One of the most popular versions of the Lord’s Prayer in Spanish is set to The Sounds of Silence, a song which is depressing enough that it could have been written by Hans Christian Andersen but which many people who don’t speak English think is about being in peace, a meditative state.
Then again, Sting and me make two people who’ll never understand people who walk down the aisle to the tune of Every Breath You Take…
Really? I’d think less of Leonard Cohen for allowing this, but I know he’s in dire straits, financially, so I’ll give it a pass.
Heh, I just listened to a CD that put Jewsih lyrics to general pop tunes. Sound Of Silence was one of the ones used.
Once the composition is licensed, Cohen wouldn’t have any direct say in the matter. Anyone can record a cover version of your composition once its published using a compulsory mechanical license. You don’t get the luxury of saying “No.” (Hence the “compuslory” part). The only thing I’m not sure about is whether new lyrics or translations would be considered “derivative works” or not which may mean you have some control, but I don’t think so.
I have a friend who can no longer hear the theme from Ghostbusters without recalling the Claremont Lounge. It was traumatic.
Back when the song was fresh, I saw a stripper dance to the Cranberries’ “Zombie”. You know, the one lamenting the violence in Northern Ireland? Yeah. Real sexy tune.
Back in my radio days the town was shut down by a fluke snow storm. The dj was looking for songs about winter and decided to play one called “Snowblind Friend”
It bothered me that President Clinton used the song “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Miz as an anthem at his first inaugural, as it is a about a woman who got knocked up by a guy who abandoned her and her child and is currently giving blowjobs for cash to support herself; everything about the song is meant to show the character of Fantine is pathetic, not inspiring.
I went to a wedding last year in which the song “Because of You” was dedicated by the bride to her groom. She obviously never listened to anything but the title–not even the chorus–as the song is about a woman who was abused by her mother’s boyfriends all through her childhood and who blames her mother for her inability to feel safe, trust me, or ever be happen.
And I make three. People never listen to the damn words of the song.
Hey, someone’s got to control and someone has to be controlled. I don’t pretend to understand it, but whatever works for each couple.
I always thought if I were a stripper, I’d choose stuff like that. Just to blow people’s minds away.
I wonder if those strippers would dance to Mothers of the Disappeared.
My son and his bride chose Meatloaf’s “Paradise by the Dashboard Lights” for their song at the reception.
The gist of the song is that the young 17 year olds are gonna have sex in the car, she swears her love for him, he says he’ll think about it and get back with her. He finally lies to her by swearing his love until the end of time just to get into her pants. The final stanza is…
How that’s appropriate to celebrate the beginning of a marriage is beyond me.
Do songs really have to match the occasion, though? Like, if the lyrics say one thing but the song’s "mood"or whatnot says another, isn’t that enough?
ETA: I still think Regan using Born in the USA is stupid, but Clinton using I Dreamed a Dream doesn’t really bother me. Mostly because I suppose it’s ambiguous enough.
That’s a kind of cute story! 
Is that what it’s about? I could never figure out the lyrics. I thought it was lady who has trust issues because her boyfriend burned her.
Back when I had an office job, my coworkers would often listen to the radio all day. One Valentine’s Day the station they usually played decided that they would play love songs all day. Which I suppose made sense.
What didn’t make sense was when they decided that anything Frank Sinatra sang was de facto a love song, so they played Mack the knife.
He can’t dis-allow it. Once a song is registered, it’s got a set price for using it: the authors keep the royalties but lose their control. Anybody who pays that set price can chop up, re-word, or generally mangle the song in any way they fancy.
or, what Swallowed my Cellphone said.
This one will sound strange to y’all, but when my brother announced his wedding date, my parents’ reaction (specially Dad’s) was “of all the days in the year, you had to choose November 20th?”
Turns out it had been SiL-Dad’s reaction too. Bro claimed they were “the only two people in all of Spain who remember what that date means!”
Anniversary of Franco’s official time of death, to match that of José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of Falange, which was the single Party legal in Spain during Franco’s rule; Falange folks always organize demonstrations on that date, which have often involved violence between them and anarchist groups. SiL-Dad’s is a cop; Dad’s political bend was “we fought on Franco’s side but not for Franco” and he remembered fondly those childhood summers spent throwing rocks at his Falangista same-age cousin.
The same week Bro made his announcement, I went to Madrid for a job interview and there was a Falange convention in the same hotel where I stayed. 450 delegates, which would put the number of people who remembered the date at a minimum of 452.
Then you cannot possibly have missed that this is the David and Bathsheba story, as another poster has pointed out.