Friend Like Me

Williams's Genie introduction is less a song than a controlled demolition of musical form itself, a vaudevillian hurricane through which jazz, big band, and theatrical tradition collapse under one performer's volcanic, unpauseable energy. The Menken arrangement is deliberately retro — swinging brass, call-and-response structure, showbiz bombast — but it exists primarily as scaffolding for Williams's stream-of-consciousness vocal performance, which includes at least a dozen distinct characters, accents, and registers within three minutes. The structural conceit is salesmanship — the Genie marketing himself — but the wit beneath the patter is sharp enough to land on pure audio without visual assistance. References cascade at a rate designed to produce delight from overload rather than comprehension; you catch half and feel generously entertained. As a pure listening experience, it is an aerobic event, the brain obligated to sprint rather than stroll. Best heard in a car, where you can conduct the dashboard without social consequence.