AMG Review of National Lampoon Lemmings (1973 Original Cast)

William Ruhlmann
All Music Guide

Starting on January 25, 1973, and running for 350 performances, ~National Lampoon magazine sponsored a comedy revue at the off-Broadway ~Village Gate nightclub in Greenwich Village. National Lampoon Lemmings featured sketch comedy in its first act, but its second act was given over to an elaborate satire of ~Woodstock that allowed for parodies of popular music figures of the day. Future #Saturday Night Live cast members John Belushi and Chevy Chase were featured, Belushi originating the Joe Cocker impersonation he would perform on television ("Lonely at the Bottom"), Chase turning in a wicked takeoff on John Denver ("Colorado"). But the biggest musical talent was Christopher Guest, who would go on to greater fame in #This Is Spinal Tap. Guest co-wrote and sang cutting portraits of Bob Dylan ("Positively Wall Street") and James Taylor ("Highway Toes"). At a time when singer/songwriter music was all the rage, the sensitive types came in for special attention (there is also a song by "Freud, Marx, Engels, and Jung"), but the closing song was a general-purpose send-up of heavy metal by a fictional group called Megadeath. (Of course, later on there actually was a heavy metal band called Megadeth.) "Pizza Man," a girl group number, was amusing but seemed out of place, while the black music song "Papa Was a Running-Dog Lackey of the Bourgeoisie" targeted Motown and Curtis Mayfield. Some of the comedy is dated, and the satire depends on familiarity with the ~Woodstock movie and biographical details of the artists' lives. Some of the material is also visual, and a video would better represent the show than this audio recording. But for rock & roll fans with a black sense of humor, it doesn't get much better than this, especially since a group of future comedy stars are glimpsed at the start of their careers.