defend the indefensible: "kokomo" by the beach boys

(xpost)

...we'll kick some ass and then we'll kick some mo', that's where our bombs will go, way down in kosovo..."

it was stoopid, but i laughed

hated this thing when it was new and stuff, mainly because it was omnipresent and less so for being annoying. now, it's just there -- not even really annoying, but not anything special either. so i am always kind of amused that "kokomo" regularly shows up in "worst songs ever!" polls -- it's not good, but it's far from the worst thing ever recorded!

http://thighswideshut.org/videos/sax.gif

But, as it is, kinda indefensible.

To Martinique, that Montserrat mystique

so 80s, esp. since montserrat is a steaming volcanic ruin now

and as a "wtf?" moment:

Port Au Prince I wanna catch a glimpse

do they REALLY wanna see probably the most run-down city in the islands?!?

i have ALWAYS heard this as "mounds of rotten steak" which you gotta admit is pretty bad ass.

me too -- until i googled the lyrics, i didn't know what they really were.

Not that far.

However, the picture of Mike Love/Disney's California Adventure = classic*(classic

Throughout the '80s, the Beach Boys had placed several songs in films (The Big Chill, Lethal Weapon 2, Troop Beverly Hills, Soul Man). In '87 the amassed brain trust of Melcher, Love, ex-Papa John Phillips, and Scott McKenzie (of “San Francisco” fame) decided to try to write a song for the film Cocktail, derived from the scene where the Tom Cruise character moves from New York to Jamaica. Recalls Melcher, "We went into it to see if anyone could write a major hit for the band besides Brian. I figured a lot their hits had been travelogues like ‘Surfin' USA' and 'California Girls.'

“John Phillips had this idea about a kind of blues song about some place the band would go before they broke up. We changed all the words and chords around and I wrote the chorus. As far as the feel goes, I always loved Jimmy Buffett records, so I got a steel drummer, Van Dyke Parks played the accordion, Ry Cooder played the guitar and the slide, and Jim Keltner was the drummer, going for a 'Margaritaville' kind of thing.

"I just layered it until it all started to shimmer. What really made it was the out-of-tune accordion: it glued everything together, especially with the steel drum. Then we left the falsettos out of the harmonies rather than having somebody copy Brian." The song shot to No. 1 and led the Still Cruisin’ album to gold.

This is a bit of a banger, this one.

Indefensible. With the sole exception of the aforementioned Muppets version.
-- Stephen C (ihope), Friday, December 30, 2005 3:06 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Link

Above posts make it appear that the Muppets covered the Imus version.

watching the muppets version on youtube, i notice that half of the lines are double entendres.

I brought in a tape with "Kokomo" on it to show & tell in 4th grade, when everyone else brought Nirvana, Weird Al and Guns & Roses tapes. Damn you, Beach Boys. I tried to explain to my classmates that it was Van Dyke Parks unorthodox accordion playing that really made the song, but no one would listen...

when I was in 5th grade, I wrote a pornographic version of this song while attending a performance of Jesus Christ Superstar with my grandma.

Cockomo?

prefer it to all other beach boys songs

Mike Love does it good.

prefer it to all other beach boys songs

-- J0hn D., Saturday, 19 April 2008 15:34 (36 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

^^^real talk

insanity

Mike Love does it good.

-- Thus Sang Freud, Saturday, April 19, 2008 3:09 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

love mike love

good tune

oh dear

and here I was thinking aero would forever remain on his pedestal

;_;

also that cartoon is fantastic

there's like a half dozen of those, they're all pretty funny

as a random-ass mike love/john phillips '80s soundtrack collabo featuring carl and john stamos it's a shocking success

this is why I play the game.

That piece on Kokomo reminded me SO MUCH of my own childhood. Wow.

Perfect until it demanded execution, anyway, which happened at Tween Hell, viz., a quilt exhibition. No—a quilt exhibition on a perfect summer day, and to be trapped in such, as a child, feels identical to what being slowly digested by a transparent worm must. Hours of cicada hum, stifling church air, polite yet impenetrable conversation; if I'd known state secrets, or what those were, I'd have begged to trade for clemency.

so otm, quilt shows are a godless void

kokomo as a code word is amazing

How about as a safe word?

ooh I wanna take ya

safeword is always one of the locations listen in the song, so if you forget the safe word just hum a few bars

^^It's all you can do when Mike Love's shoved a ball cap in your mouth.

let's not give Q. Tarantino any free scene ideas.

