Friday, December 7, 2007

Follow me, Stereo Jungle Child

I'm perversely fond of the '80s radio station one of my dear (and very young) colleagues has on her Pandora. And I think she enjoys my snickering. After all, dissecting song lyrics for their absurdity has long been a habit of mine. I remember holding forth about the inane rhyme of "Abracadra/I'm gonna reach out and grab ya" when it was first a hit, so I can't help mocking it when I hear it now.

One song I truly loathed in the '80s was "The Warrior" by Scandal (Featuring Patty Smythe). Since nobody had ever heard of Patty Smythe, that billing was a little puzzling, and I was really surprised when she was married to Richard Hell. I mean, she may be a fine person, but I had a hard time forgiving musical sins in my intolerant youth. (And, yes, the prejudices still linger, although I've mellowed. Really).

(Footnote: the Wikipedia says that she "dated" Hell, although at the time, it was billed as "married." So who knows? It also says she's now married to John McEnroe, but his entry avoids pretty much any mention of his personal life. Fallout from the whole Tatum O'Neal tell-all book?)

Anyway, I'd pretty much forgotten this song ever existed when it played yesterday, and the lyrics were even worse than I remembered them. Not that I want to tame anybody's animal style here....but we mainly used to mock the contortions she made out of the word "Warrior," (wah-ree-AW? I can't do it phonetically), which made me imagine her lips rubbered into a non-human form to pronounce it.

But..."feeding on your hungry eyes/I bet you're not so civilized." Ummm...I think the eyeball chomper is the uncivilized one, even metaphorically speaking. Or is the object of her affection feeding on his OWN eyes? Ew. That's beyond Hannibal Lector. And I have to quote this verse in its entirety:

"You talk, talk, you talk to me
Your eyes touch me physically
Stay with me, we'll take the night
As passion takes another bite"

I shouldn't be this giggly this early in the day. I may never recover. Just thinking about the mental picture of eyes touching someone...physically...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

you're taking her lyrics too literally...

teapotshappen said...

those lyrics work out pretty sweet when mixed with a random 80's post apocalyptic wasteland warrior flick, though ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UX_ImLnZu8


:)