Man of Errors: May 2008

I learn about Groupthink

Irving Janis ... wondered why intelligent groups of people sometimes made decisions that led to disastrous results.
Hey, I know, let's invade Russia (JY).
Janis was puzzled by the inability of very intelligent people to make sound decisions. His answer was a condition he termed Groupthink.
Always be wary of groups of people who think they are highly intelligent (JY)
Members' strivings for unanimity override[s] their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action
I think this is suggesting you should never be afraid to say "you're a dickhead" to your boss or anyone who sounds like an idiot (JY)
Groupthink refers to a deterioration of mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment that results from in-group pressures.
My major in-group pressure is finding meetings f**king boring and wanting to have a drink instead.

http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/4110/think.htm

My struggle to read Mein Kampf

Curiously the banner advertisement above the Project Gutenberg edition of Mein Kampf is: Learn Biblical Hebrew On-Line.

I am doing this post for two reasons:

Richard is expecting Sontag

Wine Guy put something about Mein Kampf in a comment that really surprised me

"The book made a tremendous impression on me. I became a confirmed National Socialist after reading the first page. I felt a man who could write such a book would undoubtedly lead Germany. I felt very happy that such a man had come." - Leni Riefenstahl

What surprised me was the idea that anyone could read any part of this book and think it was good.

Whenever I teach about the Nazi's at school there are usually one or two students that want to read Mein Kampf. I think this is normal. I think the best way to cure anyone of the notion that Hitler was cool is to actually give them a copy of Mein Kampf, so I do. Actually, I just give them a photocopy of a chapter. Reading a chapter is enough. No one with a healthy mind wants to read anymore.

I have always prefered Hitler's original title for the book: Four and a Half Years of Fighting Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice. The best thing about this title (aside from length) is that I can imagine Don Brash releasing his memoirs with the same title today (or Roger Douglas, or any other "misunderstood" politician. We should keep in mind that being "misunderstood" in a democracy really means that people don't like you very much).

Sontag vs Riefenstahl

This is a picture of Susan Sontag, not Leni Riefenstahl. Sontag died in 2004. I like to make quick, superficial judgements about people and my quick, superficial judgement about Susan is that she was really cool:

"Mozart, Pascal, Boolean algebra, Shakespeare, parliamentary government, baroque churches, Newton, the emancipation of women, Kant, Balanchine ballets, et al. don't redeem what this particular civilization has wrought upon the world. The white race is the cancer of human history." Sontag later offered an ironic apology for the remark, saying it was insensitive to cancer victims.

Nice.

In 2001 she had this to say about 9/11:

"Where is the acknowledgment that this was not a 'cowardly' attack on 'civilization' or 'liberty' or 'humanity' or 'the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions? How many citizens are aware of the ongoing American bombing of Iraq? And if the word 'cowardly' is to be used, it might be more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond the range of retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves in order to kill others. In the matter of courage (a morally neutral virtue): Whatever may be said of the perpetrators of Tuesday's slaughter, they were not cowards."

Smart, annoying people like this are needed in droves.

Susan had something to say about Leni.

Leni

I rather like Leni Riefenstahl.

There's a documentary about her life called The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl. It's very good.

I feel that she embraced her opportunities and was excited by the rise of the Nazis without being too bothered by what they really stood for, or caring very much about what they were really doing. She used her creativity to make things she admired look beautiful on film. Unfortunately she admired the Nazis and made them look beautiful and powerful on film. In hindsight she probably wished she hadn't.

When she talks about Triumph of the Will in the documentary the only time she is really animated is when she is in the editing room explaining how the movie was made, showing her clever editing, and the techniques she used to make something quite dull (loads of people standing around) look good.

Still, it's a difficult ethical point, and you can never entirely let her off. Leni was clearly a person interested in documenting power and the body, in that she is not alone as an artist, but somehow it doesn't quite feel comfortable when the artist makes murderous ideas look good.

The Aesthetics of Power

So the Nazis had a thing about the Greeks and in particular the Spartans. They also had a thing about making power look sexy, and keeping the message simple. You can see where I'm going with all of this, but I feel like taking my time.

And yet, it doesn't seem a coincidence that the modern Olympic movement was reborn at the time when European empires were entering the final stages of their international land grab, that tipping point when the land runs out and the greedy begin to stockpile their weapons.

Olympic Ideals

The Olympic torch relay was reinstated by the Nazis for the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Since then it has been a proud Olympic tradition.

