1 (edited by BansheeUK 2011-11-25 09:27:22)

Topic: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Okay, thinking caps time: just running with an idea from the One Hit Wonders thread; without hitting the obvious like overt sexual references (anything by Judge Dread) or direct drug references, how about songs that have upset the establishment. Either the most unexpected of artist, seemingly innocent of song or for the strangest reason or piece of lateral thinking.

When you think about it, you can see why Eartha Kitt's The Heel was banned by the BBC, a song about a down-trodden woman contemplating poisoning her husband (even though she changes her mind). However, The Kink's Lola was blocked by the BBC, not because of the transgender central character but until the reference to coke-a-cola was changed to cherry cola (now available at all grocery stores....) Even though it was an instrumental, the theme from Man With The Golden Arm was banned as the film's main character was a heroin addict.

Until relativelty recently, the BBC had a ban on "pop" takes on Classical pieces, such as The Cougar's Swan Lake rip, Saturday Night At The Duck Pond Shame this particular wrinkle was lifted before Barry Manillow put Could It Be Magic over Chopin's Prelude in C minor......

I can understand why, from the Gulf War, The Cure's Killing An Arab was banned, but did you know, under the same ban comes Cher's Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) and Phil Collin's In The Air Tonight?

Yeah, well sometimes the bans match good taste - Lulu's Eurovision song Boom Bang-a-Bang is also a no-no

Often politics wade in, McCartney's Give Ireland back To the Irish is a resounding example, but I bet you wouldn't have expected ABBA to have upset a few folks on Capital Hill, Washington where tracks from The Visitors album, namely Soldiers, When All Is Said And Done and The Visitors were read to have very pro Eastern Bloc sympathies during the Cold War 80s.

Anyway, that's an intro, bound to be loads more, but if you know the why, share. One thing though - keep it clean, you never know, your mum might be reading....

Mike

When life gives you lemons; don't make lemonade.
Give back the lemons.  Why were the lemons free?  What's wrong with the lemons?
Do Not trust the lemons...

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

An obvious one -1977 - God Save The Queen - Sex Pistols - the BBC banned it - despite being banned, it managed #2 in the UK Charts

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Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Ed Sullivan making the Stones change the lyrics to Let's Spend The Night Together to Let's Spend Some Time Together, so racy! He couldn't stop Jim Morrison though. Jim sang "girl we couldn't get much higher" and that was the last appearance of The Doors on The Ed Sullivan Show.

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What is success? Is it do yo' own thang, or is it to join the rest?   -Allen Toussaint

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Controversial:  1972 - Chuck Berry - My Ding a Ling

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Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Banned on the Beeb at the time
"Je t'aime... moi non plus" - Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg (1969)
So, went out and bought it - still have it in my collection

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Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Brack wrote:

Controversial:  1972 - Chuck Berry - My Ding a Ling

My brother bought this for me as a Christmas present that year, along with Long-haired Lover From Liverpool.  We're not close.... tongue

Mike

When life gives you lemons; don't make lemonade.
Give back the lemons.  Why were the lemons free?  What's wrong with the lemons?
Do Not trust the lemons...

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

and what about the ones that got away? - Stranglers: Peaches, - JJ Burnell could not pronounce a certain part of the female anatomy that he had read about, - obviously he never found it, - so he was allowed to sing it on Top of the Pops...  lol

I bought God Save the Queen when it first came out, - it probably actually made #1 but the BBC could not ignore it so easily if they declared it as such.

"Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood got banned and then unbanned...loads of sexual ones, - Ivor Biggon's was quite funny! - But then you go down to "Don't Cry for Me Argentina" which I think was also banned at some point.

Nowadays they make a radio edit where you hear the start of the word usually a "F", - Radiohead changed the F word in "Creep". - I think that the album version of "Perfect 10" by the Beautiful South is funny in its original form.

My YouTube channel with plenty of my Joe's videos dating from 2009 inc his first Hammersmith Odeon ones:
http://www.youtube.com/ian916fun

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

If I remember rightly, didn't Ivor Biggun end up on That's Life with Esther Rantzen, under the name Doc Cox? Not that much of an improvement at sobriquets go. Tongue-in-somewhere, Judge Dread holds the record for most bans by the BBC.

Ha, yes, the Frankie/Mike Read debacle where Mr Read took it on himself to be the protector of the nation's ear, snapping the record in two on air and ensuring the Frankies were #1 for over a month....

If you want a "potty-mouth" record, then RATM's Killing In The Name will make a Marine blush and gave Bruno Brooks a telling -off when he played the uncensored version on the chart countdown.

Rammstein's "Ich Will" caused a bit of a stink.

Even though it was written as a positive message to the disabled, Ian Dury's "Spasticus Autisticus" was shunted to "after watershed" only airplay.

Tom Petty rolled a joint in You Don't Know How It Feels and got blue-penciled and Billie Holiday got censored as a "madam" for Love For Sale in 1956.  Innocent times?

