I ain't no hollaback...bananas?

Cafe Society
41

Right up until this very moment I’d have sworn I didn’t recognise the song being mentioned in this thread, but THAT interpretation of the lyric made the little lightbulb go on over my head.

I hear this song on the radio a lot, and up until last night all I’ve ever heard was ‘because there ain’t no harm in that, girl’…then last night it came on while I was driving and I thought “huh, maybe it’s ‘because I ain’t no Harlem black girl’…”

So now I know the song you’re speaking of. And am even more perplexed. Of course, it’s not at all helped by the fact I can’t understand basically any of the lyrics except for the ones I’d proudly identified as ‘aint no harm in that, girl’.
/sigh
:frowning:

42

They discussed this song on the radio a few days ago. The announcer said that it’s basically saying that Gwen heard a vapid cheerleader talking about her, and she’s not going to bother to verbally reply (no holla back)-- she’s just going to kick your ass. “The shit is bananas” means that it’s ridiculous, and the cheer is way of mocking her rival.

43

Radio stations appear to be torn between those who will play “This is my sh–” and those that will cut it all the way down to “This is my.”

44

I just heard part of the song again today. Gwen’s definitely talking about fighting some cheerleader after school, but the nature of a “hollaback girl” may never become clear.

[For the record, it was a “this is my shhhhhht” edit.]

45

Reviving this to add the following note from AOLnews:

I’m interpreting this to mean “I don’t know, I didn’t come up with it.”

46

What a copout.

47

No kidding. Gone are the days when people at least tried to write songs that mean something, I guess.

48

Wow, the only two times I ever heard this song, I thought she was saying, “I ain’t no Hollenbeck girl,” thinking she was referring in a derogatory way to the LA neighborhood. I’ve never even heard the term hollaback. I am so feeling my age right now.

Joining UrbanChic in doddering away on my walker…

49

Reference to Daddy Yankee’s “Gasolina”, a track often paired with Hollaback Girl in the clubs – basically in this track, the rapper brags, and the girl moans back at him, that she’s always asking him to “give her more gas”. If I understand correctly this season’s NewYoRican-speak, the phrase, by analogy with accelerating your car, has an street meaning of givin’ it to your woman “harder, faster”. The phrase “le gusta la gasolina” does have a safer, family-audience slang meaning, of someone who likes to cruise around in your ride, thus rendering the track air-safe as a tale of a girl who’s into guys with fast wheels.