At the closing ceremony of the 1936 Olympics Baron Pierre de Coubertin (founder of the modern Olympics) said:

“Keep the holy flame alight… The memories of courage will remain unextinguished, since courage was necessary to face the difficulties that the Fuhrer had countered with the slogan Wir Wollen Baueun (We want to build)… Let the German people and its leader be blessed, for the things that were just realised.”

Another person with something to say was the poor old Fuhrer:

"The sportive, knightly battle awakens the best human characteristics. It doesn't separate, but unites the combatants in understanding and respect. It also helps to connect the countries in the spirit of peace. That's why the Olympic Flame should never die."

Jolly good.

The fascism thing

I'm one of those people who think that most things are really shades of grey, but I'm happy to call Nazi Germany pure evil and I don't expect many people to disagree with me. Americans, for example, would quite rightly pride themselves for the part they played in bringing the Nazi regime to an end in 1945. And yet...

I have always loved Classics, and whenever I have a gap in my Social Studies classes I slot in a bit of film and history concerning the ancient Greeks and the Romans. We watch Hollywood's latest version of Troy and Alexander the Great. The students love it. The movie they loved most last year was 300.

300 is a movie that promotes fascism.

Fascinating Fascism

I think one of the jobs of a history teacher is to make the "young" aware of the patterns of human behaviour. Obviously this covers a lot of different things, but at the moment we are looking at how, even in a country with an excellent education system and free elections, people who are embodiments of evil can be put in charge.

I'm one of those people who think that most acts in History are really shades of moral grey, but I'm happy to call Nazi Germany pure evil and I don't expect many people to disagree with me. Americans, for example, would quite rightly pride themselves for the part they played in bringing the Nazi regime to an end in 1945. And yet...

I have always loved Classics, and whenever I have a gap in my Social Studies classes I slot in a bit of film and history concerning the ancient Greeks and the Romans. We watch Hollywood's latest version of Troy and Alexander. The students love it. The movie they loved most last year was 300.

300 is a movie that promotes fascism. It is an uncomfortable fact, but the ideals that the Nazis promoted in the 1930s and 40s are still attractive. Especially to the young.

The Olympic torch relay was reinstated by the Nazis for the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Since then it has been a proud Olympic tradition.

At the closing ceremony of the 1936 Olympics Baron Pierre de Coubertin (founder of the modern Olympics) said:

“Keep the holy flame alight… The memories of courage will remain unextinguished, since courage was necessary to face the difficulties that the Fuhrer had countered with the slogan Wir Wollen Baueun (We want to build)… Let the German people and its leader be blessed, for the things that were just realised.”

Another person with something to say was the poor old Fuhrer:

"The sportive, knightly battle awakens the best human characteristics. It doesn't separate, but unites the combatants in understanding and respect. It also helps to connect the countries in the spirit of peace. That's why the Olympic Flame should never die."

So the Nazis had a thing about the Greeks and in particular the Spartans. They also had a thing about making power look sexy, and keeping the message simple.

Riefenstahl. Olympia. It's a film full of beautiful bodies. You notice only incidentally that it is filmed at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. The values that Riefenstahl puts in this film are values that most cultures share. Love of one's country, striving for the physical limit, glory.

And yet, it doesn't seem a coincidence that the modern Olympic movement was reborn at the time when European empires were entering the final stages of their international land grab, that tipping point when the land runs out and the greedy begin to stockpile their weapons.

I rather like Leni Riefenstahl.

There's a documentary about her life called The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl. It's very good.

I feel that she embraced her opportunities and was excited by the rise of the Nazis without being too bothered by what they really stood for, or caring very much about what they were really doing. She used her creativity to make things she admired look beautiful on film. Unfortunately she admired the Nazis and made them look beautiful and powerful on film. In hindsight she probably wished she hadn't.

When she talks about Triumph of the Will in the documentary the only time she is really animated is when she is in the editing room explaining how the movie was made, showing her clever editing, and the techniques she used to make something quite dull (loads of people standing around) look good.

Still, she did seem to be into the Nazi thing a least a little.

"[Mein Kampf] made a tremendous impression on me. I became a confirmed National Socialist after reading the first page. I felt a man who could write such a book would undoubtedly lead Germany. I felt very happy that such a man had come." - Leni Riefenstahl

What really surprises me when I read this is the idea that anyone could read any part of this book and think it was good.

