Real Leroy Mercer: The Original Recordings of John

John Bean | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 19, 2008)
• Original Release Date: 2008
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Dualtone Music Group
• ASIN: B001B92E08
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #122,837 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

The official digitally re-mastered version of recordings made in the late 70s and early 80s by a man who, up until now, has been a mystery. Alternately called "The Redneck Tapes", "Whup Ass Man", or "Leroy Speaks", these prank calls are legendary among truckers, country stars, and record shop employees, and they capture a true genius of psychological manipulation at work. From FBI informant to crazed ex-lawyer to jailed con artist, the rumors surrounding the author of these masterpieces created a figure larger than life. Know this: the author is a born prankster named John Bean, who died in the early 80s.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pretenders to the Mercer throne? Hunh! I'll whup your ..., April 27, 2010

By 

maelje - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Real Leroy Mercer: The Original Recordings of John (Audio CD)

In these days of shameless hype, staged "reality" shows and cultural devolution, it is good to remember that there once lived a man named John Bean. He had a telephone, a tape recorder, an assumed name and one of the most inventive, if vicious, imaginations ever bestowed by God upon man.

Forget Roy D. Mercer, the Jerky Boys, Telephone Terrorists and all those other contrived, phony pretenders to the throne. John Bean was a genius; according to friends and family, he regarded the prank call as not some sort of cheap thrill or stunt but rather an art form. It shows: His calls to a shoestore, to auto parts purveyors such as "Eddie's Auto" and other retailers are pure brilliance. His format was usually rather predictable -- cheated customer seeks refund or replacement or some kind of satisfaction. In "Plots," though, he sheds crocodile tears as he responds to a sales call from a seller of cemetery plots, and in "Pigs," he strings along the seller of some choice porcine specimens with ridiculous but heartfelt-sounding one-liners.

I've played this for people who don't even LIKE this kind of humor, and inevitably it reduces them to eruptions of laughter, choking and even tears. John Bean is dead now, but his art (and I mean that seriously) lives on.