Actually my college GF called this out as being dickish when the song came out because they guy is bragging about the crazy girl he had last night, so I listed here to honor her memory. In hindsight maybe she identified and took offense with the crazy part. ![]()
Woefully incorrect interpretation.
First of all, the singer is directing at the girl herself. Calling her a little crazy equates to saying she’s a lot of fun. The kind of face that starts a fight means she’s the kind of girl guys would fight over to have.
The singer goes on to say how enamored with her he is.
There is nothing dickish about this particular song.
Yeah, I don’t see the dickitude in that one. There’s nothing dickish in knowing that one isn’t ready for marriage. There’s nothing in the song that necessarily implies a sexual relationship. And even if he’s “willing to screw her,” does that mean anyone who has sex before marriage is a dick?
If there’s any dickitude in that song, it’s the admission that he’s been “one poor correspondent, I’ve been too, too hard to find.”
How about wishing death on your paramour’s husband, as in Blue Oyster Cult’s “See You In Black”?
I’d like to see you in black
It’d make me feel like your husband’s dead
I’d like to see you in black
We could make him suffer instead
(the husband has been physically abusing his wife though)
17 is literally a child.
I certainly think the realization is fair, and it probably bodes well for both. But it’s how Pete Burns says it that is sooo horrible…
Your sweet nature, darling
Was too hard to swallow
I’ve got the solution
I’m leaving tomorrow
Then this is in there…
Now other loves will tell you that
I’m nothing but a pleasure-seeker
Well, for once I really must agree
I need to leave you by yourself
It just seems like he’s twisting the knife unnecessarily. “You’re too nice, so I’m leaving you!” But at least I guess there is some self-awareness in the above stanza.
But there’s actually something that belies some insecurity from ol’ Pete in the chorus - he says “Somebody real nice to me/Who doesn’t notice all the others.” So is that hinting that his old lover had a wandering eye, or that he’s so egotistical he wants to be the only focus in his partner’s life?
I think we should contact Pete Burns and tell him we’re digging into his lyrics in this way…
Definitely dickitude.
OTHELLO
Down, fall, down, fall,
strumpet!
DESDEMONA
Mercy!
OTHELLO
Die!!
DESDEMONA
Let me live tonight…
OTHELLO
No!
DESDEMONA
One hour…
OTHELLO
No!
DESDEMONA
An instant.
OTHELLO
No!
DESDEMONA
But while I say one prayer.
OTHELLO
It is too late!
(He smothers her.)
Definitely dickish.
I nominate Zappa’s “Magdalena” as a candidate for thread winner.
Blech!
I wasn’t a child at 17. Legally a minor, but in no way a child. YMMV
Gee, I wish I hadn’t looked up the lyrics. Ugh. You win the thread.
Would “I Can See For Miles” qualify?
Certainly panopticonny.
Zappa’s “Magdalena”
Wow, I haven’t heard that song since high school (when we slit the cellophane wrapper on the then-new album Just Another Band from L.A.). But when I saw Magdalena referenced, I immediately replayed the whole song in my head.
“Dooo you haaave any ideeeeea…”
Listening to the song, rather than just reading the lyrics, you get the disdain Frank feels for the protagonist (and all the “Plastic People”; middle-management toadies of his day, who’d sold out to the American Dream).
The All-American Rejects, Gives You Hell
“If you find a man that’s worth a damn and treats you well,
Then he’s a fool, you’re just as well, hope it gives you hell.”
Listening to the song, rather than just reading the lyrics, you get the disdain Frank feels for the protagonist (and all the “Plastic People”; middle-management toadies of his day, who’d sold out to the American Dream).
Frank Zappa was openly disdainful if not contempuous of just about anyone who wasn’t Frank Zappa.
I don’t understand what’s dickish about this song or these lyrics in particular.
I think the phrase “the girl I had last night” is kind of gross.
As to Under My Thumb, I can completely see why it was mentioned by a couple of people, yet for some reason I always took it as the singer’s wishful thinking. Maybe it’s the jaunty music, but I always think it’s the narrator kind of bragging to his friends, even though they and he know that the girl is anything but under his thumb. Like Mick’s whistling past the graveyard or something.
As to Under My Thumb , I can completely see why it was mentioned by a couple of people, yet for some reason I always took it as the singer’s wishful thinking. Maybe it’s the jaunty music, but I always think it’s the narrator kind of bragging to his friends, even though they and he know that the girl is anything but under his thumb. Like Mick’s whistling past the graveyard or something.
I’ve always heard it as tongue–in-cheek, deliberately outrageous “feminist baiting” as one writer put it. But your take on it also makes sense to me.