Whenever I teach about the Nazi's at school there are usually one or two students that want to read Mein Kampf. I think this is normal. I think the best way to cure anyone of the notion that Hitler was cool is to actually give them a copy of Mein Kampf, so I do. Actually, I just give them a photocopy of a chapter. Reading a chapter is enough. No one with a healthy mind wants to read anymore.

I have always preferred Hitler's original title for the book: Four and a Half Years of Fighting Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice. The best thing about this title (aside from length) is that I can imagine Don Brash releasing his memoirs with the same title today (or Roger Douglas, or any other "misunderstood" politician. We should keep in mind that being "misunderstood" in a democracy really means that people don't like you very much).

Leni's decisions remain a difficult ethical point, and you can never entirely let her off. Leni was clearly a person interested in documenting power and the body, in that she is not alone as an artist, but somehow it doesn't quite feel comfortable when the artist makes murderous ideas look good.

A smart lady who had Leni on was Susan Sontag.

Sontag died in 2004. I like to make quick, superficial judgements about people and my quick, superficial judgement about Susan is that she was really cool:

"Mozart, Pascal, Boolean algebra, Shakespeare, parliamentary government, baroque churches, Newton, the emancipation of women, Kant, Balanchine ballets, et al. don't redeem what this particular civilization has wrought upon the world. The white race is the cancer of human history." Sontag later offered an ironic apology for the remark, saying it was insensitive to cancer victims.

Nice.

In 2001 she had this to say about 9/11:

"Where is the acknowledgment that this was not a 'cowardly' attack on 'civilization' or 'liberty' or 'humanity' or 'the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions? How many citizens are aware of the ongoing American bombing of Iraq? And if the word 'cowardly' is to be used, it might be more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond the range of retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves in order to kill others. In the matter of courage (a morally neutral virtue): Whatever may be said of the perpetrators of Tuesday's slaughter, they were not cowards."

Smart, provoking people like this are needed in droves.

The earliest experience of art must have been that it was incantatory, magical; art was an instrument of ritual. The earliest theory of art, that of the Greek philosophers, proposed that art was mimesis, imitation of reality.

It is at this point that the peculiar question of the value of art arose. For the mimetic theory, by its very terms, challenges art to justify itself.
- Susan

Was Leni Riefenstahl just copying something human that we don't care to praise? Or is praise of this kind of art actually immoral?

Three things. Firstly, if you google image Sexy Nazi (don't ask), you end up with pictures of Asian women in Nazi uniforms. Secondly, while I was in Japan a restaurant in Korea had to close because it had chosen to go with a Nazi theme for its decor. Thirdly, I went to a restaurant in Osaka a couple of times called Christon (Christ-on).

I'm neither of the people in this photo.

This photo is of two weird men at a restuarant in Osaka called Christon. The man on the right is a waiter. They are not in a church, they are in a restaurant.

I went to this restaurant a few times, once with a friend (M) who enjoyed himself immensely. We ordered a kind of peach champagne that the menu promised would leave a "fizzy reverberation in our behinds", but failed to deliver.

The people who run this chain (they also do Buddha), bought all their authentic Catholic iconography in Spain and shipped it to Japan to be used as decor in restaurants. That's right, it's not even fake, all those Virgin Mary's were once in churches, were once objects of prayer.

It is all peculiarly offensive and laughable at the same time.

Detaching the sacred and associating it with the profane is jarring. Curiously associating evil with the profane is also jarring.

As another blog puts it:

Yet for much of the world, Hitler and the Nazis are no more than an obscure historical reference--a vague association with Germany. So, in far-flung places like Mumbai or South Korea, when you think of beer, you think of Germany, and when you think of Germany, you naturally think of Hitler.

True.

Which leads me back to 300 and my students who also regard the Nazis "as no more than an obscure historical reference".

[The] film... celebrates the rebirth of the body and of community, mediated through the worship of an irresistable leader.

Through Leonidas the 300 become a community, infact the movie title celebrates this.

The... film is an epic of achieved community, in which everyday reality is transcended through ecstatic self-control and submission.

If the warriors follow Leonidas and his beliefs unquestioningly they will achieve greatness.

[This] portrait evokes some of the larger themes of Nazi ideology: the contrast between the clean and the impure, the incorruptible and the defiled, the physical and the mental, the joyful and the critical.

The Persians are consistently portrayed as effeminate, deviant, deformed and untrustworthy in the movie.

