The Last Bass Outpost
Main Forums => The Outpost Cafe => Topic started by: Chaser001 on January 14, 2011, 09:50:55 AM
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http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2011/01/12/16865021.html
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What have we come to? :-\
Knopfler doesn't like to play the song anymore (unlike other Dire Straits oldies) and I always thought the muisc as ham-fisted as the lyrics (with the riff owing a generous nod to DP's Woman from Tokyo). The song didn't swing and Dire Straits without swing is pretty much a useless exercise for me.
The lyrics I always thought embarrassing for another reason: Obviously, Knopfler overheard a conversation by furniture movers and it stung him because he felt unappreciated for the work he put in his career. But his reaction was arrogant, clumsy and devoid of very little insight of how darn privileged he was with the Dire Straits success. Other people work hard too with less success. In my world, you don't make aloof jokes about furniture movers shaking their heads at your personal wealth. And from someone who was a school teacher I would have perhaps expected a less cynical treatment of the subject. He was certainly no Ray Davies with that lyric. And another popstar multi-millionaire/ex-teacher (Herr Summer) joining in at the end to add to the ridicule pretty much topped it off for me.
That said, Knopfler can be funny "Two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong!":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXJ0E1TYN-E
and can paint a picture with words:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDlvKzJrWws
MFN (ATCFF) was obviously written in 10 minutes and on a bad day.
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We get the edited version on the radio here.
Have for years and years now.
:-\
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That is just plain silly.
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Telegraph Rd., to me, is one of the finest songs ever written.
I must've read the lyrics sheet about a thousand times, and it never ceases to hit a nerve.
Money for Nothing on the other hand...a total waste of his talent.
I agree - adding Sting just punctuated the stupidity of it all.
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It's stupid, but nowhere near as stupid as censoring Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.
The merits of the song have nothing to do with it.
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The Mark Twain thing was a subject in German papers too. Political correctness at its worst.
So with "nigger" gone, is "A-rabs" still allowed?
While we're at it we should get rid of the word "moor" in Othello and "Shylock" in The Merchant of Venice should be called "X, a person of either gender and unknown etnicity and religious beliefs". Pippi Longstocking's dad isn't gonna be "negro king" very much longer either. Porgy and Bess is no "negro opera". Martin Luther King never used the word "negro man" and and there was never a movement of black consciousness in French Africa called "négritude" either.
You may still call me kraut though!
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... sometimes a sour-Kraut...? :o ;)
Can you still give someone a black-look...?
... and heaven help reruns of minstrel shows; Al Johnson will never be seen again...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24sB2hxrU3g
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I've always hated Money For Nothing. Stupid uninspired mumbling vocals of Knopfler.
In fact I dislike all Dire Straits songs :-[
But not as much as my brother maybe...
On my brother's wedding there was a DJ providing the music for the party that was held on a big sail boat in the middle of the IJsselmeer.
My brother and his wife had a list of songs they like and they went through the repertoire with the DJ a few days prior to the wedding.
They had also made a black list. Artists they did not want to hear on their wedding party; Celine Dion, Frans Bauer etc etc. And Dire Straits.
That evening all guest were on deck dancing, drinking, having a good time. The DJ was spinning records, when all of a sudden the intro of Money For Nothing blasted out of the speakers... I have never seen my brother run so fast (with that much alcohol in his system). He flew to the turntable and summoned the DJ to end that song NOW. :mrgreen:
It was a close call. A few more bars of that song and the party would have been dead...
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Telegraph Rd., to me, is one of the finest songs ever written.
I must've read the lyrics sheet about a thousand times, and it never ceases to hit a nerve.
Money for Nothing on the other hand...a total waste of his talent.
I agree - adding Sting just punctuated the stupidity of it all.
Couldn't agree more. Some years ago, a greek music mag had started to pictorialize lyrics of famous rock songs to look like a comic book. They have done "In the name of love" by U2, "riders on the storm" by Doos and some others. But their best work was on "Telegraph road". Oh man, what a song.
