Yeah, and don’t forget the line
Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy – no more draft
He was the top man at his craft
But then his number came up and he was gone with the draft
He’s in the army now, a-blowin’ reveille
He’s the boogie woogie bugle boy of Company B
Since Pluto got demoted, Interplanet Janet. Seems like other school house rock songs should fit, but I can’t remember them all off hand.
Pretty close to what I was thinking. No burgers, but Teresa Brewer is pretty tasty!
I have that CD. I thought it was “lotta red uranium”, which didn’t seem to make much sense, but then the whole song’s kind of silly. The singer of the second verse sounds for all the world like Popeye’s voice in the B&W cartoons.
“Divide And Conquer” by Hüsker Dü from 1985:
We’ll invent some new computers
Link up the global village
We’ll get AP, UPI and Reuters
And tell everybody the news
It’s all old news at this point.
“Here’s my number and a dime,
Call me anytime.”
I think that was Donna Summers
Nope you’re right, the line is about Sunblock
Once back in the 90s, when Beck’s “Where It’s At” was a new song on the radio, I took my (then very young) niece to a flea market in Seattle. I pointed to some old electronics and said “Look! Two turntables and a microphone!” Her nose went straight up in the air: “Nowadays, people only use CD players.” Never try to out-hip a Seattle pre-teen girl.
On a related note, I’ve often thought it weird that more modern technology gets so few mentions in songs. Back in the 50s and 60s songs were full of drive-in movies, telephones, records etc etc, but how many songs today reference emails, instant messenger, text messages, MP3s, iPods…? Surprisingly few IMHO, considering how pervasive this stuff is in teen culture.
There’s Hello by Poe, as one example.
I can accept that. The line being about sunblock makes more sense there, really. I’ve just never heard sunblock referred to only as “45”.
As someone without a cell who occasionally finds himself attempting to track down a working payphone, it’s been ages since I’ve seen one that was less than fifty cents.
There’s “Not Tonight” by the New Cars, for one.
I find it comforting that Interjections will always show excitement or emotion. They’re generally set apart from a sentence by an exclamation point (or by a comma when the feeling’s not as strong.)
Geraldine may or may not still be playing hard to get, though. So it’s possible that this post is not entirely irrelevant.
Can anyone identify the other prominently obsolete reference in “Back in the USSR”?
The British Overseas Airways Corporation (“Oh, flew in from Miami Beach B.O.A.C.”) has been British Airways since 1974.
“Come and keep your comrade warm.”
Beechwood 4-5789
You can call me up and have a date any old time.
The Pogues - “Streets Of Sorrow/Birmingham Six”
It’s a political one but it mentions the Birmingham Six and Guildford Four still being in prison and all of them have since been freed.
Also, Stars - “Tonight,” although that one was anachronistic when it was written (2001). “Telephones and old typewriters, words of love along the wire.”
There’s also International Player’s Anthem by UGK feat. Outkast, which begins