I am from Kokomo.

(Indiana. USA. Auto town.)

Thus, I have heard this song more than everyone else in this thread. Combined.

Alas. Now it is playing in my head again.

actually WORSE than Kokomo! i don't know how they did it, but they did it. the worst band on the planet just keeps getting worser.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuoIvNFUY7I

huh. dancing baby aside, that's not bad. i always mean to check those guys out more, understand they're considered quite the big deal.

yeah i think they were...in 2007.

wrong thread guys

port au prince
i wanna catch a glimpse

i stand by my earlier "kokomo" comments more or less - it's catchy and harmless despite a really metallic and inorganic choice of sounds for a band whose themes are very material (sun, sand, surf) or very heartfelt, and the real problem is that one must now imagine their "beach" as someplace you reach via cruise ship rather than by thumbing a ride (or turning on in your bedroom).

"wrong thread guys"

soooooooo the right thread. there is no way i'm going on an animal collective thread.

Good god, I've avoided any new Animal Collective this whole album cycle until you advertised that as worse than 'Kokomo' Scott. It did not disappoint.

Here I was thinking that they couldn't possibly name it something as stupid as 'Floridada' and make the mistake of actually saying the word in the song. Spoiler: not only they do it say it, they say it a lot.

Whoo boy, that was bad.

Thanks?

*not only do they say it

Jeez, it seems to have triggered a seizure that it warned me about and caused me to type nonsense.

Good god, I mean are they serious? It sounds like something Weird Al would do to make fun of them.

I mean, I'm astounded. Impressively bad.

port au prince
i wanna catch a glimpse
*epic sax*

i keep on listening to "floridada," at least once every couple days. i guess it's time i bought an animal collective record, huh.

this song is like when the bad guys win in a movie

Hmm, "New Yorkork"

Let's do that..

Compare "We'll get there fast and then we'll take it slow" from "Kokomo"

with

"Imma take it slow just as fast as I can" from "Body Like a Back Road."

(It's kinda like comparing how Whitesnake walked down a road alone, going down the only road they'd ever known, and then Green Day walked a lonely road, which was similarly the only road they'd ever known. Who was on those roads? No one. Because they were being walked alone.)

Everyone else was driving

i was walking down the highway, baby
i'm just a rebel with nothing to lose
you know i hate to leave you lonely, lady
but the hard life is calling and i just can't refuse-ah

this is a cool piece https://www.stereogum.com/2006749/kokomo-beach-boys-story/franchises/sounding-board/

and this is some video https://youtu.be/Z8JqzFg1OGs

Derek Jeter's Taco Hole
― Tape Store (Tape Store), Friday, December 30, 2005 5:02 PM (twelve years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

we'll get there fast and then we'll take it show makes sense

they want to get there (Kokomo) fast (b because they are excited for vacation)

then they'll take it show (chillax on vacation)

fun fact: 'kokomo' is good

not bad

UMS: compare "Body Like a Back Road," specifically the line "I'ma take it slow just as fast as I can."

I get more requests to write about this song than any other, and I have to say, "But it's not bad."

^ this guy fuckin' gets it

it's bad

I don't dislike it.

I was born in 1986 and it wasn't until like 2003 that I found out that the Beach Boys had more songs than "Kokomo"

Best thing Stamos was ever involved in.

UMS: compare "Body Like a Back Road," specifically the line "I'ma take it slow just as fast as I can."

― nonsensei (Ye Mad Puffin), Tuesday, July 24, 2018 8:23 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think it makes a lot more sense than this line

though "I'ma take it slow just as fast as I can." def has some "galaxy brain" appeal

song/verse is so so and just kind of there but the catchy chorus alone def makes it. if nothing else then Mike Love hit a homerun there. this is a fast food jingle level earworm.

Yeah I have always liked this song while knowing (even as a kid) it was trash.
And the verses are nice but indeed the most catchy part is Love’s.
Actually I’m pretty sure if you ask 100 persons to sing « Good Vibrations », I’m pretty sure 60% will sing Mike’s chorus part.

60% of people are pretty dumb tbh

I think of the bit where Mark says "c'mon, feel it feel it!"

aruba jamaica oh I want to take you to
bermuda bahama let’s leave it up to fema
key largo montego baby my state’s a frozen igloo
oh I want to take you down to
cancun-o we'll get there fast and then I’ll shitpost slow
that's where mr. trump would go way down in cancun-o

— kilgore trout, back in some form (@KT_So_It_Goes) February 18, 2021