Musical Mysteries

[Kromm]

Serious or Joking. Tiny niggling trivial things or big epic ones. 

 

Discuss those things in songs, or the music industry in general, that you just can't figure out.

 

 

 

[Kromm]

For example, one that sounds humorous (like it's just a slam on her) but I also seriously wonder...

 

Why doesn't Ariana Grande's label (or whatever other handlers she has) make her go and take diction lessons?  She's got a great tone, but worse diction than some two year olds.  Just one of countless examples... go listen to her new song "Focus". About 26-27 seconds in, she can't even enunciate/pronounce "Baby" properly.  I mean how bad is your diction when you slur a single syllable word?  And remember that video linked to is a cleaned up and mastered version. Live, she's often just one big rambling warble, where it all flows together and you can't understand more than every fourth word.

So what's the deal here?  Is she somehow actually MORE marketable because she can't be understood?

 

I guess the backup mystery with her is how she got such a swelled head/became the total rhymes-with-witch she's reported to be these days (countless incidents, including the latest one with her simply not showing up for a TV taping) when she used to come off as fairly sweet, professional type a few years ago.

Edited November 9, 2015 by Kromm

[spaceytraci1208]

Where the hell did John Fogarty pick up the accent he sings in?

[GaT]

This is the perfect topic for this. This is a stupid little thing that's driving me crazy. This is the full (I think) video for Camila Cabello's Havana

The part that is driving me crazy is the end. After she starts dancing with the bicycle guy, he says "I didn't know you knew how to dance". Didn't they just meet? How would he know anything about her? Is there a longer version of the video in which they meet at the beginning? I don't know why I've become obsessed with this, but it really bothers me, how would he know if she could dance or not? LOL

[janie jones]

When I saw the title of this thread, what popped into my head was the Publius Enigma.

[BuyMoreAndSave]

On 2/3/2018 at 9:54 PM, GaT said:

The part that is driving me crazy is the end. After she starts dancing with the bicycle guy, he says "I didn't know you knew how to dance". Didn't they just meet? How would he know anything about her? Is there a longer version of the video in which they meet at the beginning? I don't know why I've become obsessed with this, but it really bothers me, how would he know if she could dance or not? LOL

I thought that the guy was supposed to be someone who knew her previously but only saw her as a friend/acquaintance, but now started thinking of her in a romantic way after she decided to go out and be less sheltered. IMO the whole video is kind of a metaphor for her starting her solo career anyway so maybe the guy is supposed to represent the general public not realizing that she could succeed by herself.

[Blergh]

I've often wondered if Bruce Springsteen's mechanic character's adoration for the rich girl would have actually lasted all the way on his very long walk from the distant LA suburbs where he'd driven her all way the back to his garage in the "I'm On Fire" video!

[millennium]

Speaking of Springsteen, wtf is a "curly wurly?"

[BuyMoreAndSave]

Why is singing the last chorus of a song an octave higher considered to be a good thing, why is it done so often, and who made this a thing? It's horrible!

[WendyCR72]

On 3/29/2018 at 10:29 PM, millennium said:

Speaking of Springsteen, wtf is a "curly wurly?"

Well, it's the name of the UK candy bar that is the answer to the defunct US Marathon candy bar of the '70s! (Braided caramel covered in chocolate.) Otherwise, I got nothin'!

[Zola]

2 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

Well, it's the name of the UK candy bar that is the answer to the defunct US Marathon candy bar of the '70s! (Braided caramel covered in chocolate.) Otherwise, I got nothin'!

@millennium. I have always loved Cadbury's Curly Wurly's. It's basically a caramel chocolate bar covered in dairy milk with a soft toffee-like centre but shaped into a rope-chain. They've been on sale here in the UK for 30 or 40 years. 

The only downside I had with a Curly Wurly, was on one occasion years ago I was chewing away on one when I felt one of my fillings dislodge from my tooth - the toffee had somehow pulled it out, and I had to go to the dentist for a repair.  

Edited April 5, 2018 by Zola

[millennium]

35 minutes ago, Zola said:

@millennium. I have always loved Cadbury's Curly Wurly's. It's basically a caramel chocolate bar covered in dairy milk with a soft toffee-like centre but shaped into a rope-chain. They've been on sale here in the UK for 30 or 40 years. 

The only downside I had with a Curly Wurly, was on one occasion years ago I was chewing away on one when I felt one of my fillings dislodge from my tooth - the toffee had somehow pulled it out, and I had to go to the dentist for a repair.  

Here in the US we had something similar called a Marathon Bar.   