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...but now that you mention it?
I believe our version here also edits the line,
"Look at that mama,
she got it stickin' it in the camera.
Man, we could have some ____."
Seems to me that I recall him saying "fun" there at one time.
No?
We also get,
"...funky kicks goin' down in the city"
for Steve Miller's "Jet Airliner" too.
How about The Who's,
"Who the f*** are you?"
That one got by for a long time
but I even hear that one edited out to silence now too.
I've always wondered about my fave-
How long before someone finally catches the classic by Brian Adams
where he states at the fade out ending of "Summer of '69",
"Me and my baby, 69"?
;D
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Herr Adams has confirmed that the Summer of 69 did not take place in 1969 at all and that the number combination alluded to something entirely else.
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How on earth did the BBC ban eight miles high and let walk on the wild side stroll straight through...
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Oh the list we could compile...
From "The Lemon Song" to "Afternoon Delight".
;D
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Obviously, Knopfler overheard a conversation by furniture movers and it stung him because he felt unappreciated for the work he put in his career. But his reaction was arrogant, clumsy and devoid of very little insight of how darn privileged he was with the Dire Straits success.
Judging from Knopfler's hairline even with the first release I doubt that part of the song was autobiographical. Then again, maybe that's why he sounds so pissed off. :mrgreen:
As for the censoring and PC climate we have now where some people can use words that others can't, having grown up hearing the "N" word used liberally on (some) sitcoms, comedy albums, and everyday life, I find the outrage it seems to inspire among some just a bit manufactured (especially when it's OK for some to use the word and not others). I avoid using many words as a matter of principle but I have an issue as soon as someone else decides whether I can or whether my kids should be sllowed to read classic literature that happens to include some of those words.
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Knopfler was no David Lee Roth even as a younger man (he was past thirty when the Dire Straits broke through), but I once read an interview where he said he had overheard remarks of the sort. Don't know if they were his furniture movers though.
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... sometimes a sour-Kraut...? :o ;)
Can you still give someone a black-look...?
... and heaven help reruns of minstrel shows; Al Johnson will never be seen again...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24sB2hxrU3g
Better not here, if known.
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Art should not be censored, be it music, film, or literature. Art can be beautiful or ugly yet always moving. To reshape past works is to edit our history.
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Even Charlie Daniels calls the devil a "Son Of A Gun" on some versions of The Devil Went Down To Georgia.
:rolleyes:
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OK, my .02
The problem isn't art or one's ability to express themselves through art form.
The problem is that some people are just never satisfied, and instead of using their creativity to exceed boundaries, they use their "artistic" rights to push decency far beyond their own creative limitations.
There was an exhibit in NYC (and probably elsewhere) where an artist covered a likeness of the virgin Mary with elephant dung.
People went bonkers, and then both sides of the fence spilled into the streets and it became a huge issue.
Being neither an art fan nor very religious, I just thought it was someone's weak attempt at hanging up shit at the Guggenheim (literally), then watching the havoc their "art" created.
If people didn't take liberties with the freedom of expression, pieces of literature and lyrics wouldn't be censored the way they are.
Just like the premise of "Telegraph Rd." - given the opportunity, people will &%#$ everything up.
Then again, I may be wrong...that happens a lot.
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I find it unreasonable that some people who are "in the club" can use a specific word referring to gender, race or sexual preference but get mad when others who are not in that club use the same word.
If you don't want others to use it, don't use it yourself...and correct others in your "club" when they do.
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Art should not be censored, be it music, film, or literature. Art can be beautiful or ugly yet always moving. To reshape past works is to edit our history.
Thank you for putting it so simply.
Editing "nigger" out of "Huckleberry Finn" is a travesty. That book is a period piece and everything about it was a sign of the times.
Last year one of the new djs at our station asked if it was okay to play a song with "nigger" in it. It's not on the list which the FCC considers obscene or indecent, so I said yes, it was okay to play it. As an example I referenced Sly and the Family Stones' "Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey". It was a period song with social commentary and in my opinion it's okay to play. Same with Dylan's "Hurricane".