[The film] celebrates a society where the exhibition of physical skill and courage and the victory of the stronger man over the weaker are... the unifying symbols of communal courage.
The Spartans are cool because they kill everyone and they are a tight knit group.

All quotes from Sontag on Leni Riefenstahl's book of photography about the Nuba, and they are all quotes that I would apply to the movie 300.

[The] fascist aesthetic... flows from a preoccupation with situations of control, submissive behaviour, extravagant effort , and the endurance of pain.

Sounds like a bunch of Spartans with a death wish to me.

Fascist art displays a utopian aesthetics - that of physical perfection.

Oh, the poor old hunchback. Even though he is devoted to the Nazi regime he must be rejected because he is handicapped and will spoil the perfect functioning of the Aryan machine. Let's not even go into the opening scenes where imperfect babies are tossed off cliffs.

Fascism also stands for ideals that are persistent today under other banners; the ideal of life as art, the cult of beauty, the fetishism of courage, the dissolution of alieanation in ecstatic feelings of community; the repudiation of intellect, the family of man. These ideals are vivid and moving to many people.

I have absolutely no hesitation in calling 300 a movie that promotes fascism. This is probably unsurprising; what was surprising for me was that my students all admired the Spartans in 300, and that many of the ideals that the movie expresses are vey close to ideals that we are taught to admire in our own culture.

This leads me to conclude that badges saying NEVER AGAIN are pie in sky fantasy; that fascism will always be with us, and it remains the duty of teachers to combat it's superfical appeal.

Eleanor

Eleanor woke a couple of times in the night. It was nice to go in and have hugs and comfort her.

We had to get up quite early and go down to the hospital. Eleanor was happy enough. We read some books in the waiting room while the receptionist bantered with a doctor at the front desk. The story I read her was about finding a teddy bear in a tree.

Eleanor was processed efficiently. She put on a little blue gown and had a name tag strapped around her ankle. She wanted to play with the little boy in the next booth. She handed him a plastic cup. He held it for awhile and then passed it back.

Cathy went with Eleanor into the operating room. They gave Eleanor gas. Eleanor became heavier in Cathy's arms as she went away from us, as she vanished. Her mouth went slack. The doctor asked Cathy to leave.

When we went back to see Eleanor she was struggling in the arms of a nurse. She didn't know where she was or what she wanted to do. It was good to feel her fighting in my arms and hear her screaming, it sounded like: "I'm alive! I'm alive!"

After half and hour Eleanor was happy. She drank a bottle of milk and ate some toast. The doctor made reassuring noises and then we left.

Time and fate has its hands on us, and nothing can stop them from their work. All there really is to stop the fear is love.

Dear one, we love you.

A Commentary on the Interview

Terry: A very interesting song to write about. Something Japanese, something to write about, something you’re writing about.

[F**kin' a, and they say good rock journalism is dead - JY]

Terry: Choice one. Well take it away, mate.

[I refer to my previous comment - JY]

Terry: So out of that genre you sort of like Joni Mitchell and African funk and all that?

[What genre is that again? - JY]

Terry: An interesting song to write about to, someone who’s been a housewife for twenty years and waiting for someone.

Man of Errors: And then he doesn’t want to be there. Oh well, that’s life I guess.
Terry: Yeah, and pretty hard case to about it.

[Twenty years of quiet desperation... that's life I guess - JY]

Man of Errors: Still, it’s expensive to do all these things.
Terry: That’s true, it's very expensive, but still, it’s good.

[What's good? Things being very expensive? - JY]

Man of Errors: Underneath it all is sex and death.

Terry: Well there’s nothing wrong with that.

[Except the death bit - JY]

Terry: Christmas in Japan, another interesting title, what's that all about?

[If only I had said: "What the fu*k do you think it's about, Terry?" - JY]

Kurt Cobain once wrote a song called

I hate myself and I want to die.

I wonder what his wife thought.

Of course this is the same guy who wrote: "it's better to burn out than it is to fade away" in his suicide note.

I wonder what Neil Young thought.

As I listen to my one and only radio interview for the twenty-second time I think of that scene in Fawlty Towers: a married couple are in the dining room complaining to each other about the food. The wife says to the husband - "Why don't you say something?" Basil cruises past and says "How are your meals?" and the husband says cringingly - "Oh, fine, fine."

