― Dee Xtrovert (dee dee), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 23:07 (eighteen years ago) link
is he a famous dead body?
― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 23:08 (eighteen years ago) link
Well I mean the Yorkshire Ripper, who of course is/was PS.
― Venga (Venga), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 23:32 (eighteen years ago) link
― Ned T.Rifle (nedtrifle), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 06:34 (eighteen years ago) link
― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 06:50 (eighteen years ago) link
chilling, isn't it? immediately conjures up a mid-seventies datsun in crappy grey, with plastic seats and ... gah. astounding song - perhaps my favourite thing they ever did - but one that really freaked me out when i first heard it (at a relatively tender age).
― grimly fiendish (grimlord), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 09:27 (eighteen years ago) link
― Myonga Von Bottom (Myonga Von Bontee), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 09:45 (eighteen years ago) link
I'm pretty sure it's about driving out to the countryside to have a picnic with a top 40 cassette in the tape deck, only to end up being raped and murdered. Maybe it's kind of supposed to symbolize society selling you idyllic dreams when reality is much bleaker. Regardless, there's some black humor to it (especially "I can't forget the impression you made/ you left a hole in the back of my head").
destroyalltacoson May 23, 2006
― fake irish times letters mac d (nakhchivan), Sunday, 13 October 2013 20:32 (ten years ago) link
it never struck me that these lyrics were dark or anything until now. weird.
― akm, Monday, 14 October 2013 19:24 (ten years ago) link
the music is quite dark and malevolent though. although i never knew it was meant to be about a murder. i thought it was about someone having a nervous breakdown.
― Old Boy In Network (Michael B), Monday, 14 October 2013 19:26 (ten years ago) link
He explained that song in detail somewhere. It was based on a rape/murder he read about in the newspaper
― kornrulez6969, Monday, 14 October 2013 22:49 (ten years ago) link
Ok, from the Wikipedia page...I guess no murder
John Lydon (1979/99): “It's straight out of the Daily Mirror, so I can't guarantee its authenticity.”[11] “This was another newspaper story which fascinated me. A girl bundled blindfolded into the back of a car by a couple of bad men and driven off into a forest, where they eventually dumped her. The men had a cassette machine with an unusual tune on the cassette, which they kept playing over and over. The girl remembered the song, and that, along with her recollection of the car and the men's voices, is how the police identified them. The police eventually stopped the car and found the cassette was still in the machine, with the same distinctive song on the tape.”[12]
― kornrulez6969, Monday, 14 October 2013 22:51 (ten years ago) link
let the sick play
― reggie (qualmsley), Sunday, 17 December 2017 22:17 (six years ago) link
Talk about getting a song stuck in yoru head
― | (Latham Green), Thursday, 22 September 2022 20:05 (one year ago) link
Bye teh way the version from American bandstand to me is the definitive
― | (Latham Green), Thursday, 22 September 2022 20:06 (one year ago) link
yeah but they are miming there aren't they?
― link.exposing.politically (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Thursday, 22 September 2022 22:52 (one year ago) link
when post-punk and early new wave are described as "dark", "eerie", "cold", "gloomy", "ominous", etc.
...this song is the blueprint. because damn. very classic.
― ミ💙🅟 🅛 🅤 🅡 🅜 🅑💙彡 (Austin), Friday, 23 September 2022 00:42 (one year ago) link
I think I was thinking of this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMZFyaI0Wsw
However, the American Bandstand is definitely the definitive mimed video version.
What is poptones about? A painful human suffering? Or confusion and being dazed? Or the strange juxtaposition of pop music and crime? The singer just sounds annoyed, not really scared.Song about an event is not the same thing as the event. It is a cloud of thoughts, feelings, uncertainties...
"I can't forget the impression you madeYou left a hole in the back of my headI don't like hiding in this foliage and peatIt's wet and I'm losing my body heat"
― | (Latham Green), Friday, 23 September 2022 12:55 (one year ago) link