Wow...it's early. I need to be in bed. But oh well. I also needed (wanted) to get this done!
Even though it's advent, I still don't want to get into the cheesy Christmas spirit just yet. Instead, I wanted to do something VERY METAL.
As well as from the UK, just like Viv here. First, I have to state - I FUCKEN' LOVE THIS BAND. I have seen them twice (long, long ago) and they blew me away. They always had a great way of taking literature (Samuel Taylor Colleridge, Frank Herbert, Alfred Lord Tennyson), history (Battle of Balaclava, Battle of Britain) and Egyptian Mythology (Horus / Osiris) and turning out beautiful, overpowering, epic head-banging tunes.
And then there was the time they took on Greek mythology. They came out with a freakin' awesome song, but took a great amount of liberty with the story - as they are entitled to do. So really, I guess I don't have any complaints about this song. It's not really that cheesy. I just wanted to put some Iron Maiden on my mix.
And it's a teenage sadness everyone has got to taste... An in between age madness that you know you can't erase...
I think those two lines (and one tag line to follow) really create the anxious, hormonally charged and dirty feel to this upbeat, power-pop anthem - an homage to high school lust and "the kill" - because to hear this song is to understand there is no "thrill of the chase". In fact, those lines and several others made critics dub the song (which is amazingly tame by today's standards) "misogynistic". I have to admit - when this song came out in 1979, I was a touch too young (well, actually, a touch to innocent) to really get it. "They don't what? But I do what?" Until one of my dirtier-minded friends told me. Yeah, I get it! She DOES it. Heh heh, cool. Hey Butthead, I think I got a boner.
I promised I'd break with the "70's Hard/Glam Rock" theme this week, and I have delivered. This band gave us a lot...most notably, a number one single that I'm still sick of (and is for some reason also on my iPod), and oh yeah...skinny ties. Holy shit, skinny ties. Did you wear one in the 80's? It was because of these dudes...
What the!?!? They tucked their ties into their underwear creating a sort of uber-treasure trail? Maybe you don't recognize them like this...you may recognize them on stage, though:
Okay, I gave it away with the picture. The band is The Knack. The song - Good Girls Don't. A song so cheesy it defies description. Still, I am somewhat blinded by my inexplicable love for this song, so I had to confirm it's cheesiness with my wife. She looked at me funny. "Is a bear catholic? Does the Pope shit in the woods?" Yeah, it is cheesy. But it's also awesome.
Lyrics...and ooh look! The video even! (WARNING! You may shake your head and reflexively blurt "What the f*** were we thinking back then?")
And holy bad haircuts, Batman - they're still touring! That evil Billboard #1 Hit about one of their young groupies (that was 30 YEARS AGO) carried them a long, long way! Okay, I'll admit that I do like several of their songs, and they do have some good ones. However - we live on a historic landmark that gets LOTS of outdoor wedding receptions in the summer, and I hear that "evil hit" at EVERY FRACKING ONE! ---------------------- UPDATE: I forgot to mention, notice the disparity between the "safe for radio" lyrics in the video and the actual lyrics scrolling...
Okay, so last week I did some cheesy 70's rock. Well, I did some this week, too. Picking cheesy 70's rock songs is like shooting fish in a barrel. I'll branch out.
This week, a song that I forgot was there.
Throughout rock history, so many songs have followed the format "Boy meets girl, boy falls in love with girl, boy loses girl (sometimes to a car crash, sometimes he kills her, sometimes she leaves him) boy laments." Today's song follows the format:
1. Boy is bored on Saturday night 2. Boy drinks and takes drugs 3. Boy wants to go to midnight show 4. Boy drives under the influence 5. Boy goes too fast and can't avoid crashing 6. Boy dies, but can't figure out why
We all have them ... songs that are just so damned cheesy we enjoy the heck out of them. Some of them are meant to be humorous and cheesy, but I much prefer the ones that aren't. Those songs conceived with the intent of assaulting the charts - and maybe they did - but they are just so bad you have no idea how they became hits. And you love them.
Sometimes there are bands like that - where a significant portion of their body of work meets the standard. Such is the case with Sweet, a UK "glam rock" band that has endured many years since forming in the early 70's.
Their best known songs in the U.S. - "Fox on the Run" and "Ballroom Blitz" - are cheesy indeed and definitely have a place on my iPod, but their best is the wonderful 1974 tune, "Little Willy".
Why? Because I just a love "Star-shine shimmy shuffle smile". My wife thinks it's because I'm really trying to believe that "size doesn't matter".
I give you, (The) Sweet, with "Little Willy".
And in case you really need to know what they're singing...
