Wizard rock is a fun genre, and logically many of its bands are quite funny, too. But when it comes to cleverness and humor, The Blibbering Humdingers may very well be in a category all of their own. Comprising Scott & Kirsten Vaughan, the band places heavy emphasis on the quality of their lyrics, which are always sharp and full of wit. Their music, too, is fun and quite versatile—ranging from the jazzy “Niffler Swing” to a German version of Draco and the Malfoys’ “99 Death Eaters“—which has earned them widespread acclaim in the wrock scene (Even Wrock Snob, the persnickety connoisseur of wizard rock, once lauded the band’s album Wizard Rock Made Me Crap My Pants for being “the defining example of how to make a humorous wizard rock album”).

I reached out the other day via owl post to ask the band a few questions, and they happily obliged! Unfortunately, after my initial inquiry, my owl got lost in a hurricane and ended up somewhere near Australia, forcing me to make do with bat post. (Reminder: Don’t use bats again—they gossip nonstop!) Despite these hurdles, I am happy to say that I now have the answers that you have all been waiting for! Let’s dive right in…

Paul: Let’s jump on back to the beginning. How did The Blibbering Humdingers get started? I know that you also are affiliated with the filk scene, too.

Scott & Kirsten: We didn’t actually start getting into the filk scene until 2009ish. As the wrock scene has slowed down Filk has sort of become a new home for us. We … began performing together in 1992 in the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism – a sort of role-playing group for medieval history/lifestyle enthusiasts), where we are still known as Efenwealt Wystle and Maîtresse Aénor d’Anjou. So for over 25 years we mostly did medieval, renaissance, and folk music around campfires. Then from about 2006-2009 we owned a store called Camelot-Treasures that specialized in fantasy and medieval history. We sold all kinds of HP merchandise in addition to dragons, pirates, fairies and other related stuff. Whilst looking for songs to perform for a HP-themed event we stumbled upon several wizard rock acts. Then in August of 2007 decided to start our own wrock act.   Not long after we started hosting regular wizard rock shows at our store, going to HP cons and eventually became friends with a bunch of other wrock performers and fans.

Our friend Chuck Parker has played bass with us for a number of years now both live and on our last few albums. We met him through the convention scene.  Our kids Aiden and Liam started joining us on drums and keyboards a couple years ago – and since Covid has hit, they’ve been instrumental (pun intended) to our online performances. We’ve also had live and recording contributions from lots of other wrock people like Stacy and Jon of Swish & Flick, Matt Maggiacomo, Brian Ross, Bryce Cone, Ashley Hamel, all the members of Hawthorn and Holly, and many other excellent musicians.

Paul: Who do you look towards as musical (or lyrical) inspirations? Are there artists or whole styles that you hope to partially emulate?

Scott & Kirsten: We are very into 80s pop music and that has influenced a lot of our wrock—but we’re also into old-timey stuff, celtic folk, classic rock, prog rock, and medieval/renaissance music. Artists like Weird Al, the Cars, Blondie, Billy Joel, and Tom Lehrer probably influence our wrock material the most.

Paul: That is quite the artist selection. I love it! How do you approach writing and recording music?

Scott & Kirsten: Scott wrote most of our earlier wrock stuff, but over the years Kirsten did more and more of the song writing. And lately she’s been doing most of most of the hard lyrical lifting with just a little musical help from Scott or our son Liam. Our stuff has always been very lyrically focused—we really prize wit and humor, and thoughtful lyrics that are easy to understand.  Unlike many wrock acts, we don’t write from a particular character’s perspective. We just latch onto themes, events, or characters we think are funny or interesting. Recording is mostly handled by Scott, because he likes that sort of thing but Liam is starting to do help with some of that.

Paul: With all the safety shut downs, many are understandably longing for the golden age of concerts! What have been your favorite places to perform and why?

Scott & Kirsten: The Wrockstock events were hands down the best wizard rock experiences ever. Those weekends were all about the music and the shows and brought creators and fans together like nothing else could.

Paul: What has been your strangest (or unexpected, etc.) experience in the wizard rock scene?

Scott & Kirsten: The friendships we’ve made have been incredible. But probably the most surreal experience was chilling in the Green Room at Leakycon London with a bunch of the movie actors and Hank Green and a bunch of super famous people. We wish we’d had the guts to chat with them more than we did. Also meeting Lev Grossman at Dragon*Con and him knowing who we were was pretty wicked. And we gave some of our CDs to “Weird Al” Yankovic at an autographing a few years ago. He said he’d share them with his daughter who is the hardcore HP fan. Who knows? 🙂

Paul: What do your foresee the future holding in store for your band?

Scott & Kirsten: We’ve really found a home in the Filk community. They would love to adopt any and all wizard rockers and we keep suggesting that wrockers reach out to filk cons and other cons around them for opportunities to perform. We’ve definitely branched out from only doing HP-related material and try to distance ourselves from JKR as she keeps digging her heels in so deep over her personal problems with transgender identity.  But we still play the occasional HP festival, or HP-themed event.  And just like medieval and Celtic music will always be a part of what we do musically, so too will wizard rock. Harry Potter is not going away anytime soon.

Paul: And for fun—You are at Hogwarts and some casts the bat-bogey hex. Quick! What is your go-to silly hex or jinx?

Scott & Kirsten: Flippendo!  🙂

If you want to know more about The Blibbering Humdingers, check out their website here. You can also buy their music from Bandcamp, as well as a whole bevy of other online outlets. Feel free to follow them on social media, too, or drop them a line to tell them how funny Free Awkward Hugs is.