Late at night, on a bright city street,
a bunch of rats bopped and squeaked to the beat
of bongos and blues harp and a cowbell, too—
“We are the Jazz Rats! How do you do?
We make cool rhythms and play all night,
and only go home when the sun is in sight.
Then we sleep and dream all day
of the music we can’t wait to play
each night!”
Every night they made words and rhythm
for everybody who came to hear them.
Then one day they saw a poster on a post
that told about a contest with a prize for the most
be-boppingest band in sight!
The prize was a drum set with…
a BOOSH-thump bass drum,
a chook-chook high hat,
a rat-a-tat snare drum,
and boom-bam-bim-bom toms.
“Let’s enter that,”
said a rat called Flat.
“That’d be freaky,”
said a rat called Squeaky.
“Think we could win?”
asked their drummer, named Din.
“At least we can try it,”
yelled a rat named Riot.
“And I’ll play the harp,”
said a rat called Sharp.
So they entered the contest, and practiced each night.
They had to make sure they played everything right.
Pretty soon crowds would gather around
just to bop to the Jazz Rats’ latest sound—
that’s right!
But across the street, and feeling blue,
the Fat Cats wanted an audience, too.
They entered the contest, and practiced a bit,
but somehow their music just wasn’t a hit.
They kept the beat with a pair of spoons,
but nobody liked their sour tunes:
when they sang in harmony, loud and strong,
it sounded like a cat fight instead of a song.
What a fright!
“We are the Fat Cats, Meow to you!
Stop and listen to us, whatever you do!
We Fat Cats don’t draw much of a crowd,
just because the Jazz Rats are playing too loud.
If we had bongos, harp and cowbell, too,
we would sound just as good as they do.
So stick around awhile—what!? You say we’re no fun?
Wait! Don’t go! We’ve just begun!”
“We’ll never win,”
sighed a cat called Thin.
“If we played like the Rats…”
said a cat called Fats.
“Maybe then we could win,”
decided Thin.
“And if we took their stuff…”
said a cat called Fluff,
“Then they couldn’t play,”
said a cat named Stray.
Their secret plan was really sneaky:
During a solo of high notes by Squeaky,
the Fat Cats made a bang and a buzz,
and when everyone ran to see what it was,
they took the Rats’ instruments and hid them away.
“Oh, no,” said Squeaky, “now we can’t play!”
Flat said, “Now what do we do?
The contest is tomorrow, too!”
“Come on,” said Sharp, “we’re all in a slump,
and the best cure for that is to visit the dump.”
Flat said, “This hurts more than I can say.”
“Yeah,” yelled Riot. “We all wanted to play!”
Din was restless. He started to tap,
bim-a-bim-bim-bim
on an old tire rim.
Riot yelled, “Cool!” He started to whap,
thub-a-thub, thub-a-thub
on a bent golf club.
Flat found a stubby stick to rap,
wham-a-bam-bam-bam
on an empty paint can.
Sharp made a sound with an old rubber strap,
bub-a-bub, bub-a-bub
on a leaky tin tub.
Squeaky sang out, “The Jazz Rats don’t quit!
Are we discouraged? No, not a bit!
We can make music all through the night,
and only go home when the sun is in sight.
No matter what happens, night or day,
the music’s in us, you can’t take it away.”
They played and squeaked through the rest of the night,
and when the sun came into sight,
they hauled their rim, club, can, and tub
over to the contest at the Alley Cat Club.
What a sight!
When they got there, the contest had started.
“Look,” said Squeaky, brokenhearted,
“the Fat Cats are first, and they’re playing our stuff!
They took it away, and that’s bad enough,
but now they’re pretending our stuff is theirs.
That’s not right, it’s really unfair!”
“Yeah,” said Sharp, “but we just can’t allow
anything more to bother us now.”
“Cheer up!” said Flat, “and remember this:
if we do our best, there’s no way we can miss!
No matter what happens, night or day,
the music’s in us, it’s here to stay!”
So the Jazz Rats played all the things they had found,
and made the most bebopical sound:
bim-a-bim-bim-bim
thub-a-thub, thub-a-thub
wham-a-bam-bam-bam
bub-a-bub, bub-a-bub…
And the crowd went wild! It cheered loud and strong!
Even the Fat Cats were yowling along:
“You’re the Jazz Rats, and you’re all right!
You make rhythms and play all night!
You’ve got more rhythm than all the rest!
You have our vote! You are the best!”
And when at last the contest was done,
the judges announced, “The Jazz Rats have won!”
What a night!
The crowd brought the Rats with a roar and a yell
to the street, where their bongos, blues harp, and bell
sat by the drum set they’d worked hard to get.
And there stood the Fat Cats, completely upset.
“We’re sorry we stole your stuff,” Fats wailed,
as the Cats chewed their whiskers and twisted their tails.
“We should have worked as hard to play
as we did to take your stuff away.”
“We’ve learned our lesson now,” said Fluff.
“We thought we just weren’t good enough.”
“Hey,” said Squeaky, “it’s all okay.”
Flat asked the Cats, “You want to play?”
“There’s this drum set,” said Sharp, “we just happened to win.”
“And some really cool junk from the dump,” said Din.
Riot yelled “Sure! There’s enough to share.”
Fats said, “Rats, you’re more than fair!”
He was right!
Now, after dark, when the sun’s gone down,
Folks go to hear the new group in town…
Late at night, on a bright city street,
cats and rats yowl and squeak to the beat
of drum set and cowbell and stuff from the dump:
“We’re the Fat Cat Jazz Rats—watch us jump!
We play in the most bebopical style.
The music’s in us, and it makes us smile.”