This year marks the 45th anniversary of Disneyland’s Enchanted Tiki Room, the birthplace of animatronics and one of my all-time favorite Disney attractions. Some of my earliest memories are of being dandled on my grandfather’s knee at the Tiki Room while we sang and whistled together to the birds’ songs and jokes.
Former Disney designer Kevin Kidney and Jodi have been commissioned to make a run of limited-edition items based on the Tiki Room for a special event at Disneyland on June 22 and the schwag is awesome — every nerve in my body just stood on end and shouted “WANT!” (Oh, if only I still lived in LA!)
For years, I’ve harbored a fantasy of putting together a punk/alternative tribute disc for the Tiki Room, with the parrots voiced by Shane McGowan, Nina Hagen, Cheech Marin and Jean Reno, and the songs performed as follows: “In the Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Room,” the Ramones; “Let’s All Sing Like the Birdies Sing,” Shonen Knife; “Hawai’ian War Chant,” the Breeders; and “Heigh-Ho” by Tom Waits.
Yes, I know, many of these people are dead. But a fella can dream.
We’ve been waiting 5 years to make this item, and it’s finally happened.
Rongo, the Tiki God of Agriculture, is at long last a beautiful green-glazed ceramic drinking vessel for your Tiki bar. His very unusual size and shape makes him an equally suitable fruit bowl, cereal bowl, or whatever-you-like-bowl. He’s even clutching his spool of kite string, just as he’s been doing at Disneyland for 45 years.
(Thanks, Dwiff!)