Reviving San Diego's Rock Renaissance
(Paul Kaufman gives new meaning to the phrase “Trivial Pursuit.”)
Here’s another parlor-type game: Describe two songs that seemingly have nothing in common (era, style, etc.) yet have multiple disturbingly similar characteristics once you list them.
Here’s an example: The Beatles “I Saw Her Standing There” and “Rock ‘n’ Roll All Night” by KISS. You’re thinking this is crazy, but hear me out:
(Ray Brandes offers a brief history of misheard lyrics in rock ‘n’ roll.)
Music fans have long been thwarted by misinterpretations of lyrics mumbled by rock ‘n’ rollers, with often hilarious results called “mondegreens.” Numerous such misinterpretations were to be found in the Kingsmen’s 1963 version of Richard Berry’s “Louie, Louie,” and led to an FBI obscenity investigation after a parent wrote of her disgust with the lyrics to then Attorney General Robert Kennedy. In his book about “Louie, Louie” Richard Marsh describes the phenomenon:
Back in 1963, everyone who knew anything about rock ‘n’ roll knew that the Kingsmen’s “Louie Louie” concealed dirty words that could be unveiled only by playing the 45 rpm single at 33-1/3. This preposterous fable bore no scrutiny even at the time, but kids used to pretend it did, in order to panic parents, teachers, and other authority figures.
Read more‘Hold Me Closer, Tony Danza, and Count the Head Lice on the Highway’
(Manual Scan/Lemons Are Yellow vet Paul Kaufman hails rock-‘n’-roll Yiddishkeit.)
David Klowden already perfectly summarized some pastrami- and tongue-in-cheek ethnic pride in a recent post: “I am putting together a seminar & book tour for my method: ‘Dave The Jew Shows You how to Make Beautiful Women Think You’re Cooler Than You Are in Ten Easy Lessons’ ™.”
In the spirit of David’s post (and our earlier “Hyphenates” thread), here’s “Jewish like KISS,” a musical number based on the irony of having one foot in the Ché Underground and the other in a cultural Old World. (Both had a healthy reverence for the historical.)
I thought it would be fun to have our own sort of self-referential “We’re an American Band”-type number, with all the required fake bravado. I threw in shout-outs to some of my favorite Jewish rockers, Joey Ramone (born Jeffry Ross Hyman) and KISS members Gene Simmons (Chaim Witz) and Paul Stanley (Stanley Eisen).