The Fob Song
by Toby Joe Turner

Toby Joe Turner.

Toby motherfuckin' Joe Turner.

You may not currently know this University of Florida telecommunications major, but if you're an Internet user with a sense of style and taste, he'll soon become a crucial — if incredibly transient — part of your life.

He is the creator of "The Fob Song."

"Fob song?" you might ask. "As in... car fobs?"

Yes. We are discussing a song featuring a white dude rapping about car fobs.

Toby Joe Turner: You keep walking to your well-parked ride/ You take off your jacket 'cause it's hot outside/ You lift up your keychain because you're getting close/ You search for the thing that you need the most/ It's a little black oval-shaped button-studded clicker/ As you push the button, it unlocks and lights flicker

Other Guy: What's it called?

TJT: It's called a fob.

Other Guy: I'm sorry, I didn't get you, what is it?

TJT: It's a motherfuckin' fob.

Other Guy: Okay, no I still didn't...

TJT: It's called a fob.

Other Guy: Could you enunciate please?

TJT: It's a motherfuckin' fob.

Other Guy: Sorry 'bout the confusion/ but I still don't understand.

TJT: I just told you four times/ just talk to the hand.

Other Guy: The marimba's too loud/ it's just confusing my ears.

TJT: You're right, I'm sorry for snapping/ I should rap more clear.

"The Fob Song" combines the all the awkward, earnest whiteness that made SNL's "Lazy Sunday" a smash underground hit, throwing in fumbling invocations of the F-word and a pulsing, inexplicably compelling but minimalist marimba musical accompaniment for good measure. The song very much sounds like somebody dared Toby Joe Turner to write a three-minute hip-hop track about car fobs, and he rose desperately to the challenge, only to fall about 20 seconds short.

The track is very much in the spirit of Tenacious D or This is Spinal Tap — eminently listenable, flawed in a way that is both a send-up and an earnest tribute to its real-world relatives, and occasionally totally, legitimately funny.

Those who are enchanted by "The Fob Song" — and there will be many — would be well advised to check out the rest of Swingin' D Productions, the Toby Joe Turner online fortress of multimedia power. Other tracks ("Skeet Missile," "The Bad Ass Toby Song," "The Ridiculously Hot Potentially Lyrical Toby Song") lean toward the earnestly instrumental, and are actually quite listenable, but the News section of the site is where the remainder of the funny goodness lies:

Ahh!! We were supposed to get my niece a puppy for christmas.. but... we couldn't wait. And we got 2 instead. AAHH!! PUPPIES!@3@!!!I guess that reaction makes me gay.
To balance.. I shall name them..
BLADE . And.... SLAYER

Actually I think.. Puppy is a good name. For both of them.

Genius.

The career arcs of dudes of Toby's caliber and temperament (Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Holly, Pierre Trudeau, et al.) tend to be spectacular but brief, so catch him in all his glory while you can, before his inevitable death in a cocaine-related private jet crash.

And remember: It's a motherfuckin' fob.

— James Norton (jrnorton@flakmag.com)