A child's imagination is a wonderful thing!  But I believe there is a big difference between imitating and originating.  Most of us have pretended we were Superman, etc;, but we probably learned more and developed more by playing with a cardboard  box or a coffee can that was laying around.  I think these are great songs, but I would be even more pleased if the children who hear these songs ended up naturally making up songs on their own.  After you buy the DVD/CD, I mean!

The Kazooks is a collaborative effort of people, neighbors and friends that I know, spearheaded by me, Ed Wake, from Riverside, California.  I had observed that there was a lot of "kids songs" on the internet and available for sale, but most were old standbys slanted toward preschoolers, or instructional songs, such as those obviously that teach children to read, brush their teeth, etc.  With some other songs available, kids were being encouraged to grow up too fast; (perhaps even subliminally), with Top 40 songs sung by kids, and these would  include "falling in love" songs, etc.; which seemed inappropriate to me for elementary school children.

I am married and all grown up now, and our two phenomenal children have left home and are doing well, (one in New York and one on her way to Ireland). What I did remember from my own childhood is how me and my two brothers would make up our own songs, poems and stories.  The ones that my brother Jim made up were the ones that I personally remembered even to this day, decades later.  Three of those have made it to this collection, Betty the Whale, Hammerhead Shark and Top Bunk! with some additional lyrics by me.  Since I still really liked these songs so many years later, and since they were actually written by a child at the time, I believed that they could do well as recorded songs for generations to come.  I utilized my imagination to create the others on the DVD/CD.  Most of these are character songs, and are intended to encourage children to invent their own characters and imagine more adventures.

My absolute favorite activity as a child was playing in our room upstairs with little animal erasers.  To my recollection, my Mom and Dad had bought each of us boys one of these at a roadside store on our way from Chicago to California when I was about 5.  They cost 15 cents.  I got a red whale named Splashy, Paul got a skunk (I forget what he named it) and Jim got a green elephant with pink ears which he named Grink. (How cool is that?!)  We liked them so much we increased our collection, and would often save up our 16 cents (tax, you know) and walk down to the corner store after we got our 35 cent allowance that week to get some new animals.  (Through the magic of the internet, I have been able to discern they were manufactured by Diener Industries of Chatsworth, who would later make a bunch of similar toys for McDonalds Happy Meals.  Those were more sports figures or space aliens and to me, were never as cool as the detailed animals we already had)

We shared a playroom upstairs and had one additional bedroom off of that room, and the entire area became the magic scene for what we would call The Adventures.  The land they lived in we called Radioland, and soon it became Adventures in Radioland.  All the sea animals we would put in and around the bathroom sink. There was a family of rabbits and chipmunks with many, many colors and styles of rabbits and they were called the Chup-Chups (which is where the name of the fictional rabbit drummer for the Kazooks actually comes from).  On one book case was the lair of "the bad guys"....these were not the same class rubber animals but were weird looking creatures or snakes or scorpions that we had gotten from gumball machines.  We put on shows just for ourselves, such as "Sky King" starring two eagles, "The Hippo House" (where my fascination with hippos started). ( I do remember we plagiarized the opening song of My Three Sons for The Hippo House theme song.)

It is because of these memories that I commissioned an artist I knew to create the play map that we enclose with the DVD/CD.

This small poster can be used by the children as a map for further adventures, using their own toys on hand and their own imaginations.  Below is a photo of the map, and then another one of the map showing the rubber animal erasers I used as a child in my bedroom to simulate how your children could utilize the map. ( A larger, 3' x 5' map is also available through our Store page, at pretty much our cost through third party printers.  Larger ones also available, email us if desired.)  Or, they could easily utilize their own bedrooms and their own imaginations.  None of the rubber animals are for sale or included with any packages on sale from this site; your children can no doubt have similar items at home or available near them or online.  Thank you.