One Hit Wonder

It was an interesting day today — the latter part of it was spent dealing with a kid who complained that his finger hurt. Not to us, of course — he had “forgotten” to let us know when it started hurting last night. But he told one of his teachers. Who noticed that the thing looked infected and was all sorts of colors. So she called socKs, and I came early to pick him up.

We were able to make a doctor’s appointment on short notice — everything is fine now. It took some coaxing to let the doctor lance the blister and squeeze out the nasty stuff that, according to Avi “looks like yellow quesadilla cheese!” Lovely.  He’s on antibiotics and is all bandaged up.  It could have been much worse.

On the way to the pharmacy to fill his prescription he asked a random question:

“Aba*, what’s a ‘One Hit Wonder?’”

I knew the origins of the question. We, as a family, have become hooked on the Disney Channel’s animated series Phineas and Ferb. If you’re not familiar with this show, it’s closer to WB’s Anamaniacs than any show I’ve seen for a long time.  It’s a show geared towards kids, but the humor evetually ends up way over their heads and simply nails the parents who grew up in the 90s,  The show premiered last year and was Emmy nominated. Very classy stuff.

Anyway, one of the episodes dealt with the notion of becoming a “One Hit Wonder.” Phineas and Ferb, stepbrothers who cleverly find themselves in one wacky adventure after another, discover that Mom, as a teen, had one hit record and then couldn’t repeat the success. They decide to become one-hit wonders themselves, makng it big with one song and then intentionally becoming primadonnas to sabotage themselves from any further success. Funny stuff.

But he wanted an explanation of a “one hit wonder.”  I told him that it was a singer or a group that only had one song that was famous.  I’m not sure he had it, so I decided to drive the issue home:

“So, Av — were the Beatles a one-hit wonder?”

“No!” He explained that they have many songs.

“How about the Wiggles?”

“No!” And then he turned the tables on me. “How about They Might Be Giants?”

“No! Because they have lots of songs, right?”  He was beginning to get it.

“So Aba — what group is a one-hit wonder?”

And my mind was blank. There are so many out there and I couldn’t just pull someone out that my kid would recognize. But I answered nonetheless:

“Pseudo Echo.”

I have no idea why I said that out loud. Pseudo Echo.  I could have picked Right Said Fred. EMF. Lou Bega. Wrecks-N-Effect.  Soup Dragons.  The Starlight Vocal Band.  The Buggles. Deep Blue Something. Boomtown Rats. Kajagoogoo. Scritti Politti.  Even Timex Social Club.

But Pseudo Echo?  What the hell is wrong with me?!?

“Aba, what’s Pseudo Echo?”

“Oh look! We’re here! Let’s get out of the car…”

Perhaps one of these days he’ll learn about the magic and mystery that is Pseudo Echo…

Direct YouTube Link

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* Hebrew for “Dad.”