Andy Sturmer - Scooby Songs - Non-Album Tracks (1999-2023)

Here's a strange album, probably one of the strangest I've ever posted on this blog. It mostly consists of songs about the Scooby Doo TV show and movies!

The only reason I care about such songs is due to the person who wrote and sang them: Andy Sturmer. If you're not familiar with his name, he was one of two main co-writers for the power pop group Jellyfish, and he sang most of their songs. In my opinion, he is a pop songwriting genius, and has a great voice. But after Jellyfish broke up in the early 1990s, he decided he didn't want to be in a band and live the rock and roll lifestyle. In all the years since then, he's kept a very, very low profile.

But that's not to say he hasn't still done music. He recorded an album's worth of demos around 1999, but never released him. Luckily, they were leaked to the public and you can find them here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2023/11/andy-sturmer-holding-out-for-something.html

He also got deeply involved with Japanese pop music. He's had a long association with the Japanese duo Puffy AmiYumi, writing many hit songs for them and producing even more. I like a lot of their music, despite the fact that the vast majority of their songs are sung in Japanese, even most of the ones written by Sturmer. (I have to assume he learned to speak Japanese since he has such a deep connection the Japanese music. He even sang a song in Japanese back when he was in Jellyfish.) I may post a Puffy AmiYumi compilation, if there's enough interest and if I get around to it.

Sturmer's relationship with AmiYumi blossomed in the late 1990s and continued into the 2000s. But increasingly after 2000, he found more work applying his ability to write catchy pop songs for commercials, TV shows, and the like. The vast majority of these had him write the songs but other people would sing them. However, by and by, he developed a deeper relationship with the people making new Scooby Doo TV shows and TV movies, especially TV movies. 

Frankly, these sound pretty bad, with titles like "LEGO Scooby Doo! Haunted Hollywood" and "Scooby Doo and WWE: Curse of the Speed Demon." (Keep in mind WWE is the name of a professional wrestler association.) Even so, songs were needed, and Sturmer has such a magic touch that even songs about the Scooby Doo gang sound pretty good to me.

The vast majority of the songs here are from various Scooby Doo related projects. However, the first three songs are from different projects, including a song for a Winnie the Pooh project and one for a Batman one. Also, the fifth song, "Himawari," sounds very different from all the rest. It's sung entirely in Japanese. It comes from a 2007 tribute album to the Japanese band Unicorn, another band that he has connections to, including production work.

On the downside, these songs are often short, and about Scooby Doo related themes. They also sometimes have weird noises over them, because none of these have been officially released on record as far as I know (other than "Himawari"), so sounds from the TV show or movie often overlapped with the music. I tried to clean that up as best I could (that's why four of the songs have "[Edit]" in their titles, because those had more editing done than the others), but I couldn't clean everything.

On the upside, if you like the power pop hooks of Jellyfish, you should like this. It's somewhat different, more commercial and less rocking, for instance. But the songs are nothing if not catchy. Plus, I only selected the ones actually sung (or co-sung) by Sturmer, and he has a great voice. Furthermore, I don't think anyone has ever put together a collection of these songs before, so this should be new to just about everyone.

This album is pretty short, at only 31 minutes. However, Sturmer is still at it. The last two songs are from 2023. So I hope more songs will emerge and I'll be able to add to this album. Better yet, I hope he puts out some original music that doesn't consist of Scooby Doo songs!

01 Fourth of July Parade (Andy Sturmer)
02 The Little Things You Do (Andy Sturmer)
03 Batman, the Brave and the Bold [Instrumental] (Andy Sturmer)
04 When the Circus Comes to Town (Andy Sturmer)
05 Himawari (Andy Sturmer)
06 On the Case (Andy Sturmer)
07 I Don't Know about You (Andy Sturmer)
08 Appetite (Andy Sturmer)
09 Wake Me Up to Say Goodnight [Edit] (Andy Sturmer)
10 Brand New World [Edit] (Andy Sturmer)
11 Hollywood (Andy Sturmer)
12 No Pain, No Gain (Andy Sturmer)
13 Scooby-Doo, Scooby Don't [Edit] (Andy Sturmer)
14 Scoobystition [Edit] (Andy Sturmer)
15 Go Big (Andy Sturmer)
16 Where Only Heroes Go (Andy Sturmer)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16227824/ANDYSTRMR2003-2023_ScobySngs_atse.zip.html

I put the album cover together. I found a photo of Sturmer, but I have no idea where or when it's from. It's probably from his Jellyfish days, because he hasn't been photographed much (or at all) since then. I scattered some Scooby Doo characters around him, in keeping with the music content.

