedy By Mark Weber Nick Alexander, the self-proclaimed "Weird Al" of Catholic comedy, returns. Some of Nick Alexander's songs are just plain silly. The king of Catholic comedy takes pop songs and parodies them. As the self-proclaimed "Weird Al" of Catholic music, Alexander found some success with his first release, A Time To Laugh, a year ago. Now he's back with more silly songs on Eternal Life: The Party Album. Life has a distinct '70s/'80s feel. The only recent songs parodied are somewhat lackluster versions of Lenny Kravitz's Fly Away and Barenaked Ladies' Pinch Me. Skip those in favor of other classic hits. Alexander's high-pitched, "new wave" (slightly whiny/nasal) voice is just right for Nahum, Zephaniah, Malachi, a dead-on parody of Tommy Tutone's original Jenny (867-5309). The rosary is the subject of These Beads, a strange albeit educational version of These Dreams by the Wilson sisters, of the band Heart. Evangelize, a well-written religious parody of Gloria Gaynor's huge 70s hit, I Will Survive, will make you laugh. Therese of Lisieux, a send-up of Eddy Grant's Electric Avenue, will liven up dull Catholic CCD classes. It's a very clever three-minute mini-bio about the legendary saint known as "the little flower." The highlight of Life is We Want To Stand United, which finds Alexander hitting the church history books and spoofing Billy Joel's We Didn't Start The Fire. If you want to sum up theological history from A.D. 313 to the present, this song covers it: "Baptists form, then they split, Wesleyan makes Methodists, Mormons follow Joseph Smith as a Deity. Whitfield, Edwards, then Finney, A.M.E. from bigotry, JWs, they've introduced a lower-case 'g.' Maria Monk's tale untrue. Darwin's Monkey Trial blues. Azusa Street, Campfire Meet, Preacher Billy Sunday." And that's just one verse in this detailed study of Christianity throughout history. Alexander should win a songwriter's award for We Want To Stand United. Recently married, and living near New York City, Alexander keeps busy writing parodies and sharing them with appreciative audiences who aren't afraid to laugh. Eternal Life: The Party Album is the kind of disc you'll want to share with friends. If you're in the mood for Catholic parodies (did you even know they existed?), Nick Alexander is your man. Reviewed by Catholic Parent (July/August 2001) Weird Al Yankovic, move over and make way for the wacky, tongue-in-cheek catachesis of Nick Alexander. A once "closet" parodist, Nick's "secret songs" surfaced while passing time at a conference with some fellow Catholic artists, all awaiting a concert sound check. Beyond amused, Nick's colleagues unanimously convinced him that a comedy CD of these rare, warped, strictly Catholic observations was proper penance. Curious? How about Sonny & Cher's signature "I God You, Babe" converted to a soul-searching "I Got You Saved?" Or, the question asked by the Clash in the song "Should I Stay of Should I Go" - you guessed it, "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel." The Village Peoples' "YMCA" becomes "R.C.I.A." PJ'S OK: Give this CD to your favorite catachumen! 
Reviewed by Catholic Marketing Network (Vol. 5, Issue 2, 2nd Qtr 2001) Imagine, if you will, what would happen if today's rock superstars openly sang songs of . . . their Catholic/Christian Faith?!? The result would be _A Time to Laugh_ the world's first Catholic parody CD. Nick Alexander takes standard secular pop songs and rewrites them so that they have comedic lyrics, yet remain devoutly Catholic. _A Time To Laugh_ can work as an engaging evangelistic tool for Catholics using humor and jokes to get the message across. The comedy begins with "Old Time Gregorian Chant," a parody of Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock & Roll." The familiar music is accompanied with amusic lyrics such as "Don't want hop-hop or a country-line dance, Just give me that Old Time Gregorian Chant". Impersonating the musical sytle of Sonny & CHer, Alexander gives an interseting and funny slant on evangelization with "I Got You Saved," a parody of "I Got You Babe." "Should I Stand or SHould I Kneel" explores the confusion a non-Catholic may have the first time attending Mass and is, of course, a parody of The Clash's song "Should I Stay of Should I Go." "R.C.I.A." parodies The Village People's popular "Y.M.C.A.". Its lyrics, such as "Why don't you sign up for the R.C.I.A., It's fun to join up with the R.C.I.A., You can enter the church on Easter Vigil day, And you will get a new name," serve as a humorous yet sincere invitation to join the Catholic CHurch. Through the art of parody, Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" is turned into "Tithe After Tithe" while BIlly Joe's "Pressure" becomes "Confession," a light-hearted reminder of the importance of this holy sacrament. Hidden behind the silliness is a serious spiritual message, one that reveals that there is true happiness in being a Catholic and in following church teachings. Many listeners, regardless of their religious upbringing, seem attracted to the humor on this CD and after the jokes have passed, the message sticks with them. _A Time To Laugh_ contains ten parody songs and one serious praise/worship song, "Father." The CD compilation contains songs ranging from the '60's to the '90's. Nick Alexander, a convert to the Catholic Church, leads worship at the Diocese of Bridgeport Catholic Charismatic Prayer Meetings, and is a dynamic speaker with strong convictions. He has offered several recieved praise courses. _A Time to Laugh_ is Alexander's first parody music compilation.