Mike

When life gives you lemons; don't make lemonade.
Give back the lemons.  Why were the lemons free?  What's wrong with the lemons?
Do Not trust the lemons...

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Brack wrote:

Controversial:  1972 - Chuck Berry - My Ding a Ling

It wasn't in the US of A.  It was on the radio in both the long and, more often, and more popular, shorter, edited, (minus the chit-chat) versions and was somewhat of a hit.

Rock ON & Keep Both Hands Together, Tightly, For Safety And Faith's Sake,
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Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

In 2004 - Incubus, a band i follow closely.

Incubus, whose single & video for Megalomaniac (from, A Crow Left Of The Murder) depicts an Adolf Hitler character with angel's wings flying over a crowd. Also had the F word in the chorus.


Incubus guitarist Mike Einziger said: "It's ironic that this MTV scrutiny comes from an incident where someone bared their chest in public,[janet jackson] while for the first time, our singer has his shirt on for an entire video."

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Adele: RAH http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Oio8V3e3WU&ob=av2e -
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Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

most rap/hip hop songs played on commercial radio in the U.S.A. have to have the F bombs censored out

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Classic Rock stations had Steve Miller clean up Jet Airliner to say "funky kicks goin' down in the city" from "funky sh$t goin' down in the city". Heck FX Network gets away with the S word nowadays, but I guess that only works after 10pm for some reason. The substituted lyrics are almost comical, like tryin' to watch the Sopranos on A&E.

                                                                                                               Think Green,

                                                                                                               J Dawg

What is success? Is it do yo' own thang, or is it to join the rest?   -Allen Toussaint

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

on the subject of RATM's "Killing in the name of"... this video is one of the best, - BBC Radio 5Live tried to get all hip when it got to #1 in a protest against Cowl's X-Factor..

http://youtu.be/w2MG2NuFVI8

- listen/watch for the DJ's getting in a spin when the "F" bombs came in at the end of the song..."we asked them not to do it.."  lol

..and this same song my son and his guitar group played this Saturday to the classical music stuffed shirts and town mayor as part of their end of term recital... http://youtu.be/XeiPMeoCBtQ

Their music teacher had to give name of the song and band different/disguised names for the programme  as "The Name of" by The Machine, - censorship was easier than fear of exclusion!  roll It still goes on.

My YouTube channel with plenty of my Joe's videos dating from 2009 inc his first Hammersmith Odeon ones:
http://www.youtube.com/ian916fun

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

Ian916 wrote:

..and this same song my son and his guitar group played this Saturday to the classical music stuffed shirts and town mayor as part of their end of term recita

   smile  Excellent Ian,   Zack de la Rocha & the boys would be proud.

GOOD KARMA - http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3zkw … o1_500.jpg
Avatar Credit: D.Hirst,Olympic Union Flag
Adele: RAH http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Oio8V3e3WU&ob=av2e -
We Are The Champ20ns

15 (edited by gary 2011-11-28 23:13:13)

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

The Rolling Stones Some Girls title track.Also from Goats head Soup Star Star. I heard they told or had written lyrics as star buck star buck a star.Who would have thought Starbucks would have become so popular  lol

Your rock candy baby
Your hard sweet and sticky

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

gary wrote:

The Rolling Stones Some Girls title track.Also from Goats head Soup Star Star. I heard they told or had written lyrics as star buck star buck a star.Who would have thought Starbucks would have become so popular  lol

Gosh, Darn and Tarnation - you beat me to this one!!!

Like RATM, Nine Inch Nails were lads (Trent Reznor at least) who spoke their minds.

Mike

When life gives you lemons; don't make lemonade.
Give back the lemons.  Why were the lemons free?  What's wrong with the lemons?
Do Not trust the lemons...

17 (edited by Brack 2011-11-29 03:47:42)

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

gary wrote:

The Rolling Stones Some Girls title track.Also from Goats head Soup Star Star. I heard they told or had written lyrics as star buck star buck a star.Who would have thought Starbucks would have become so popular  lol

Well spotted Gary - i have it as well, here are the lyrics that got it banned/censored http://www.cduniverse.com/rolling-stone … 146921.htm

GOOD KARMA - http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3zkw … o1_500.jpg
Avatar Credit: D.Hirst,Olympic Union Flag
Adele: RAH http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Oio8V3e3WU&ob=av2e -
We Are The Champ20ns

Re: Banned, censored or just controversial.

I heard it was Funky Star, "you're a star funky star", - I guess they did not bother with hiding the words about "tricks with fruit" and keeping a certain body part clean?  hmm

Brilliant live clip of this superb song:

http://youtu.be/MLWooGJOM2U

My YouTube channel with plenty of my Joe's videos dating from 2009 inc his first Hammersmith Odeon ones:
http://www.youtube.com/ian916fun