'Koks' is the german word for charcoal.
but also popular slang for cocaine
And the song is orginally quite leaning on an original song from the midthirties (1930ies that is)
basically its the children singing to their mother 'mother the man delivering the charcoal is here' at a time of general poverty, with charcoal being the only way to heat the lousy rooms, and the original popular song then going on with the children wondering how mother would then pay the bill for the charcoal, cause they have no money, and then later in the way the mother reacts to the childrens questions insinuating the mother dealing out sex/favours to the delivery man to desperately somehow get him to still give her the coal to be able to support for the children.
And this song Falco took and played on the double usage also as cocaine. This quite cheeky double play with words marking his very own style, which makes his lyrics VERY dependent on not only understanding german, but also 1) viennese slang and 2) contemporary culture, pop & society.
this insinuation is also very heavily pushed in the video to the song, where the 'white powder' is never shown as cocaine (of course also due to legal reason, but also always tongue-in-cheek), but always with the charcoal & mother/deliveryman situation, even though everyone knows about the 'REAL' context that Falco sang about in the song, thats being cocaine.
@smjuke It's not a matter of English not having the word.
@smjuke It's not a matter of English not having the word.
"Coke" is the slang word for cocaine, and it traditionally means a variety of different coal and oil residue products, but especially the one you get from coking bituminous coal in a beehive oven, the same thing Falco is singing about. People, especially in places like Sheffield or Pittsburgh, used coke stoves or furnaces to heat their homes. But most native English speakers wouldn't get the pun.
"Coke" is the slang word for cocaine, and it traditionally means a variety of different coal and oil residue products, but especially the one you get from coking bituminous coal in a beehive oven, the same thing Falco is singing about. People, especially in places like Sheffield or Pittsburgh, used coke stoves or furnaces to heat their homes. But most native English speakers wouldn't get the pun.
The main problem is Coca-Cola. In German, "Coke" and "Koks" are completely different words, but in English, "Coke" and "coke" are the same word. And 80s rap music had already used that pun o much (like referencing old Coca-Cola slogans while winking so you'd know they really meant cocaine) that it had been beaten to death.
But also, home coke furnaces died out much earlier in the US and UK, around the early 20th century. So coke deliverymen weren't a big thing in the Great Depression the way they were in central Europe. America has old songs about coke, but they're all about shoveling coke on the railroads, not heating your home. The desperately poor mom of 30s stories and songs was sleeping with the meter man to get him to fudge the natural gas or district heating bill.
Of course Americans think Falco only had one song, and don't get why he doesn't ride a kangaroo in the video if he's from Austria, so maybe it's not so important to try to explain this song to them.
'Koks' is the german word for charcoal. but also popular slang for cocaine
And the song is orginally quite leaning on an original song from the midthirties (1930ies that is) basically its the children singing to their mother 'mother the man delivering the charcoal is here' at a time of general poverty, with charcoal being the only way to heat the lousy rooms, and the original popular song then going on with the children wondering how mother would then pay the bill for the charcoal, cause they have no money, and then later in the way the mother reacts to the childrens questions insinuating the mother dealing out sex/favours to the delivery man to desperately somehow get him to still give her the coal to be able to support for the children.
And this song Falco took and played on the double usage also as cocaine. This quite cheeky double play with words marking his very own style, which makes his lyrics VERY dependent on not only understanding german, but also 1) viennese slang and 2) contemporary culture, pop & society.
this insinuation is also very heavily pushed in the video to the song, where the 'white powder' is never shown as cocaine (of course also due to legal reason, but also always tongue-in-cheek), but always with the charcoal & mother/deliveryman situation, even though everyone knows about the 'REAL' context that Falco sang about in the song, thats being cocaine.
cheers from vienna.
@smjuke It's not a matter of English not having the word.
@smjuke It's not a matter of English not having the word.
"Coke" is the slang word for cocaine, and it traditionally means a variety of different coal and oil residue products, but especially the one you get from coking bituminous coal in a beehive oven, the same thing Falco is singing about. People, especially in places like Sheffield or Pittsburgh, used coke stoves or furnaces to heat their homes. But most native English speakers wouldn't get the pun.
"Coke" is the slang word for cocaine, and it traditionally means a variety of different coal and oil residue products, but especially the one you get from coking bituminous coal in a beehive oven, the same thing Falco is singing about. People, especially in places like Sheffield or Pittsburgh, used coke stoves or furnaces to heat their homes. But most native English speakers wouldn't get the pun.
The main problem is Coca-Cola. In German, "Coke" and "Koks" are completely different words, but in English, "Coke" and "coke" are the same word. And 80s rap music had already used that pun o much (like referencing old Coca-Cola slogans while winking so you'd know they really meant cocaine) that it had been beaten to death.
But also, home coke furnaces died out much earlier in the US and UK, around the early 20th century. So coke deliverymen weren't a big thing in the Great Depression the way they were in central Europe. America has old songs about coke, but they're all about shoveling coke on the railroads, not heating your home. The desperately poor mom of 30s stories and songs was sleeping with the meter man to get him to fudge the natural gas or district heating bill.
Of course Americans think Falco only had one song, and don't get why he doesn't ride a kangaroo in the video if he's from Austria, so maybe it's not so important to try to explain this song to them.