Reviewed by Mark Weber (December 2, 2000) Reprinted by permission. One of the most unique CDs you could ever buy is Nick Alexander's A Time To Laugh, a Catholic parody album. You may laugh so hard at some of the lyrics that you will cry. You may, in the words of my mother, even "pee your pants." That's the mark of a funny comedy album. A Time To Laugh is just wacky enough, just "out there" enough to sound like bad karaoke with a religious bent. To some extent, it is bad karaoke, but producer Ron Zabrocki's true-to-the-original music is top-notch and Alexander's penchant for writing funny Catholic lyrics makes A Time To Laugh a great novelty record. Alexander changes some of pop music's best-known lyrics into comedic Catholic classics that could get parishioners rolling in the pews. Skip "Repent," where Alexander attempts to sing in a high, woman's voice to emulate Aretha Franklin doing "Respect." Alexander is not the Queen of Soul. He is funny on most of the other songs, not so much for his vocal presentation style, which could use some polishing, but, rather, his witty Catholic lyrics. The Village People's classic "Y.M.C.A." becomes "R.C.I.A." Billy Joel's sneering "Pressure" becomes "Confession." Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" is changed to "Tithe After Tithe." The best song on the album is "Our Mass," which is Alexander's near-perfect parody of the British group Madness' 80's hit "Our House." Check out a sample lyric from "Our Mass"-- "Father Giles at Sunday Mass/ His homilies are eloquent/ Inspiring and relevant/ Midweek comes, he's much more brief/ Well, he just reads the gospel/ And then he sits down/ Our Mass in the middle of the week/ Our Mass in the middle of the" If you've ever been to a quick Mass in the middle of the week, you can relate to this tune. Other stand-outs on A Time To Laugh include "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel," which parodies "Should I Stay or Should I Go" by The Clash, "I Got You Saved," which parodies Sonny & Cher's "I Got You Babe," right down to Sonny's nasal whine and Cher's husky vibrato, and "Transubstantiation," changing the Beatles' classic "Revolution" into an ode to the Eucharist. In the mainstream, Weird Al Yankovic made a career on parodies of pop songs. Alexander is the Catholic parody king, and A Time To Laugh would make a great gift for someone you know with a funny bone who has lived a Catholic life or knows someone who has.
Reviewed by Tim Ryland. This Rock, April, 2001. Reprinted by permission. *** (out of *****) If there's one thing many of us could use, it's a better sense of humor about our faith. I suppose when you feel embattled, as do quite a few faithful Catholics in this country, it's understandable when you take things about the Church a little too seriously. To these people Nick Alexander's music goes off like a string of Black Cats during a prayer service. His album, _A Time to Laugh_ (a title taken from Ecclesiastes 3:4), comprises ten rock and roll songs from the 1960s through the 90s, reworked with religious themes. (On his web site, www.nickalexander.com , the artist describes himself as a "a worship leader, a speaker, an apologist, a songwriter, and a church musician.") If you're in your thirties and forties, most of the music will be familiar to you. At first blush, the juxtaposition of serious theological thoughts against familiar rock songs is funny. I played the CD for my friend Bill, a fine liturgical musician and composer in his own right. He guffawed when he heard "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel," (a whack at the Clash's 1982 hit "Should I Stay or Should I Go"). "This is genius!" he chortled. "I gotta send my sister a copy." He borrowed the CD for a few days, and the novelty wore off pretty quickly for him. But his ten-year-old daughter, too young to know the original songs, wouldn't stop playing it. Same with another friend: His ten-year-old son is nuts for this CD. It's difficult to know how to critique an album of Catholic rock parodies, since as far as I know this album is a genre unto itself. But there are certain ground rules a parody must follow to be effective. The closer the lyrics are to the original, the funnier, especially when similar words take the meaning in a whole new direction, as in Alexander's reworking of the 1983 hit by Madness, "Our House." (Original refrain: "Our house, in the middle of the street," The parody: "Our Mass, in the middle of the week.") Too often, though, Alexander parodies the title or "hook" of a song well but the rest of thelyrics are nowhere near the original (as in "Transubstantiation," based on the Beatles' 1968 anthem "Revolution" and "Tithe after Tithe," based on Cyndi Lauper's "Time after Time" [1984]). The most successful songs are "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel." "Our Mass." and "R.C.I.A.," a send-up of the Village People's 1979 disco hit, "Y.M.C.A." The arrangements are faithful, Band-in-a-Box renditions of the originals, and the uncredited guitar work is solid. But the production leaves something to be desired, and the sound is generally too thin. (For instance, the staccato horns on "Our Mass," punchy in the original song, sound as if they're in the next room.) Alexander's pleasant voice doesn't have enough oomph to carry some of the harder-edged songs like "Old Time Gregorian Chant" and "Confession" (parodies of Bob Seeger's "Old Time Rock and Roll" [1978] and Billy Joel's "Pressure" [1982], respectively). But the nasal Sonny Bono and man-deep Cher vocals on "I Got You Saved," [Cher] credited to Barry Feterman, are hilarious. An eleventh track-a non-parody song titled "Father"-hangs off the end of the album like a vestigial tail. Alexander included it, one