I thought I'd be a rockstar by now

I've been playing music since I was about fifteen or sixteen. When I was that age I thought that if you really were into rock music, and bothered to learn the guitar and were full of "feelings" and desperation and need then you would one day be discovered and become a rock star.

I was wrong. Wrong about the level of my talent and wrong about the world.

Most of me is reconciled to playing for my own enjoyment, but there will always be a part of me that hates myself for being so lame.

Wasn't your name supposed to be legend? Weren't you supposed to be dead by 32?

That's the kind of stuff you think when your 21.

Eleanor

Eleanor is sick. She wheezes in and out like an old accordian. Her ear is inflamed. Her nose streams. She has a hacking, chesty cough.

It's very sad, but she is chipper.

Eleanor will have an operation on Wednesday to put something in her ears to stop all the infections. When the doctor talked about putting her under and cutting her inner ear it was quite upsetting.

P.S. Thanks for the kind words about the interview.

A Jet Plane to Super Stardom

On Saturday at 2.30pm I will be featured (yes, that's right, featured) on Access Radio, 783AM. This will put me 29 minutes and 45 seconds in deficit with my 15 seconds of fame.

You can go to the Access Radio website and listen to previous interviews on Terry's Songwriter Show.

I wasn't used to be taken seriously. It's hard to take me seriously. My students don't.

Post-script: To find the interview go to the Access Radio website (accessradio.org.nz) and click on Music. Scroll down until you get to Terry's Songwriter Show and then click on the speaker icon next to my miss-hyphenated name.

It's not one of the great interviews, nor one of the great live performances, but it's likely to be the only time I'm on radio.

A Winter Night

The storm puts its mouth to the house

and blows to produce a note.

I sleep uneasily, turn, with shut eyes

read the storm's text.

But the child's eyes are large in the dark

and for the child the storm howls.

Both are fond of lamps that swing.

Both are halfway toward speech.

The storm has childish hands and wings.

The Caravan bolts toward Lapland.

And the house feels its own constellation of nails

holding the walls together.

The night is calm over our floor

(where all expired footsteps

rest like sunk leaves in a pond)

but outside the night is wild.

Over the world goes a graver storm.

It sets its mouth to our soul

and blows to produce a note. We dread

the storm will blow us empty.

- Tomas Transtromer

Top Five Worst Lyrics From the 80s - Part Five

You need love, I need love, here it comes , the taste of my love.

I'm gonna love you like nobody ever loved you

climb on my rocket and we'll fly.

- Emerson, Lake and Palmer

You'd be a fool to stop this tide

Spread your wings and let me come inside

Tonight's the night

Don't say a word my virgin child

Just let your inhibitions run wild

The secret is about to unfold

Upstairs before the night's too old

- Rod Stewart

And they say romance is dead.

Top Five Worst Lyrics From the 80s - Part Four

It is important to know, if you don't, that this "rapper" is about as hardcore as a music teacher at Wainuiomata. Take time and "savour", the lyrical "flavours" of Mr. Ice.

Something grabs a hold of me tightly
Then I flow like a harpoon daily and nightly
To the extreme I rock a mic like a vandal
Light up a stage and wax a chump like a candle.

[Flow like a harpoon? Wax a chump like a candle? - JY]

Dance, bum rush the speaker that booms
I'm killing your brain like a poisonous mushroom

[Poisonous mushroom? - JY]

Quick to the point, to the point no faking
I'm cooking mcs like a pound of bacon

[Geez - JY]

Take heed, cause I'm a lyrical poet
Miamis on the scene just in case you didn't know it

Cause my styles like a chemical spill
Feasible rhymes that you can vision and feel

[His style is like a chemical spill, hey, he said it. Rhymes you can vision and feel? Such as: cooking like a pound of bacon - JY]

Keep my composure when its time to get loose
Magnetized by the mic while I kick my juice

[Don't kick your juice, man. Your mother will me MAD - JY]

Man -- let's get out of here! word to your mother!

[About the juice? What? - JY]

Purple Rain: The rest of the album

I'm finishing with Prince because:

a. Richard doesn't have a friggin clue what's going on, and

b. All these photos of Prince are beginning to make me feel ill (sort or like looking at pornography with poodles in it... I guess).

When Doves Cry. Here are the three things people write about this song on the internet. They say that:

1. The song has no bass
2. The song doesn’t need to be reviewed because it’s so famous

3. The song is supposed to be semi-autobiographical

I think "semi" is well used here. Infact, perhaps we could replace it with the word imaginary.

