submissions
| Frank Zappa – Bobby Brown Goes Down Lyrics
| 17 years ago
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How do some people figure he "went too far"? You can never go too far if you don't pay attention to the boundaries of acceptibility that were imposed by OTHER people. :p
I see it as basically the tale of a snobby rich kid (the pinacle of any right-wing American dream) getting "subversified" with all this stupid fake-sex shit by a 70s feminist. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – The Man with the Dogs Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I picture a guy who's percieved as a weirdo by these stuffy tightwads, and instead of being anti-social or lashing out at them for it, he decides to embrace it and goes around showing that off, just to make them squirm. "A smile is worth a thousand biting phrases, see how stupid you are." |
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| Dead Kennedys – Forest Fire Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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There was actually a music video filmed for Forest Fire. Jello's wearing a robe that he takes off halfway through to show us his whiteys, and then he proceeds to destroy Peligro's drumset and at the end they decide to fuck the song and all come together in a dance line. What else could you expect? |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Do The Slag Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I found this first on a YouTube video. You know this would've sounded great recorded, if it wasn't for the half-assed production on Bedtime For Democracy. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Chickenshit Conformist Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Oh god, nothing's worse in these current times than acutally LABELLING yourself a punk. But that's just me, because I hate it when people apply these ready-made labels to themselves; it's just there to break everything that makes a person a unique individual. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – MTV - Get Off The Air Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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It's not just MTV either. It's VH1 and magazines like Rolling Stone and NME and even Maximum Rock'n'Roll (yeah, I said it). They're all a corrupted form of music-based media that has been hindering, not helping music. Not that the music industry hasn't been doing a lot of damage onto itself. Basically since the 80s there's been a real bad shift in mainstream music, where the emphasis is now exclusively put on artists pleasing the masses and getting out as many albums as possible and making as much money as possible. I'm not saying that all the artists within this system are corrupted like that, but they've been mislead into allowing corporate executives to give away all their rights to their music like a hooker sells her body. Now you can't go anywhere without seeing someone's music being used to plug some shitty product. And I don't care who it is, they've all set themselves up for this kind of senseless commercialization. Music is a precious thing, not just a marketing tool to be tossed around to help other people make money. The whole thing's so sugar coated and elitist, and its aesthetic has gone done the shitter. Really if you're gonna make music we should just tear it all down and start over. Maybe then we could turn out something better. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Saturday Night Holocaust Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I'd say "Police Truck", "Too Drunk to Fuck", "Saturday Night Holocaust", "Pull My Strings" and "Straight A's" were the top 5 songs on it.
It's funny how this is about a disco, since once the song gets into the fast part the guitar and bass riffs and drum beat are almost catchy enough to dance to. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Rawhide Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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There's some wrong lyrics up there. That one verse is supposed to go like this:
Through rain, wind and weather
Hell-bent for leather
Wishin' my girl was at my side
Unlike Viva Las Vegas on Fresh Fruit, they don't alter any lyrics for this from its original. It's weird but put into a political context to match the themes of the EP, it's a mocking song that does make sense. And it's a fun way to go out on a record. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – We've Got A Bigger Problem Now Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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A lot of punk fans today bashed Reagan and don't even know why he deserves it. But there is a reason. He was an old man whose mind was going fast, who didn't like to actively participate in his own decision-making, who completely ignored the poor thinking that they were all poor by their own choice, who covered up his own gaping blunders with anecdotes that didn't actually happen, and whose administration made some of the most glaring oversights in the history of US politics. The media hailed him as the "Great Communicator". If Bush had the communication skills of Ronald Reagan, his approval ratings would probably be just as high. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Chickenshit Conformist Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I pretty much agree with what some of you guys are saying. I was heavy into AC/DC and Led Zeppelin before I got into punk. And hell, I live in a fairly large house in the south Jersey burbs. Yee-haw.
I didn't really care too much for what I saw as punk; these gel-haired bondage pants and studded belt kids and also the majority of my schools who went insane over what were really just pop bands. But after I saw that a lot of punk bands actually did their own thing, both in music and dress and even attitude, I started getting into the real deal.
Take away all the nice little labels and tell me that you can associate the Dead Kennedys with Bad Brains with Black Flag. Other than being loud and noisy they don't have a whole whole lot in common. See punk was just a label that binds together people that otherwise wouldn't have much to do with each other. It was refreshing to see that in comparison to those cock metal bands that you could pick at random to put on a show together and it wouldn't make any difference because they're all the same. And yet, that's what these people are doing now. It doesn't matter whether they're the poppy mainstream bands or "hardcore" street thug wannabes. They've taken something interesting and furiously creative and made it into this worn out cliche.
