[mark12_30]

• TITLE: The Hobbitons
• MUSICIANS: ...The Hobbitons...
• GENRE: Folk.
• CANONICAL TOLKIEN or ORIGINAL? Canonical! Hobbit-songs from The Hobbit, LOTR, and Adventures of Tom Bombadil.
• REVIEW: Where has this album been all my life??? (Answer: right there on the net, while I've been hesitating about sending American cash thru the mail to Denmark. Knuckleheaded me.)
  
  The tunes are perky, the voices are hobbity. Yes! This is GOOD.
  
  All right, so I skip the orc-songs. But the hobbit songs are excellent. (Oh, and I also skip the Prancing Pony song... I don't know, EVERYBODY does that one and frankly I'm sick of it.) But the other one-- the Man in the Moon came Down too Soon, from Bombadil-- is wonderful. Really. I laughed, and sighed, and said "awww! Poor old guy!"
  
  Mewlips is good. Creepy. yet still hobbity. The walking songs are good-- you can imagine *walking* to them. Gil-Galad is good-- they used Stephen Oliver's tune which was (in my mind) the best song on the Stephen Oliver album, so-- good choice. And it's nice to hear a hobbit sing it.
  
  The Drinking Song (Ho Ho Ho) is good. They sang it forever, though. Bilbo's Last Song-- again, the Stephen Oliver tune, but with a genuine Hobbit singing this time.
  
  Oddly enough, my favorite song on this album isn't technically a hobbit song-- it's "The Valley"-- the Rivendell song from The Hobbit. Terribly undignified. I don't think Elrond was a chorus member, or if he was, he had let his hair down. The song actually succeeds in being merry! I chuckled and laughed listening to it. I'm going to learn it.
  
• DO YOU RECOMMEND IT? Absolutely.
• PRICE YOU PAID I mailed them whatever cash they asked for on the Hobbitons . They said that the stock was running low; apparently I got one of the last ones. That's too bad. If I had known how good it is, I'd have ordered it a long time ago. Why was I skeptical!?
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• WHERE YOU BOUGHT IT Hobbitons
• Do you know of any online samples? Hobbitons