Song Of The Day 10/7/2014: Eppu Normaali - "Jee Jee"

Foreign Underground: I had to cross out the "underground" part of today's entry because Eppu Normaali haven't been underground since the late '70s. They're the biggest-selling Finnish artists in music history. Yes, even bigger than Hanoi Rocks, Children of Bodom and emeffin' Lordi, emeffers. Sure, they struggled in the beginning like everyone else, as you can tell by the marvelous floral print jumpsuits they're voguing in the photo below. But after shedding their punk rock origins in songs like "Jee Jee" and going the slightest bit mainstream it's been all Savonian caviar and hovineitojensa that'll do just about anything in authentic saunas. Like the best of us, they're named after a Mel Brooks joke: "Eppu Normaali" is a loose translation of Igor's "Abby Normal" pun from Young Frankenstein. That should get you in the door. That's why I sign hotel registers Lorenzo St. DuBois.

That rubber-faced genetic mutation of Bob Geldof, Javier Bardem and, well, Marty Feldman is Martti Syrjä, lead singer of Eppu Normaali, and when the band hit a creative dry patch and took the '90s off he turned to the bottle. Normally I wouldn't go into that detail of a musician's private life, but in this case it led me to a Finnish-language newspaper article which I had Google translate into English for me, resulting in several turns of phrase I'd like us all to start using on a daily basis:

• "Alcoholism does not make it alone."


• "Now is the relaxed feeling. The band goes internally and externally, more than ever before."


• "Tripping came several times. Alcohol was replaced between the drugs. Remoteness is not alone with this country. He now knows where to want to pull the lever."


• "If the problem is really got bad, keep the faith that it can not survive on their own."


• "The third tip is that, if a heavy drinker, it is worth to practice even the roughest manner, that ice disappointed that the stop. Quite a few companies and I had always Juomatonta liquor was found, but in the end it ended."

On another note I'd like to announce my upcoming (in 25 years) memoir, In The End It Ended. Hopefully meta-humor will still be the red hot poker it is now.