And those bands can reject offers from major labels all they fucking want and claim that they're sticking to the true ideology of punk rock. It doesn't change the fact that the cliche look and sound has been around for so long that it's available now as a cash cow. When something that was once rebellious becomes that lucrative, it's a sign: it's time to move on. That's what all the great punk bands actually did.
I know it's corny, but be yourself. That's the point of punk. Said Popeye the sailor, "I am what I am and that's all that I am". |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Jesus Was a Terrorist Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Jesus was censored, persecuted, and killed for his radical beliefs and yet today's loudmouthed Christians are the one's persecuting everyone else. Jesus was also supposedly a preacher of tolerance, and yet Pat Roberts and gang are some of the most intolerant One of the ultimate ironies of today's society. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Religious Vomit Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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It's extreme but fun to listen to. I especially like the big grand opening that sounds a bit like the opening of a 60s epic.
Anywhoo the most annoying I've seen so far regarding the questioning of faith is the Christian guy who's advertising for the sponsoring of African children. Not that I don't support the cause, but it's just annoying that he patronizes us saying "I know you've been meaning to do it... maybe you just put it on your to-do list and let it sit" or something like that. When he and everyone knows that no one did it because they were ignorant and didn't give a shit. There's not much getting around that. But anyway.
This was of course one of the songs written by 6025 before he left the band and just dissappeared forever. Apparently with metnal illness. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Viva Las Vegas Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I think you've got it mixed up there. The song was put into the end of Fear and Loathing and it appears with an exerpt on the soundtrack. Obvously it's not on their album since the movie was made in the 90s.
It's kind of like closure to the beginning, on Kill the Poor where the rich and conservatives would rather do away with poor people than help, and this example of the way a lot of people become poor: by wasting all their money on gambling and drugs. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – California Über Alles Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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The version on Give Me Convenience was the original version on the single. It was rerecorded for Fresh Fruit. But the rerecording was the better. Faster, more energetic and snarling. This was their first song at the very beginning of the band, so they were kind of playing around uncomfortably before figuring out what kind of band they were really going to turn out like. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Halloween Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Halloween is a day for people to be whatever they want and let go of their fear of being judged for it by others. The rest of the year though, most would just be too self conscious to do anything out of the ordinary. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Your Emotions Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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It's about how a kid's mind is loaded with influences from a bunch of different sources: parents, their church or school, peer pressure, TV. They've never really been taught to think for themselves so by the time they're grown their mind is just a compressed brainfuck of things they've been told to think by everyone else, and since they can't sort them out into their own viewpoints they become just like a tape machine recording on repeat. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – I Fought The Law Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I should correct something. The "twinkie defense" didn't say he was depressed because he ate too many twinkies. The defense said that his recent excessive consumption of twinkies was a symptom of depression which, according to his lawyer, was a "migitating circumstance" (meaning it should lessen the sentence). White had resigned from his position as supervisor after an initiative to fire gay teachers, which White supported, was defeated. He had later asked Moscone to restate him, but Msocone and Milk opted instead for a more progressive replacement without White's knowlege, causing the assassination. |
submissions
| Dead Kennedys – Holiday in Cambodia Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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I'm seeing this as partly a smug attack on American college "intellectuals" and preps. If anyone knows more about the Khmer Rouge, they were shipping these kinds people off to prison camps and executing them to eliminate the "threat" to their "perfect peasant society". They also compared the conforming or willingly ass-kissing nature of the corporate workplace to the labor camps where people were forced to kiss ass and strictly follow the regulations or face death at the hands of the Khmer Rouge's soldiers. The US government blindly supported the regime because they opposed Northern Vietnam and the Viet Cong, but this was only because of Pol Pot's nationalistic and isolationist politics. The band was pretty much sticking it in their faces by detailing the horrors of the regime. |
submissions
| Sex Pistols – Problems Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Yeah well, just too bad they were never able to record any more music.
Anyway, I think that lyrically this is the best song on Never Mind the Bollocks just because Rotten sums up in this one song, what his entire attitude was. From the title alone it's bound to be cynical, but it's NOT nihilistic because it also presents an individualistic perserverance (when he says "I'm using my feet for my human machine" and "You won't find me just staying static"), which unfortunately is lacking in most of the punk, metal and rap that followed, which only project negativity but not as much self-motivation which could've inspired more people to do something about their problems. No wonder so many kids were doing drugs and killing themselves.
