What’s a “concept album”, and why would that be required for his song to be as described?
It is possible, and even mildly plausible, and an incident like this did happen to Douglas Adams. It’s not a particularly strange tale, and it is entirely conceivable you can see someone with something you just had in your possession and think they got it from you. Hell, I’ve had situations like that occur. For it to be a package of cookies and he ate some thinking the other person was the rude one, well, plausible.
Seconded. He wouldn’t even count some of the activities performed for the military - positions like clerical jobs weren’t held by soldiers, but by civilian auxiliaries. Those jobs didn’t count for citizenship. It was clearly more than service that was required, it was service that put your life at risk for the greater good. Postman just doesn’t fit that description.
The Vapors insist that Turning Japanese is not about masturbation. Riiigggghhhht.
Similarly, The Violent Femmes insist that Blister in the Sun is not about masturbation. Riigggghhhht.
At least Cindi Lauper admist freely that She Bop is, actually, for realz, about masturbation.
And then there’s Dizzy Gillespie’s claim that “I believe be-bop will help bring about world peace.” OK Dizzy, thanks for that. Dizzy’s been dead for almost 20 years, and world peace still hasn’t happened yet, but I’m sure that someday the sound of someone torturing a saxophone will actually get people to stop going to war.
I think you’re mixing up 2 albums: Thick as a Brick was concieved as a send up of a progrock concept album in response to critics calling Aqualung a “concept” album. Relevent quote:
Also, I don’t believe that Richard Thompson’s Here Comes Geordie is not about Sting despite the denials.
Though I am not much of a fan of Richard Thompson’s music, and while I am a huge fan of the Police’s stuff (I am lukewarm on most of Sting’s solo efforts, some is quite good, some is dreadful) I think that these lyrics characterize Sting and his oversize ego to a T.
It is clearly, obviously, unmistakably about Sting.
Speaking of LSD, Tina Turner claims she had no idea what “acid” was when she sang Acid Queen in the movie version of The Who’s Tommy. I find this hard to believe as she’s not a stupid woman, she had been in the rock scene for well over a decade, and she’d even opened and toured with The Rolling Stones. She may never have taken acid but no possible way she didn’t know what it was.
Fahrenheit 451 damned well ought to be about censorship, regardless of what Bradbury says. It’s interesting and relevant when it’s about the cultural self-censorship that comes of not being willing to offend anyone in the pursuit of artistic value. It makes sense when it’s interpreted that way.
But Bradbury says it’s about the evils of technology. It’s a damned Luddite polemic and, even though it still makes sense in that light, it shouldn’t be viewed like that. That interpretation guts the story and leaves it as pointless as any other idiot maundering about how things were better in some fictional Arcadia that can only just barely exist when an intelligent person is no older than twelve.
That’s funny, Derleth, the copy of the book I read had a preface by Bradbury saying the same thing: That there was nothing inherent about the medium of TV that prevented it from having works as artistically great as those of literature, and that the problem was the fear of giving offense and blandifying everything as a result.
Sure, but the book itself contradicts that interpretation. Johnny’s friend Carl was doing some kind of electronics research on Pluto when the Bugs hit it. Nowhere in there was there any indication that Carl’s research was inherently dangerous.
Also, the bit about counting the caterpillar fuzz if you’re blind and deaf doesn’t imply risk, just the willingness to serve.
I got the exact opposite impression from you guys; I had the impression that the MI was a VERY small part of the Federal service hierarchy, but the most classically military of them all.
(I state without further commentary that TVs can receive channels other than Fox News.)
HeyHomie: Please state why you think Blister in the Sun is about masturbation. Personally, after listening to the song and reading the lyrics, I agree with Anamorphic that it’s a drug song.
Similarly, Ted Nugent swears up and down that he didn’t know the Amboy Dukes’ “Journey to the Center of the Mind” was about psychedelic drugs. Despite Nugent’s famous teetotaler reputation, I still find this difficult to believe.
I agree with you guys on the Bradbury issue, but I wonder if the “problem” is that Fahrenheit 541 is a “classic” in the very real sense that it’s very best theme changes to suit the message of the culture who reads it. That, like the best of Shakespeare, it’s so great that it will always have an important and profound theme for the reader, though that theme may change as the reader’s needs change.
That kinda makes me want to read it again, although I didn’t like it much the first time.
You think they are putting us on? I used to think so about JP… dripping paint from a catwalk onto a tarp on the floor was a big joke. Until I saw “Autumn Rhythm” at the Met Museum. It’s the real deal, quite impressive.
There’s definitely something to what Pollack was doing, given the mathematical patterns in it so easy (with the help of a computer) to distinctively recognize but so hard to recreate. Now, whether that something is art is up for debate, but it’s certainly there.