Review: He Who Cannot Be Named – “Fibulous Fabber and Friends”

Laptop Punk Records, 14 December 2021

He Who Cannot Be Named finds his innocence.

He Who Cannot Be Named, the luchador mask-sporting guitarist from Dwarves, comes from a not-so-subtle musical lineage heavy on the shock and awe.  So when I got wind of Fibulous Fabber and Friends, a seeming children’s album, forgive me for wondering if a “fake death”-type hoax was afoot.  But alas, the children’s album thing is true as can be.  The songs on Fibulous Fabber were written in collaboration with his mother, who “wrote a children’s book about friendly but mischievous monsters”.  He Who Cannot Be Named then added here and there to the poems and turned them into songs, thus Fibulous Fabber. 

So to get this outta the way, this is no sort of punk rock.  True, some pretty significant punks show up to help out along the way, but the music is decidedly fun and light-hearted, seemingly pulled from another era.  It sits nicely alongside children’s bubblegum fare such as Groovie Goolies (TV show, not the pop punk greats), The Wombles, The Hardy Boys, Fraggle Rock, and The Archies.  In fact, so much so that I did a bit of research trying to find a throwback children’s TV show to go along with the record (again, just trying to make sure that nothing’s sneaking past me).  The songs build up fun stories of monsters who complicate the lives of kids by doing things like leaving chewed gum around, making splashy messes, dropping food crumbs, eating too much sugary goodness, leaving mud strewn about the room, and tearing holes in nice clothes.  To make these tales more convincing, a range of vocalists join up (including punk rock notables like Milo Aukerman, Chris Barrow, Dustin Umberger, Mike Patton, and Spike Slawson) and pull off unique and fun characters that truly make the record feel right.  Likewise, the music matches the varied moods, whether with school bells on “Gum Goblin”, the tambourine on “Muddier Mucker”, the countrified stylings of “Reverend Wallace Walker”, or the playful organs, guitars, synths, and “found sounds” popping up all over the place.  It’s childlike fun for sure.

Throughout Fibulous Fabber, there are all sorts of hooks that give a good number of these songs a sort of staying power.  The “Overture” and “Reprise” at the beginning and end do a fibulous (see what I did there?) job of setting up and closing out the record.  The aforementioned “Gum Goblin” is just silly catchy bubblegum fun with wonderful melodies that’ll stick around for days.  Same goes for the Spike-sung “Tickle Troll” and the Patton-sung “Fibulous Fabber” (which also has a great villainous voice drop in towards the latter half).  “Invisible Things” layers three different vocalists (Jimmy Conway, Suzanne Winters, and Pauly Paparazzi) into varied harmonies and phrasings that sound whimsically fantastic.  Elsewhere, the Umberger-sung “Splash Class” has a catchy singalong chorus and a playful feel to it while the Aukerman-sung “Cookie Crimes and Mealtime Misdemeanors” is up to its elbows in ornery angst (this one even has a fun Descendents reference: Milo gets asked if he wants a cookie, to which he responds “No, all!”).  And “Commander Crumb” plays up a great character that leaves food crumb messes all over the place with horns, synths and harmonies all hitting right.  That “hitting right” keeps up all over this record.

Sure, He Who Cannot Be Named is hitting us with kids stuff here.  But suspend the adult sense of seriousness that infects so many for a bit and there’s a lot of fun to be had on Fibulous Fabber and Friends.

Favorite song: “Gum Goblin”

Favorite moment: the ornery “No, all!” Easter egg Milo drops on “Cookie Crimes”

Favorite whatever else: the surprise of hearing a member of the Dwarves make a children’s album