I Would Die 4 U. “I’m your Messiah”… “and I would die 4 U”. He’s not a woman, he’s not a man, he’s a dove… so we would have to conclude that he is in fact Jesus. Surprised? It’s a song with a tense feeling; the drum beat is off kilter, delayed, a hand clap added in the chorus.

Baby I’m a Star. This song reminds me of the movie because it has that freaky back-tracked talking in it that sounds so cool. There is a scene in the movie where he takes his girl (Apollonia) to his bedroom which is also a home studio. They listen to a bit of sampled music featuring what sounds like a woman having sex, but is actually a woman crying, backtracked. Then there’s the sex scene. I remember there is pretty obviously no faking in the crotch rubbing department (how did Prince explain the dramatic necessity of crotch rubbing to his co-star?), and because while the woman is very large Prince is very small. You feel he might get crushed if Apollonia rolls over in bed.

Maybe this is why Prince gets away with the whole sex thing in his act. If he were a strapping six-footer covered in hair and tattoos his come-ons would be threatening, but because he’s a well groomed little waif it comes off as cheeky.

Purple Rain: Darling Nikki

Computer Blue begins with Wendy and Lisa: “Is the water warm enough?” So we assume some kind of bath-sex thing is about to take place, hopefully lesbian in nature, but they could be talking about making a cup of tea (although the tone of the final “Yes Lisa” probably rules that out). “Where is my love life?” Prince sings. Given the intro I would suggest he looks in his bathroom.

Darling Nikki. I was fascinated by the story in this song when I was too young to have any idea what Prince was on about. “Call me up whenever you wanna grind” – sounds lovely, probably it’s not coffee she wants to grind. What kind of “hotels” does Prince stay in anyway? I’ve stayed in plenty and never once seen anyone masturbating with a magazine in the lobby.

This is the song that shocked Tipper Gore when she heard her daughter playing it. Jeez, man, I never let my mother hear this track – what the hell was Tipper’s daughter thinking? Thanks to Tipper we have stupid explicit lyric stickers on CDs now – I bet Tipper’s daughter was really popular at school after that one.

Top Five Worst Lyrics From the 80s - Part Three

Try any of these lines at a night club (please). Or, if you want to spend the night in the shed, try them with your wife. I remember thinking this song had bad lyrics when it was released in 1987 (I was 14). I wasn't wrong.

Hey baby I'd like to talk to you
How about coming back to my room for a little boom boom
You keep coming to me
I can dig your dynamite
Know the way you move
Get in the groove
You're driving me crazy, crazy for you
Second time you moved me
It's time for us to boom boom
You can come right close to me
And feel the burning fire
All the time you got me
It's fine for us to boom boom
Let's go back to my room
So we can do it all night
And you can make me feel right

Boom, boom went to number one in Australia and Japan, and number two in Canada. A later Paul Lekakis single is called Assume the position.

Here's how his bio starts on Wiki: Paul Lekakis (born 1966) is a Greek-American actor, model, playwright and club music / Hi-NRG artist who was discovered for his singing and dancing skills at a nightclub while on assignment as a model in Italy.

Why doesn't this kind of stuff happen to me?

Aside from his performance in the play Two Boys in a Bed on a Cold Winter's Night, he was also in a gay horror film called Hellbent. I wonder if there are enough films like this to constitute a new genre.

Top Five Worst Lyrics From the 80s - Part Two

War, war is stupid

And people are stupid

I heard them banging

On hearts and fingers

People fill the world

With narrow confidence

Like a child at birth

A man with no defense

What's mine is my own

I won't give it to you

No matter what you say

No matter what you do

Now we're fighting

In our hearts

Fighting in the street

Won't somebody help me?

Man is far behind

In the search for something new

Like a philistine

We're burning witches too

This world of fate

Must be designed for you

It matters what you say

It matters what you do

After the bird has flown

He walked ten thousand

Miles back home

You can't do that to me, no

Won't somebody help me?

Maybe it's because people are stupid that war is stupid. After the bird has (had?) flown he walked ten thousand miles? Odd. Why didn't he fly?

Purple Rain: The Beautiful Ones

I skipped Take Me With U. It's supposed to be a duet (like Wham was supposed to be a band) between Prince and Apollonia. In the chorus Prince sounds bored; Apollonia sounds imploring. It's a simple song behind all the effects: finger cymbals and a tambourine make the drum beat interesting.

