Philosophy of the World
| Philosophy of The World | ||||
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| Studio album by The Shaggs | ||||
| Released | 1969 | |||
| Recorded | March 9, 1969 | |||
| Genre | Garage rock, proto-punk, outsider | |||
| Length | 31:39 | |||
| Label | Third Word Records (1969); Red Rooster Records/Rounder Records (1980-1988); RCA Victor (1999) | |||
| Producer | Austin Wiggin, Terry Adams, Charlie Dreyer (uncredited) | |||
| The Shaggs chronology | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |
  Link
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| Lester Bangs | (Positive) Link |
| Mojo | (Positive) Link |
| Pitchfork | 8.6/10 Link |
Philosophy of The World is the first album by the all-female teen rock group The Shaggs, released in 1969.
The band was composed of three real-life sisters, Helen, Betty, and Dorothy (or "Dot") Wiggin, from Fremont, New Hampshire, USA. They were managed by their father, Austin Wiggin, Jr., and were sometimes accompanied by another sister, Rachel. They performed almost exclusively at the Fremont town hall and at a local nursing home, beginning in 1968 and ending in 1973.
Although most people in Fremont disregarded the band's sound, their father still believed his girls were going to be big stars, and in 1969 he took most of his savings and paid to record an album of their music. Austin drove the girls down to a studio in Massachusetts, determined to get them on tape "while they were still hot." Striking a deal with a local fly-by-night record company called Third World Recordings, they recorded their debut album in one day, recording a dozen tunes all written by Dot.
Upon the first original pressing, nine hundred of the original thousand copies of the album vanished out of the warehouse, and shortly thereafter their record company's producer/president also vanished and the label quickly folded.
Despite the setback, music collectors quickly got a hold of the remaining copies and word of mouth started, with those who liked it giving almost universal praise, but with many others complaining of the sloppy almost nonsensical way the arrangements were made as well as the singing, with claims this was done intentionally at the urging of their father (a rumor that persisted for many years, although he denied it).
By the mid-seventies WBCN-FM, a local radio station in Boston, Massachusetts, began playing a few cuts from the record, and their popularity was renewed. It was further renewed when two additional things happened: in 1978 famed independent music band NRBQ listened in, sought out a copy, then had it re-released in 1980 on the Red Rooster Records/Rounder Records label; and almost immediately Dr. Demento, an American radio broadcaster and record collector specializing in novelty songs, comedy, and strange or unusual recordings, began to play it almost exclusively on his radio show nationwide, especially around the holiday Halloween when he would play the album track "It's Halloween," and for many years since it became part of his top "Funny Five" recordings of the week.
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Wikipedia