But I'm not sure Springsteen had candy in mind when he added this line to his "Blinded By the Light":

And little early-pearly came in by her curly-wurly and asked me if I needed a ride

3 hours ago, WendyCR72 said:

Well, it's the name of the UK candy bar that is the answer to the defunct US Marathon candy bar of the '70s! (Braided caramel covered in chocolate.) Otherwise, I got nothin'!

I answered Zola's post before I saw yours.  Do they still make Marathon Bars?  I haven't eaten one since maybe 1975 or 76.

[WendyCR72]

On 4/5/2018 at 6:53 AM, millennium said:

I answered Zola's post before I saw yours.  Do they still make Marathon Bars?  I haven't eaten one since maybe 1975 or 76.

No.  :-( Hence my calling it defunct. I think I last had a Marathon Bar when I was around...8. That was 1980 or so. Sigh! I did get the Curly Wurly UK brand a few years back from a candy seller on eBay. It was good, but it was much smaller than the Marathon Bar. (Hence the name and the ruler that used to adorn the wrapper!)

To bring this back to music, "Blinded By The Light" had a bunch of nonsensical lyrics, so either Springsteen was involved in '70s drug experimentation or he was a huge fan of stream of consciousness! (Although the only version [I know this is Springsteen's song/lyrics] I am very familiar with is the popular Manfred Mann cover.)

[Shannon L.]

On 4/5/2018 at 6:59 AM, WendyCR72 said:

To bring this back to music, "Blinded By The Light" had a bunch of nonsensical lyrics, so either Springsteen was involved in '70s drug experimentation or he was a huge fan of stream of consciousness! (Although the only version [I know this is Springsteen's song/lyrics] I am very familiar is the popular Manfred Mann cover.)

And kudos to them because the Springsteen version, on top of the wacky lyrics, is not great musically, so I find it amazing that they heard it and thought "We can do that song better!" and then actually managing it.

 

So, who is Carly Simon really talking about in You're So Vain?  I know the common thought is that it's Warren Beatty, but my husband said he wouldn't be surprised if it was Mick Jagger since he sings back up in the end of the song.  How ironic would it be that he's singing in a song that's bashing himself? 

[WendyCR72]

6 minutes ago, Shannon L. said:

So, who is Carly Simon really talking about in You're So Vain?  I know the common thought is that it's Warren Beatty, but my husband said he wouldn't be surprised if it was Mick Jagger since he sings back up in the end of the song.  How ironic would it be that he's singing in a song that's bashing himself? 

I, too, once heard the rumor about it being about Mick Jagger.

A hair band from the '80s, Faster Pussycat, put their spin on the song, glam metal style.

[Shannon L.]

@WendyCR72, I have that version on my phone!  I've loved it since the first time I heard it all those years ago.

[WendyCR72]

3 minutes ago, Shannon L. said:

@WendyCR72, I have that version on my phone!  I've loved it since the first time I heard it all those years ago.

Cool that the remake is from the male POV. Both sides represented.  :-)

[Blergh]

Johnny Cash's in-laws, the Carter Family were among the earliest country music radio and phonograph stars touring from the 1920's onwards. Anyway, the crossed paths with Jimmie Rodgers   'The Singing Brakeman' who would die of tuberculosis in 1933.  Mr. Rodgers knew his time was fleeting but insisted on recording songs up to  two days before his death while going and forth to his literal deathbed so his family would have something after his demise. The BIG 'mystery' here is that when he got too weak to hold his guitar, according to Johnny Cash, his mother-in-law Maybelle Carter not only held the guitar but played the notes to the songs but, despite the fame of the Carter Family, her alleged vital contribution to her colleague's sessions somehow went under the radar! 

[smittykins]

If nobody admits to ever watching Hee Haw, how come everyone knows the lyrics to “Where Oh Where Are You Tonight?” 😛

[Dandesun]

On 9/9/2019 at 7:02 PM, smittykins said:

If nobody admits to ever watching Hee Haw, how come everyone knows the lyrics to “Where Oh Where Are You Tonight?” 😛

I had Hee Haw overalls.

Don't judge me. I was three.

[Blergh]

One of the most haunting  and intriguing popular songs of any genre has to be "Ode to Billie Joe" (1967) written and sung by the sultry Bobbie Gentry mainly focused around a family dinner in which all the family members discuss the apparent suicide of a local boy from a bridge while having an otherwise ordinary meal with the narrator ( Miss Gentry) trying to keep her own council re her own involvement with the late Billie Joe a secret from the others! Since the song mentions  quite a few known landmarks around Miss Gentry's own Mississippi hometown in the song, it's often been speculated to have somehow been a biographical account which she's never confirmed or denied. In particular, there's been heated debate as to what it was  the fictional (?) Billie Joe was seen throwing off the bridge before jumping to his own death which Miss Gentry has zealously refused to identify except to say that it held the key to the  suicide motive!