supposes, to show he can do serious worship music. But it's a weak, 4/4-time reworking of the Our Father over an unexceptional D-C-G chord structure, and it doesn't belong here. The deeper question concerning _A Time to Laugh_ is whether or not it's appropriate to use parodies of rock and roll songs to communicate truths about the Catholic faith, as Alexander attempts to do. "I find humor to be a refreshing and effective way to bring out certain truths," he explains on his web site. "Some of my favorite preachers, like Scott Hahn or Fr. Benedict Groeschel, use humor to their advantage. It picques our interest, gives us an ability to laugh at ourselves, and preaches to us in ways which humorless preaching doesn't... "Tell me, is there anything so wrong with taking what is so precious and trying to convey it in such a way that others can understand it? We have many wondrous treasures that are locked within cathedral walls. Are we truly making the effort to share our treasures outside of designated culture-zones? "Further, one thing I enjoy about today's popular music is that it's infectious. You can't get it out of your head. Now, if you combine the repetitiveness of a strong melody with a strong message, you will create a powerful force." The counter-argument is that rock music's very infectiousness is part of its problem. Much has been written about the nature of the rock and roll backbeat and how it appeals to our prurient nature. While I tend not to subscribe to this theory, I have to recognize that as a creature created by a perfect God in order to love him, I am badly tainted by the profane culture in which I live. If I had grown up unexposed to rock music and had experienced it only as a faith-filled adult, how would it impress me? Probably like Van Halen impressed my parents, which is not much at all. And while I laughed at "R.C.I.A.," should we ignore the fact that the original song and the group that performed it not only glorified the campy homosexual culture of 1970s San Francisco but helped make it mainstream? Is it wrong to take what is precious and try to convey it in a way that non-Catholics can understand it? Sometimes, at least, I think that answer may be yes. But Nick Alexander is a clever guy, and the Catholicism he preaches is orthodox. If you are unconcerned by the larger questions, or can answer the objections to your own satisfaction, _A Time to Laugh_ will be just that.
Reviewed by Lynn Stinnett Williams. Catholic Faith & Family (June 18-July 1, 2000). Page 30. Reprinted by permission. What Weird Al Yankovic is to secular music, convert Nick Alexander is to religious songs. Alexander's parodies of popular secular songs is the funniest release of Catholic muisc in ages. His "A Time to Laugh" includes "Old Time Gregorian Chant," a parody of Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock & Roll," and "Tithe After Tithe," a parody of Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time." Where the Clash asked "Should I Stay or Should I Go?," the singer/songwriter quips, "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel?" Alexander's lyrics are delightful, blending orthodoxy with humor. "A Time to Laugh" is great family entertainment that should spark laughter and discussion.
Reviewed by David Wang for Catholic Grapevine I have often wondered why comedy is so hard to find in Christian circles. Whether it be movies, TV shows or music, we seem to be a rather serious lot. Circumstances recently found me as a roommate to an utterly crazy Catholic-convert named Nick Alexander at a Catholic youth conference. When he mentioned that he wanted to do a Catholic parody album, I had my doubts. When I recently received his album, however, I was rewarded by an evening of laughs. Imagine an ode to Gregorian chants sung to the tune of "Old Time Rock and Roll" or trying to fit hand actions to the "RCIA," a parody of that Village People dance favorite, "YMCA." "I Got You Saved" is a take on "I Got You, Babe," with a side-splitting impression of both Sonny and Cher. Even the Clash song "Should I Stay or Should I Go" becomes "Should I Stand or Should I Kneel," a song which tells of the utter confusion facing a non-Catholic attending Mass for the first time. However, hidden behind the silliness is a really serious spiritual message, that being that there is true happiness in being a Catholic and in following church teachings.
Reviewed by Fr. J.T. Zuhlsdorf http://forum.catholic.org: administrator When I was in seminary we would make up parody songs. Based on popular melodies, we would rewrite words to well-known hymns and so forth. Among our favorites were such ditties as Server Girl based on the Beach Boys tune, The Church Has One Foundation (it's B-I-N-G-O), I'll Never Go To Mass Again ala Burt Bacharach (you know.... "What do you do when you do Renew?"). We had some very clever fellows around the place. Of course, we were working of frustrations and we tended to be a little.... cynical. Recently I was listening to Vatican Radio and heard a parody of a song by the Clash having a Catholic theme. I was intrigued and sent an e-mail to Vatican Radio to find out who made the song. They responded and contacted the young American gentleman responsible. This fellow seems to lack our cynicism but is very creative. His name is Nick Alexander and the album is entitled A time to Laugh. It contains various parodies, ten in number, and one more serious original composition. Included in the parodies are I Got You Saved, from Sonny and Cher's "I Got You Babe", R.C.I.A from "Y.M.C.A." by the Village People and Tithe after Tithe from "Time After Time" by Cindy Lauper. I think that this is a positive and lighthearted contribution |
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