So in that sense, when put together with the slower tempos of the songs it makes the most influential punk band an anomoly in the genre whose attitudes they kick-started. |
submissions
| Sex Pistols – Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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And Boss Man, that is the correct notion. From a clip I've seen from the movie there's a subtitle at the beginning of the song that says "Kids audition: anyone can be a Sex Pistol". The song also explains the plot of the movie, McLauren's idea that they cheated the record companies for money. |
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| Sex Pistols – Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Tudor Pole also says "Bob Dylan's got a parking ticket stuck to his arsehole" and calles Sid Vicious a "rock and roll cliche".
According to Lydon's book they had these auditions near Finsbury Park, pretty much right down the road from where his parents lived, and that even his brothers went and auditioned. It pleased dear Johnny none. |
submissions
| Sex Pistols – Did You No Wrong Lyrics
| 18 years ago
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Just for general information, this song was the b-side for God Save the Queen. It was also apparently the first song they wrote, that they kept. |
submissions
| LCD Soundsystem – Losing My Edge Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It seems like it's also sort of recalling a lot of underground music history from the 60s, 70s and such. Can, Captain Beefheart, CBGB's, proto-punk, punk & post-punk and dance & electronic.
I didn't know until reading the lyrics that he mentioned PiL (Public Image Ltd), and first time I heard it, I was thinking that it was kind of like a PiL song. |
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| Sex Pistols – Bodies Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Well I just read in his book, as a child he would constantly have to clean up his mother's miscarriages. "They must've been going at it like rabbits". |
submissions
| The Clash – Death or Glory Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I think it's saying if you have a dream of one day basking in your own glory and you set out to do just that, you will fail because that isn't a reason for playing music. And years later you're just another washed up old rock star looking back on how your cause was destroyed by your own pomposity. |
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| The Clash – (White Man) In Hammersmith Palais Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I've always thought both of the bands were great. Their connection is that Strummer was inspired by the Pistols to join The Clash. The Sex Pistols didn't like them. Paul Cook thought they were just riding on their coat tails and John Lydon didn't like their music. But the supposed "rivalry" between the two bands just was an embellishment by the music press. They only met on a few occasions and from the pictures I've seen they seemed to be pretty friendly with each other. Both bands seemed to be pretty fed up with the stupid behavior by the punk followers, as shown in this song. First the fighting and other stupidity, the copied and unoriginal cliche punk outfits, and then came the mainstream co-opting of it all. By then very few people actually knew what the point was supposed to be. |
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| The Clash – The Guns of Brixton Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Paul Siminon grew up in Brixton (part of the reason why The Clash were so influenced by reggae was their closeness to the black community). Anyway the place was full of gun violence and police oppression. It says when the police come for you, you can either give up and arrested, where you'll likely end up in death row, or you could confront the police where you'll likely end up being shot down, either way you can shortly die.
About personal connections with it, I live pretty close to the Philadelphia suburbs so any time the local news is on you're bound to be hit with stories about shootings and crime and awol cops; they just go down the list of unsafe neighborhoods where this is always happening. So this song always reminds me of that. |
submissions
| The Clash – Garageland Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I don't think they would have ever actually said they wouldn't try to rise above "amature punk" given where they went to, but in terms of not caring about who likes them, it's true. I'm also pretty sure that the guy who said the band should lock themselves in a garage did not sleep very much afterwards for the rest of his life.
I wanted to say something about the actual sound on the album, which is great: having Jones's guitar on the left playing more subdued staccato lines and solos while Strummer's guitar is on the right playing full heavy rhythm. It's brilliant and this is one of the tracks that really shows it the most. |
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| The Clash – Clampdown Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Possibly the best song on London Calling. And if it is that might just make it the best Clash song ever. Still though, there are so many great ones on that album you could choose from without getting much argument. Anyway, clampdown is a much more interesting and accurate word for what's being described than all the hippies and 60s protestors who told everyone to "fight the MAN." And band was saying to youths to actually be aware of what's going on. |
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| The Clash – Jail Guitar Doors Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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You can tell that this along with I Fought the Law were recorded with the same producer as Give 'Em Enough Rope. It sounds like it could've been put on that album (which I thought was rushed). |
submissions
| Sex Pistols – Pretty Vacant Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It's basically an anthem of teenage apathy. You don't want to listen to anyone, you don't bother thinking about your future, you don't feel like really doing anything constructive with yourself. And most of all, you don't care. |
submissions
| The Clash – London Calling Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It's a goodbye to the current UK punk scene, which had pretty much degenerated. "Now don't look to us, all this phony Beatlemania has bitten the dust". Telling people to stop looking to them to decide what to do, to think for themselves. Woven into this apocalyptic vision of London. Strummer did live in a high-rise flat above Thames river, so "I have no fear". "We ain't got no swing, except for the ring and that truncheon thing", truncheon being the clubs used by the police. It was saying there was no social scene in England, no action except for that of the police, which were keeping them down. "We ain't got no highs, except for that worm with the yellow-y eyes", the people were at an all-time low and some were in a useless drugged stupor.
