Who's he?

The closest thing to the sound of pure joy, Shooby Taylor's surreal scatting is legendary in the twisted world of outsider music. Wildly improvising his own scat syllables - "la da-da raw!", "poppy-poppy-doppy-doppy!", "splawww!" - over existing records by the likes of Johnny Cash and The Ink Spots, Shooby's guileless, breathless chattering is sure to make even the most embittered curmudgeon smile. Shooby was first discovered when a bootleg tape of his work recorded in the 1980s began to circulate through the American music industry, instigating a huge search for the elusive William Taylor of Brooklyn, who was thought to work for the US postal service. After dozens of leads went cold, in 2002 a hardcore fan finally tracked the 73-year-old to a nursing home in New Jersey, where ill health had confined Shooby to his bed. Tragically, the scat man had suffered a heart attack in 1994, silencing his singing forever.

Why should we care?

While success eluded Shooby during his lifetime, most people who hear his idiosyncratic scatting are instantly charmed by its warmth, humour and sincerity. In the US, various record company bigwigs tried to re-release Shooby's records, without success, and the Late Show With David Letterman even tried to get him to scat live on air. In the UK, Channel 4's Adam And Joe Show sampled Shooby's voice in its theme tune.

Where is he now?

Shooby died in September 2003, but not before handing over a bunch of tapes to those dedicated to keeping his work alive. However, because Shooby scats over songs recorded by established artists, releasing his work is a licensing nightmare, and so far no record company has been brave enough to take the risk (US label Absolutely Kosher was once interested, but didn't comment when Bizarre asked what happened to its promised re-release).

CURRENTLY AVAILABLE: A couple of Shooby songs appear on the Songs In The Key Of Z compilations, but you can download his stuff from Shooby.com. We'd recommend starting with 'Lift Ev'ry Voice And Sing'