The Beautiful Ones. Back behind the lazering synthesizer stabs is the piano ballad; the playing more insistent in the verses than in the choruses. The synthesizers are the only thing really creating the Prince flavour, but the song is soon to move off into unexpected directions. We come to the spoken bit - “Paint a perfect picture” - again, I don’t think this song is about much: beautiful people are mean? Prince seems upset. Just how upset we are going to find out. The song begins to come apart. The synthesizer starts to sound a little sea sick, and then comes the really unexpected screaming-on-the-floor ending featuring great deliveries of lines such as: “Baby, baby, baby, listen to me… I may not know where I’m going babe (wo-oh)”.

There’s no way to write the “wo-oh” sound that even suggests its effect.

Purple Rain: Let's Go Crazy

A lyrical interpretation of a Prince masterpiece:

Life is an electric word that means forever, which is a long time, but Prince is here to tell us there’s the afterworld.

The afterworld is a place of never-ending happiness where you can always see the sun, day, and night.

Now bearing this afterworld in mind, next time you call up your shrink-slash-drug-dealer in Beverly Hills, don’t ask him how much time you have left, ask him how much of your mind is left (it’s asking questions like this that keeps shrinks in business).

You should ask this question because life here is much harder than life in the afterworld, because life here is lived on your own.

If you don’t like life, and you get depressed, don’t take drugs, think about the “higher floor”.

Even though Prince said earlier that you were alone, well you actually have friends, for example he called up his old lady for a chat and she started simulating sex (see how comforting that is? Saying “old lady” and “sex” together like that?)

So, hey, don’t get depressed go look for the purple banana until they take you to a mental institution.

Death makes us get over excited, we wonder what the point of life (and this song) is, but we don’t get depressed about it, we get carted off to mental institutions instead.

Kids, just say no to drugs (and daffodils) because He (and Prince) is coming. (Again, see how comforting that is… the idea of Prince and, I suppose, God “coming”. )

I think what we’re really supposed to take from the song is this: let's have a party.

And then there’s the end of the song. The end fits with the beginning. We have had the stately start, been lifted up by the song sermon, and now we get the big finale (as in a black gospel church finale, not a hand-around-the-tea-and-scones white-church finale). When that guitar lifts out of all the synthesized pomposity and scorches alone, slightly breaking up – oh, man! It had more impact for me back in 1984 because playing guitar that fast seemed impossible, like we had entered another realm, like Prince had really leaped beyond the song and gone to, well, the afterworld.

Later on, sitting in various bedrooms around my crummy hometown with heavy metal albums and guys with guitars replaying solos note perfectly, I realised that even though it seems like you want more of that kind of Let’s Go Crazy guitar solo you don’t… less really is more.

Top Five Worst Lyrics From the 80s - Part One

The following posts in this thread will have to have some limits imposed on them. The main rule is that only one crappy lyric is allowed from each "artist". The real reason that I introduce this rule is because otherwise Simon le Bon would have all of the top five places.

My all time favourite worst lyric from le Bon is: "I smell like I sound."

Bad?

However, you can't get in the top five with a single line, it has to be a sustained effort. Choosing almost at random from le Bon's substantial body of work (his ouevre if you will), I would like you to savour the ungrammatical obscurity of Last Chance on the Stairway:

I don't remember quite how I met you, wasn't long ago
Just get a picture of sun, in your eyes,
The waves in your hair
Maybe it's something said in a movie or you could've said last night.
Just took me out on a limb
And I don't really know what I'm doing here.
And sometimes I'm caught in a landslide
My beats so in time, can you look at me
I'm out of reach,
I'll talk if it feels right
I've had my last chance on the stairway.

Funny it's just like a scene out of Voltaire,
Twisting out of sight
Cause when all the curtains are pulled back
We'll turn and see the circles wet raced
Aint no game... (oooh)
When you're playing with fire
It doesn't seem right that we fight
So the party runs on all night
So nervous to say, tell me can't you see
If you want I'll fall out foreverI cant say no more... babe dance with me
And please don't say leave till later
I've had my last chance on the stairway.

Wonder why... (wonder why oooh)
What makes me rise so high
Maybe its something they put in your perfume
Or the look in your eyes
It could be the atmosphere sinking
Oh, I don't even know what you're thinking
Don't even know what you're drinking
But it keep this heaven alive

You and I both know that in our life times Le Bon will be celebrated as a great poet and he will be studied by earnest undergraduates.

Actually, I could run that course.

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