The Happy Telephone
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The Happy Telephone is a set of self-produced cassette recordings of prank phone calls recorded during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Their material has been used on the Howard Stern and Mancow Muller radio shows.
[edit] History
The first Happy Telephone tape known to exist was a 60-minute cassette released in the late 1980s, entitled "The Dialing Delinquents". Most of the callers on this tape are young teenagers; some are young women.
A set of two 90-minute tapes (known as the "#2 & #3" tapes) was released later, around 1991. The #2 tape was very briefly distributed by Mordam Records in 1992. Later that year, the #3 tape was released by independent record label Black Label Records, but was quickly withdrawn because of copyright issues with included music and Simpsons-inspired artwork used on the tape. Subsequent releases of this tape omitted the copyrighted music and artwork.
The Happy Telephone tapes were first sold locally in the Knoxville, Tennessee area. The #2 & #3 tape sets were popular sellers at Raven Records, an independent record store in Knoxville, during the 1991 release. A small batch of 60 minute "best of" tapes were sold by special request during shows at Knoxville concert punk rock / alternative venues Planet Earth and The Orpheus. There were also a few early "#1" copies circulated at Atlanta venue The Metroplex. Over the years, poor quality bootleg recordings of the tape continued to circulate among underground fans.
It is mentioned on one of the tapes their sole inspiration was the Tube Bar prank calls and Louis "Red" Deutsch.
