Golden Hits Of The 60s”
Main MenuConcept Refinement The Author..Wayne JancikGolden Age Of The 50sGolden Age Of The 60s1970s and There After
TINY TIM
“TIP TOE THRU’ THE TULIPS WITH ME”
(AI Dubin, Joe Burke)
Reprise 0679
No. 17 June 29, 1968
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“I’m the only living artist, probably the only celebrity in the world, who actually is able to duplicate the
sound of Byron G. Hardin. He was Thomas Edison’s favorite singer in 1902,” quoth the not-so-tiny but
still very much Tiny Tim to Record Collector’s Monthly, in 1986. Tim was quite a character, then as for
all his life, six foot one, with his unruly hair, prominent nose, loud clothes, childlike and seemingly
asexual demeanor, ratty-looking shopping bag, ukulele, wavering falsetto-and that featherheaded song
(initially popularized by Nick Lucas in 1929), “Tip Toe Thru’ the Tulips With Me:’
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Tiny Tim seemed to sprout up fully formed from nowhere; his past is rather sketchy. As Herbert Khaury
(b. possibly Apr. 12, 1930, New York City), he used to perform in the ’50s, but was booed quite often.
Apparently, audiences failed to understand that “the spirits of the singers whose songs I do are living
within me,” as Tim explained to Rolling Stone’ s Jerry Hopkins.
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In the mid-’60s, as Darry Dover, Larry Love, later Tiny Tim (a name given him by an agent for midgets),
Tim played to increasingly receptive crowds in Greenwich Village coffee-and-bongo spots like the Fat
Black Pussycat Cafe. Rowan and Martin’s “Laugh-In” and Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” brought him
national exposure; he starred with Paul Butterfield, The Electric Flag, and BARRY McGUIRE in the
hippie-era film You Are What You Eat (1968). His televised wedding to his true love, 17-year-old “Miss
Vicki” (Victoria May Budinger), took place December 17, 1969 on “The Tonight Show,” as 35 million
viewers watched in wonderment. Their daughter was named Tulip, and they split up in 1977.
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“It’s important for me to see myself the way others see me–as a freak, a curiosity,” said Tim to the
Chicago Sun Times’ Jeff Zaslow. ”All of us have to look honestly at ourselves.”
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The immediate follow-up to Tim’s “Tulip” tune was “Bring Back Those Rock-a-Bye Baby Days” (#95,
1968). “Horribly done,” groaned Tim to Record Collector’s Monthly. “Don’t mean a thing that it made
the Hot 100. … ‘Hello, Hello’ [Tiny’s fourth single] was also horribly done. I’m an artist who needs a
sketch, and needs time to complete his work. That song was first done in 1922, by Lee Morse … I did it
in August of 1968 when I was in Las Vegas and when that horrible album Concert in Fairyland came
out. It wasn’t produced by Warner Bros., it was recorded six years before. The owners wanted
$25,000 from Warner Bros. to withhold the release, and they refused to pay. It was old studio tracks
with a canned audience, and it had 100,000 buyers. That’s what killed me in the phonograph business.”
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Reprise, the Warner Bros. subsidiary, dropped Tim in 1971. Recordings thereafter, were issued but only
sporadically and on labels with limited distribution. Some of these, if you can find them, are quite
interesting, such as:”I Saw Elvis Presley Tiptoeing Through the Tulips;’ “Am I Just Another Pretty
Face?,” ”I’m Gonna Be a Country Queen,” and “The Hicky on Your Neck.” Notice I have said interesting;
not necessarily good.”
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Again in the ’80s, he made appearances on TV talk shows, “acting” in the gory slasher flick Blood
Harvest (1986), working rock’n’roll revival shows, and touring with Alan C. Hill’s Great American Circus.
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“Remember it’s better to be a has-been, than a never-been,” said Tiny to Zaslow, in 1984, when appearing
with a boxing kangaroo in a one-night stop in Ottawa, Ill. “It’s okay. Whether you’re a flash in the pan,
like me, or whether you last longer at the top, at least you know you accomplished something. I can go
to any library 10 years from now and read the tons of publicity I received. It was wonderful to have
been there once.,
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Added Tim: “People can humiliate you, only if you let them… :’
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