Rock & Roll and Language (was: 70s crap)

[Sherwood, Harrison]

>From: 	Gary L. Thompson

>Don't know about Romance languages, but in the '80s there was some 
>rompin, stompin rock in Polish (with many group names adapted English 
>words, e.g., Perfekt, Ladypank). That was one of the few outlets for 
>transparently coded resentment against the Colonels after the "state of 
>war" in Dec. 1981 (remember Reagan's call to light a candle in the 
>window?).

Yeah, amid all the self-congratulatory yadda-yadda one reads about r-n-r
and revolutionary attitudes and overturning the Old Order, it's easy to
forget that there _are_ places in the world where the simple act of
picking up an electric guitar and quiffing your hair is considered
genuinely, dangerously subversive and worthy of serious retribution, and
not just a product of a desire to _epater_ whatever _bourgeoises_ you
haven't done lately.

One thinks of the Plastic People in Checkoslovakia, or Los Jaivas in
Chile, and no doubt many others whom we've never heard of, who
_actually_ suffered for their art--people for whom bad hours, bad food,
bad beer and bad backstage blowjobs sound like a little bit of heaven,
when compared to a billy-club over the ear and a month in the cooler for
covering the Bachman-Turner Overdrive.
>
>Last trip to Europe ('93) I rented a car and drove a bit in Finland, and 
>caught an _extremely_ funny (to American ears) set of Rick Nelson songs done
>in 
>Finnish. You haven't lived until you've heard "Travelin' Man" or "Goodbye 
>Mary Lou, Hello Heart" in Finnish . . . 

In two totally separate cultures I lived in during the
Seventies--Finland and Chile--I came across the practice of mouthing
total gibberish into the mike, in lieu of lyrics. But you don't just
mouth _any_ random crap--it's gotta be _American_-sounding random crap,
with the cracker accent and the Elvis lip-curl:

     Gwanna-pitch-a leemoramma
     Fwanna-beetcho-rang
     Gonna gitcha-gatcha magoratcha
     Lamma-ramma-blang!

     Let's rock!

Harrison "All rights reserved" Sherwood

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