Funny weird or Daft song titles

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Funny weird or Daft song titles

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:
I always like taking note of song titles when checking out music and sometimes the song title can seem a bit crazy or intriguing even before hearing the song.
There are numerous examples so I'll just list a few to get started, and see how it goes...

Closer to home,

Wind Chill Factor (Minus Zero)

Minus zero is err, zero Which isn't a Wind Chill factor at all.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Maths was never my strong point, but I suppose taking nothing from nothing leaves nothing. Have you ever tried your hand at Zen koans? eg The world is vast and wide, why do you put on your robes at the sound of a bell?

-- Edited by noelindublin on Tuesday 5th of July 2011 03:22:26 PM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:
Have you ever tried your hand at Zen koans?

No. Never heard of them until now (and a quick google search).

As a computer geek, I am familiar with the concept of minus zero in one's complement arithmetic where when all the bits are set i.e. 11111111, the value is considered to be minus zero. http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/univac/minuszero.html

Thing is I was studying this sort of stuff about three years after surfacing, so originally minus zero didn't register (ho ho IT geek joke).

I suspect Geldof got the phrase off Dylan...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Minus_Zero/No_Limit

suss · In the Long Grass

noelindublin wrote:
24 Minutes (HOURS) From Tulse Hill (TULSA) - Carter USM
(BETTY) Dickie Davis Eyes - Half Man Half Biscuit
(FOOT) Paintball's Coming Home - Half Man Half Biscuit
(BRIDGE OVER...) Trouble Over Brigwater/ Mathematically Safe - Half Man Half Biscuit
The Taking Of Peckham (PELHAM) 123 -Carter USM

The play on other titles ones are fairly obvious, but no less clever or amusing. Not heard of many from your list have to confess. Will have a think about others to add. Must be a few Carter to add (Only Living Boy in New Cross springs to mind immediately). Good topic!

-- Edited by suss on Tuesday 5th of July 2011 03:34:28 PM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

I Scrubbed the Crabs That Killed Sheffield - Jarvis C0cker

Thinking About the New Millennium Just Makes Me Wanna Come - Jarvis C0cker

-- Edited by ArrGee on Tuesday 5th of July 2011 03:42:49 PM

noelindublin · Loudmouth

suss wrote:
noelindublin wrote:
24 Minutes (HOURS) From Tulse Hill (TULSA) - Carter USM
(BETTY) Dickie Davis Eyes - Half Man Half Biscuit
(FOOT) Paintball's Coming Home - Half Man Half Biscuit
(BRIDGE OVER...) Trouble Over Brigwater/ Mathematically Safe - Half Man Half Biscuit
The Taking Of Peckham (PELHAM) 123 -Carter USM
The play on other titles ones are fairly obvious, but no less clever or amusing. Not heard of many from your list have to confess. Will have a think about others to add. Must be a few Carter to add (Only Living Boy in New Cross springs to mind immediately). Good topic!

-- Edited by suss on Tuesday 5th of July 2011 03:34:28 PM

Well done for getting all the references. Another intriguing title is A Punch Up At A Wedding by Radiohead.

I think the Ten Houses Of Eve by The Fall is a play on the horror movie from the fifties, The Three Faces of Eve starring Bette Davis.

Always liked Back In The DHSS, and Back In The DHSS again. That was a play on BACK In The USSR by Scouseres Half Man Half biscuit.

Lots of the stuff John Peel played in the eighties was by indie bands that often came up with good song titles especially The Fall and Half Man Half Biscuit or The Macc Lads. Another Carter USM London reference is in their compilation called Brixton Mortars.

I think US country music can come up with good song names- a famous example being All My Exes Live in Texas. but country music is not my scene.

suss · In the Long Grass

Agreed about HMHB. 'All I Want For Christmas is a Dukla Prague Away Kit' prob deserves to be on list.

Splodge were a good bet for this sort of thing. Blown Away Like a Fart in a Thunderstorm, Michael Booth's Talking Bum, and Anarchy Chaos Stanley Ogden are all contenders.

John Wayne is Big Leggy deserves mention I think. Need to go a long way to beat ArrGee's I Scrubbed... entry though.

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

suss wrote:
I Scrubbed...

For your pleasure...

http://www.pulpwiki.net/Pulp/IScrubbedTheCrabsThatKilledSheffield

Early on a Saturday morning
Sometime after eight o'clock
I received a vile warning
It all came on as a bit of a shock
There were crabs all around me
Hundred thousands; well quite a lot
They'd been put in water; left them through the night
Now that they'd died they had started to rot

Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed...
I scrubbed the...
Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed the crabs that killed Shef

The stenches were quite amazing
Still I had a job to do
Later on I heard some people complaining
But the terrible smell just grew and grew
Eventually they had finished boiling
A crowd began to gather round
Well, we took them out and put them under the counter
And we sold them off; 28 pence a pound

Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed...
I scrubbed the...
Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed the crabs that killed Shef

I didn't mean to kill them
Just did as I was told
All those women and children DEAD
Because of the crabs that we'd sold
I'm not feeling cool in my head
I can't believe there're so many dead
(??)
Aarrgghh!

Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed...
I scrubbed the...
Wooah-ooh-oh-ooh
I scrubbed the crabs that killed Sheffield

I scrubbed the crabs that killed Sheffield

Notes

This song was inspired by an incident when Jarvis was working on a stall at Sheffield's fish market.

This explanation is from a History of Pulp (Disco-very, 1995):

One day the crabs were delivered early and left overnight in water. By the morning they'd already started rotting and everyone was complaining about the smell. A few had been sold before the health inspector condemned them all.

-- Edited by ArrGee on Thursday 7th of July 2011 08:21:16 AM

noelindublin · Loudmouth

suss wrote:
Agreed about HMHB. 'All I Want For Christmas is a Dukla Prague Away Kit' prob deserves to be on list.
Splodge were a good bet for this sort of thing. Blown Away Like a Fart in a Thunderstorm, Michael Booth's Talking Bum, and Anarchy Chaos Stanley Ogden are all contenders.
John Wayne is Big Leggy deserves mention I think. Need to go a long way to beat ArrGee's I Scrubbed... entry though.

Why did I think that Pulp song was some sort of weird STD reference?

Another good Carter pun/title is their album 101 Damnations. Sheriff Fatman by Carter is partly based on the slum landlord from the 1960's Peter Rachman, and Nicholas Van Hoogstraten [Van Whatshisface].

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

noelindublin wrote:
...the song title can seem a bit crazy or intriguing...
Why did I think that Pulp song was some sort of weird STD reference?

smile That's what I thought before I saw the lyrics.

As an adjunct to this, there are songs that seem to have, ahem, some not particularly well hidden meaning.

Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin would have made more sense had it been called Whole Lotta C0ck, and the end "I wanna be your backdoor man. Keep it coolin, baby." implies buggring around rather than an affair.