Damn, hope they catch the shooter.
He remained active and engaged even later in his life. Rapper Tauheed K. Epps, who records as “2 Chainz”, sampled Lehrer’s song The Old Dope Peddler [PDF] for his track Dope Peddler, asking permission to use a snippet. Lehrer wrote back:
As sole copyright owner of ‘The Old Dope Peddler’, I grant you motherfuckers permission to do this. Please give my regards to Mr. Chainz, or may I call him 2?
We linked to his lyrics, although they are slightly inconveniently PDF files, because in 2020, he placed all of his lyrics in the public domain. A couple of years later, he did the same with all his original melodies, ending the disclaimer on tomlehrersongs.com:
In short, I no longer retain any rights to any of my songs.
So help yourselves, and don’t send me any money.
Legend.
He also said it felt weird performing his songs in public; he compared it to a novelist showing up to read their book out loud to people. You guys have the album, that’s why I made it. What do you need me for? I don’t know you people and I’m up on this big stage, this feels weird. I want to go home and relax.
Be like Tom 😀
Also he was like 83 when he wrote that response to Mr Chainz and like 94 when he made his stuff public domain
This is so sad. I learned of Tom from Dr. Demento in the 80’s where he was in frequent rotation. My favorite of his from back then, which feels a little maudlin now that i’m older, is this gem:
Poisoning Pigeons in the Park by Tom Lehrer https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VR9Qm7IXpU8
The Royals apparently loved that song, per the article. (Well, except for Liz)
he sings it with such glee, the juxtaposition with the dark subject matter just makes it really extra funny. It made it into the top 10 a lot.
