A Bit of Fry & Laurie - Music

Music

Laurie is an accomplished musician, and this talent was often featured on the show in the form of plot points in a sketch and satirical songs. It was also a chance for Laurie, who often played straightman to Fry's antics, to show his own comedic abilities. The first such song, "Mystery", parodies a mournful love song from a lounge singer (Laurie mimics the vocal mannerisims of Sammy Davis Jr.) and presents the obstacles to a relationship between the singer and the object of affection, which become more outlandish every verse: she lives in a different country, would probably have a problem with the singer's job ("with the Thames Water Authority"), has never actually met and may indeed "take a violent dislike" to the singer, and has been dead since 1973 ("fifteen years come next Jan-uary"). This segment of the show quickly became one of its most popular. Laurie later played the song when appearing on an episode of Inside the Actor's Studio in 2006. His songs include:

• "Little Girl": Wearing a false pencil moustache and overly-oiled hair, Laurie, in the role of a child pornographer-celebrity photographer, tells in the style of Noël Coward of how he made an underaged girl famous by seducing and taking wildly erotic pictures of her. As the paparazzo continues to photograph the girl throughout her lifetime, she becomes a singing sensation, marries and divorces a pop singer, and fades out of the public eye. The photographer ends his song by mourning that the 'little girl' is no longer little or a girl, but on the bright side, has a young daughter whom the photographer would very much like to meet.
• "America": Laurie dresses in what was, at the time, the 'standard' American rock star uniform – flannel, white T-shirt, jeans, sneakers, and a bandana headband in the style of Bruce Springsteen and Jimi Hendrix. Laurie dramatically sings the song, the lyrics of which consist of "...America, America, America..." and "...the States, the States, the States...", until Fry comes on stage, quite annoyed, and punches him.
• "The Sophisticated Song": Laurie, in a white and black suit, plays guitar, accompanied by a back-up band, singing about how normally he is very cool until he needs to talk to his true love, at which point he becomes so speechless, he begins to drool.
• "The Polite Rap": Prancing around in neon gangsta clothing, Laurie parodies the hip hop culture with this rap telling people to be nice, rather than bad, and that he's a "good-ass motherliker", rather than "bad-ass motherfucker".
• "Where is the Lid?": Laurie announces that he has written a "savage, angry" song about "jars that become separated from their lids". Playing the piano, he sings "Where is the lid?" mournfully and repetitively. In the background, Fry finds a stray lid, and tries it on an open jar sitting on the piano; it fits, and he pleads with Laurie to stop singing as the lid has been found and restored to its jar. Laurie ignores Fry and continues to play until Fry punches him. (This is immediately followed by a mini-feature about Laurie's "death".) This song is thematically and musically very similar to "America".
• "There Ain't But One Way": Laurie and Fry, dressed as two rednecks, introduce the song. A jibe at American Southern patriotism, Laurie sings about how the only way to solve the world's problems, from the hole in the ozone layer to poverty, is to "kick some ass", while Fry, playing his mentally challenged brother ("the victim of an unfortunate musical accident"), shouts out "yee-hah!" and repeats "kickin' AY-ass!" when sung by Laurie and stomps around, eventually falling offstage.
• "I'm in Love with Steffi Graf": Laurie once again has a back-up band while he plays the acoustic guitar, and makes a play at the depressing grunge music of the 1990s. He overdramatically flips the hair out of his eyes in the style of Robert Smith of The Cure and, affecting an effeminate lisp, proclaims his love for tennis player Steffi Graf. He goes so far as to proclaim that he stalked her during her tournaments and finally reveals himself as the man who stabbed Monica Seles as revenge for her defeat of Graf, a big news story in 1993. While the tune is performed, a slideshow of Steffi Graf playing tennis is shown on a projector screen.
• "Too Long Johnny": Laurie appears dressed completely in black and wearing a red fedora. He plays slide guitar on a resonator guitar and, affecting a bluesman accent, he sings, "Too long, Johnny, too long, it's way too long", then proceeds to sing/explain about how he wants to cut "it" down to a perfect length. Unfortunately, though Johnny does get "it" down to the perfect length, he claims he made "its" width much too thin, and must now start all over again.
• "Hey Jude": Laurie plays his grand piano and sings "Hey Jude" by The Beatles, in a voice reminiscent of Pinky and Perky. Fry eventually joins him on stage and begins to sing along in an impossibly deep voice. Fry then holds up cue cards so the audience may sing along with the "na na na na" of the refrain. Hugh Laurie played the piano one octave lower than usual while singing normally, this was then transposed one octave up to give a normal sounding piano with a high-pitched voice.
• "Love Me Tender": Laurie once again covers a famous musician, this time Elvis Presley. He even adopts a Presley-esque voice for the song. However, Laurie's attempt at seriousness becomes decidedly skewed after the camera pans out, revealing that he is singing to Nicholas Parsons sitting on a stool. Laurie finishes up the song then tenderly kisses the shoulder of Parsons's suit.
• "What I Mind": Laurie on piano and accompanied by a backup band band sings a country song about hard times with his "girl", who will not stop referring to him as an inanimate object, such as a hoover, a key, and a garage.
• "The Protest Song": Laurie again provides himself with a backup band and plays acoustic guitar as well as harmonica. He spoofs American college activist rock, singing about how everyone can make the world a better place. Much like his cover of "Love Me Tender", this song appears to be Laurie's attempt at seriousness, at least until he reaches the part when he must actually sing what everyone is supposed to do to build a better society. Every time he reaches this part, as if unable to think of an actual course of action to save the world, he mumbles incoherently in to the microphone. When he reaches the end of the song, he repeats the line "All we gotta do is..." several times, and then resumes playing the harmonica. He also performed this song on BBC's Comic Relief telethon in 1993, and in 2006 alongside his hosting duties on an edition of Saturday Night Live.

Hugh Laurie did not write the intro theme of the first series. It is, in fact, "Mardi Gras in New Orleans" by Professor Longhair.