The Rhapsody of Tuli Lyrics

The time was 1965 and a band called The Fugs met every afternoon to rehearse at the Peace Eye Bookstore. Which was located in a former kosher butcher shop at 383 East Tenth. Next door to Peace Eye on the second floor above the Lipshutz wholesale egg market lived a young songwriter named Tuli Kupferberg. Tuli worked every day composing songs on a reel to reel tape recorder. In The Rhapsody of Tuli we trace his work shaping some of the startling and beautiful melodies that later graced The Fugs repertoire. We begin The Rhapsody of Tuli as he composes one of his most beautiful songs.

Morning hm hm hm hm

Feel so lonesome in the morning

Morning hm hm hm hm morning

Morning brings me grief

Next we find him shaping Mathew Arnolds wedding poem of 1852 the threnody known as Dover Beach.

Let us be true to one another

So various so beautiful so new

Let us be true to one another

Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light

Let us be true to one another

No certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain

Let us be true to one another

One of The Fugs most popular songs became an anthem of its era. A sort of pre post modern 20th century sutra. Lets hear it for nothing!



(Tuli) Tune traditional Yiddish, bulbous, words by, Tuli. New words.

Monday nothing, Tuesday nothing, Wednesday, and Thursday nothing

Friday for a change a little more nothing, Saturday also nothing

Sunday nothing, Monday nothing, Tuesday and Wednesday nothing

Thursday for a change a little more nothing, Friday also nothing

Tuli astutely realized that if a song became associated with a dance craze the fruge, the twist, the monkey, the fish, or the mashed potato. Then even a beatnik song crafter could reap bundles of cash, mountains of moolah, plethora of penenzi.

Let's Fug, baby let's Fug,

Let's Fug, baby let's Fug

Let's Fug, baby let's Fug

Let's Fug, Let's Fug, Let's Fug, Let's Fug


Let's Fug, baby let's Fug

Let's Fug, baby let's Fug

Let's Fug, Let's Fug

Baby. Let's. Fug.

Let's Fug

Let's Fug

Let's Fug

And here's yet another dance single Tuli fashioned. This time cunningly focusing on the hypothalamus; the part of the brain associated with thrills, eros, and forbidden fun.

Hypothalamus

Hypothalamus

Hypothalamus

That's the brain for me!



Hypothalamus

Hypothalamus

Hypothalamus

That's the brain for me!

One of the early members of The Fugs was a wild young poet named Zabo. Who gave Tuli the idea for a song from the Bible.

The Ten Commandments, The Ten Commandments

Thou shalt not kill, dada dada da dada

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's ass

Thou shalt not steal, dada da da

Thou shalt honor thy father or thy mother

What a prognosticator of taste and social trends he was. As Tuli Kupferberg crooned into his Wollensack tape recorder up in his forty dollar a month pad on East Tenth predicting the rise 20 years later of the narcissistic, self absorbed, workshop crazed, me generation.

Not us, not us us, not we we,

but me meee

oh me me, not them them at all,

but me me, me me, me me, me me, me me

And finally we close the Rhapsody of Tuli with a ballad of love and longing from one of his dusty lonely reels.

Not enough loving, not enough loving

Not enough loving, not enough loving

Ahhhhh


Too much hating, too much hating

Too much hating, too much hating

Ahhhhh


Not enough kissing, not enough kissing

Not enough kissing, not enough kissing

Ahhhhh


Too much fighting, too much fighting

Too much fighting, too much fighting

Ahhhhh


Not enough fucking, not enough fucking

Not enough fucking, not enough fucking

Ahhhhh


Too much killing, too much killing

Too much killing, too much killing

Ahhhhh