Well, the urban djs, none of whom were white, said it was "NEVER acceptable for a white person to play a song with "nigger" in it. In my opinion that is stupid, short sighted and completely ignorant of any history of recorded songs. Songs which repeat the word endlessly and gratuitously (oddly, like many hip hop or rap songs) are pointless and, in my opinion, make the artist sound stupid. I also think that endlessly repeating it, even in that genre of music, sets back the efforts of blacks and whites to heal the wounds of the past. My two cents.
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Possibly one of the funniest movie scenes ever.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcZ9ku_wInw
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OK, my .02
The problem isn't art or one's ability to express themselves through art form.
The problem is that some people are just never satisfied, and instead of using their creativity to exceed boundaries, they use their "artistic" rights to push decency far beyond their own creative limitations.
There was an exhibit in NYC (and probably elsewhere) where an artist covered a likeness of the virgin Mary with elephant dung.
People went bonkers, and then both sides of the fence spilled into the streets and it became a huge issue.
Being neither an art fan nor very religious, I just thought it was someone's weak attempt at hanging up shit at the Guggenheim (literally), then watching the havoc their "art" created.
If people didn't take liberties with the freedom of expression, pieces of literature and lyrics wouldn't be censored the way they are.
Just like the premise of "Telegraph Rd." - given the opportunity, people will &%#$ everything up.
Then again, I may be wrong...that happens a lot.
Well said.
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On another note, "MFN" is essentially harmless - the connotation of "faggot" in that lyric has nothing to do with homosexuality, and most people understand that, IMHO. As Dee Snider once said on Howard Stern's show (paraphrasing)- "No, not THAT kind of fag, the kind like when you were in grammar school"
This coming from a man who basically wore frilly ladies' lingerie onstage in their club days. ;D
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There are still what people call "fag machines" round here...
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There are still what people call "fag machines" round here...
we call 'em PT Cruisers 'round here **
**just kidding - if this offended you, please lighten up
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Lighting up...? :mrgreen:
I had some football "buddies" that went on a trip to Fort Lauderdale one year (back in the early eighties) and went up to a bar counter and asked for some "change for the fag machine..."
Apparently you could have heard a pin drop; he had a hard time explaining that in the UK fags is a slang term for a cigarette...
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yeah, I overheard a guy in Australia ask if he could "bot a fag" back in the '80's.
I kept steered clear of him after sundown until someone explained that he was looking to bum a smoke.
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Lighting up...? :mrgreen:
I had some football "buddies" that went on a trip to Fort Lauderdale one year (back in the early eighties) and went up to a bar counter and asked for some "change for the fag machine..."
Apparently you could have heard a pin drop; he had a hard time explaining that in the UK fags is a slang term for a cigarette...
Strangely enough, if they had been in the Deep South, they might have been understood. I've used the word "fag" to mean "cigarette" myself.
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Watching some of those old All In The Family reruns it's amazing what Archie Bunker got away with.
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we call 'em PT Cruisers 'round here
That got a pretty healthy snort at the Carlston house. :mrgreen:
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Watching some of those old All In The Family reruns it's amazing what Archie Bunker got away with.
True, but that's some funny stuff!!!
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Watching some of those old All In The Family reruns it's amazing what Archie Bunker got away with.
That show, Sanford and Son, and others are what I was referring to. I know that Archie Bunker was supposed to be a buffoon and ignorant, but the fact that they could still use his language and outlook as a foil for jokes kind of invalidates the idea that "certain words" are so heinous and hurtful that only some people should be allowed to use them (because they're only heinous and hurtful coming from a select group of people).
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That show, Sanford and Son, and others are what I was referring to. I know that Archie Bunker was supposed to be a buffoon and ignorant, but the fact that they could still use his language and outlook as a foil for jokes kind of invalidates the idea that "certain words" are so heinous and hurtful that only some people should be allowed to use them (because they're only heinous and hurtful coming from a select group of people).
"...and then there's Maude"