Andy Sturmer - Holding Out for Something Better (1999)

I recently posted two stray tracks albums from the early 1990s band Jellyfish. They're great. Andy Sturmer was the main singer for Jellyfish, as well as one of the two main songwriters. Since Jellyfish broke up in 1994, he's kept an extremely low profile. He hasn't joined any other bands since then, and he's never released a solo album, or even a solo single. But... there's this. If you're a Jellyfish fan, you definitely need to hear this. It's the closest thing to another Jellyfish album after the band broke up.

So what is this, exactly? That's complicated. Let me explain. I found these recordings from an Internet page that has ceased to exist. I went looking around for more information, and came up with very little. So what I'm writing now is based on what I remember from when I found this material years ago, plus, what little I could find out in a recent search.

Andy Sturmer was a great singer-songwriter in Jellyfish, as well as being the band's drummer, but apparently he's an introverted person who didn't like being a star. So, while he continued a music career, he chose a behind the scenes role. Apparently, in the years since Jellyfish broke up, he's had a successful career writing catchy songs for other bands (especially the Japanese duo Puffy AmiYumi) and TV shows and movies. I plan on posting another album just of his TV show and movie songs after 2000, when that aspect of his career started to take off.

But he hadn't had much success with that at the time of these recordings, which I think is around 1999 (though I could be off by a year or two). The last two songs were done for "Gregory and Me" a children's TV show that came out in 1996. But the others are demos for a solo album he was working on. He's kept such a low profile that he almost never gives interviews. But in 2002, a Jellyfish archival release mentioned he was working on a solo album that was due to be released soon. It's over twenty years later, and there's still no sign of it. 

I could be wrong, but I think what happened was he sent out a tape of these demos around 1999 to people in the TV and movie industries to show his continued ability to write excellent songs years after Jellyfish broke up. Somehow, the recording got to the wider public, although these are still very obscure. I hope by posting this album here, they'll get more attention, because this is very good stuff. There are two obvious covers: "We Are the Champions" by Queen, and "Turn, Turn, Turn (To Everything There Is a Season)," made famous by the Byrds. Other than that, I believe all the songs are originals, and this shows he still had the same songwriting talent he had in Jellyfish (not to mention the same singing talent).

As far as I know, everything here is still technically officially unreleased in the sense that it's never been for sale. However, it all sounds as good as you'd expect a studio album to sound. One song, "Liquid Casanova," was performed with the band Sugarbomb, which put out a few albums in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but I believe that song remains unreleased as well. 

There's never been any name to this album. I picked the title "Holding Out for Something Better" after the first song here. I thought that was fitting with the fact that he's never released his solo album after so many years. Also, the song order is basically the same as the order I got them. But I don't know if that was random or if it was done intentionally by Sturmer or anyone else.

Again, if you like Jellyfish, you need to hear this. It's in a very similar style, with very similar quality.

This album is 37 minutes long.

01 Holding Out for Something Better (Andy Sturmer)
02 The Angel Made Me Do It (Andy Sturmer)
03 Widowers Song (Andy Sturmer)
04 Turn, Turn, Turn [To Everything There Is a Season] (Andy Sturmer)
05 I Built Me a Bridge (Andy Sturmer)
06 Sweet Wingless Angel (Andy Sturmer)
07 Love So Pure (Andy Sturmer)
08 We Are the Champions (Andy Sturmer)
09 The Beginning of the End (Andy Sturmer)
10 Liquid Casanova (Andy Sturmer & Sugarbomb)
11 Commercial Spot (Andy Sturmer)
12 Gregory and Me (Andy Sturmer)
13 Underneath the Sea (Andy Sturmer)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/hvnfkYnP

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/user/files/ZwtJxspUTBs6M6N/file

Because Sturmer has kept such a low profile after Jellyfish, I couldn't find any photos of him that are definitely from after his Jellyfish years. This one is probably from his Jellyfish time. But I picked a dark and moody photo out of many more options because it seemed fitting to his reclusive behavior.

In February 2025, the cover image was upgraded with the help of the Krea AI program.