"Come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls", telling the youths that if they don't like the way things are they should go out and try to change it.
At the end he says "I never felt so much a-like..." I didn't no what that meant but in the live version he says "...like singin' the blues." |
submissions
| The Clash – All the Young Punks (New Boots and Contracts) Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Hitler was my friend, now shut the fuck up.
They were through with the confines of the current punk scene because of all the followers it was producing who just liked the "fashions". John Lydon's song "Public Image" by PiL talks about much of the same thing. It's as much a goodbye to the punk "phenomenon" as London Calling is. |
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| Sex Pistols – New York Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Other than the input of McLauren the Pistols weren't really inspired by the New York scene; the influences go further back accept for maybe Jones' style. Basically McLauren was always telling them about the NY scene and aggrandized it so much that the band got so sick of it that they wrote this song trashing the scene. It was more like taking a piss on McLauren, which I think is proof for the nay-sayers of the band's independent streak which the even the manager could not often restrain. |
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| Sex Pistols – Belsen Was A Gas Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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I agree with that. Some of you should try to express your opinions without sounding like a loud annoying asshole. This is not FOX News, gentlemen. |
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| Sex Pistols – Belsen Was A Gas Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It was originally written by Sid Vicious for the short-lived Flowers of Romance band. But you have to think of it from the view of the band, who took human frailties and sensitivities as an opportunity to pounce on them without much restraint. Just go look at Bodies, which is also another song most people misinterpret. I don't think they were really being anti-semetic (Lydon is just anti-religion, period).
I don't particularly think this is one of the best Pistols songs either; however the guitar riff is wicked. |
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| Public Image Ltd – Public Image Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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At the beginning he's also saying that some of those "punks" that the Sex Pistols influenced only saw it as an image without paying much attention to the ideas and messages they were expressing in and out of the music. And he says he's going to be an individual, not a cliched cartoon. It's ironic how today most punk has become a cliche, which is what they were originally railing against. |
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| Sex Pistols – Bodies Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It's neither pro-abortion or anti-abortion. It's commenting on the act of abortion and weaving in this story about Pauline, who was out of a mental hospital and kept showing up around the band. It should also be said that Lydon keeps changing the perspective. The chorus is the baby, but then in the middle of the song he says "Fuck the fucking brat... I don't want a baby that looks like that". I don't know if he ever had experiences involving them like that one guy said about his childhood, but the end result is a violent song about a violent act that doesn't just touch on the subject but rips it apart. |
submissions
| The Clash – White Riot Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Oh, turns out the raw single-version is the one released onto the US version. I had the UK version before I found it. |
submissions
| The Clash – Janie Jones Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Actually Janie Jones was a famous madam of the 70s - which means she ran a social escort (prostitution) service. The other explanations are right. Of course, in the 70s in Britain the shitty jobs were the only ones available, so letting your employers know how you really felt about your job was widely discouraged. But listening to a song that implies it's a good idea is pretty liberating. |
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| Sex Pistols – EMI Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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The solo in the middle of the song is effing awesome. Yes, I've heard Van Halen and Steve Vai and all those other "virtuosos", but big colorful flashy solos don't do it for me. This very short, repeated progression packs all the rage, and it's also triumphant in a way. Fuckin' A. |
submissions
| The Clash – White Riot Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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Use your head. The sirens used at the beginning are supposed to be British police cars... that's what they sounded like, at least in the 70s. The foot-stomping in the middle of the song is the actual resistance against police tyranny that the song talks about.
Besides, the ORIGINAL version of the song doesn't feature any sirens or other sound effects. It begins "1-2-3-4" and sounds much more like a live performance than a studio take; it's faster and more intense like the Clash live gigs were acclaimed to be. So I'd suggest finding this raw version if it's not the one you've heard before. |
submissions
| Sex Pistols – Submission Lyrics
| 19 years ago
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It's actually surprisingly poppy and slow for a Sex Pistols song (even though their sound was known for abrasive, intense takes on medium paced songs). Still fucked up though, Pistols style. Nice. |
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