Silliest Words in a Pop Song - Page 2

WelshWitchPMD · #16 03-12-2006, 07:21 PM

Silly words in a pop song? I think that just about every song in the top 40 right now would qualify.

amber · #17 03-12-2006, 07:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

Some people call me the space cowboy, yeah
Some call me the gangster of love
Some people call me Maurice
Cause I speak of the pompatus of love

I would say this is in the lead.

He has another winner with:

"Abrah Abrah Cadabra! I wanna reach out and grab ya!"

irishgrl · #18 03-12-2006, 07:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidMn

Yeah, it's liek you wanna ask "Who the hell's Maurice?"

I believe that's a reference to Maurice Chevalier, a very courtly French Actor.

and I believe that last bit goes:
Some people call me "Maurice"
cuz I speak of the properties of love......

does anyone remember a quaint little song called "Thank Heaven for Little Girls?" That was Maurice. Bless him.

irishgrl · #19 03-12-2006, 07:58 PM

Disco Duck.
Funky Worm.

Guitarzan.
Gidget the Midget

one of my faves however is this gem:

Hello Muddah
Hello Faddah
Here I am at
Camp Grenada.... (I dont remember the rest!)

eclipse · #20 03-12-2006, 08:04 PM

You youngins'..obviously have no respect for the Space Cowboy...
He was excellent- at the time, just think about other songs like:
Cadilac Jack or
How about Mary Lou?
Fly like an eagle?
The original "Jack and Diane"...This is the story of Billy Joe and Bobbie Sue, 2 young lovers....
or... that's all I can think of..
He really had a few good tunes...when you were really stoned/wasted and singing along....
Not that I have any first hand knowledge

(At least that is what I have read in a book...hee)

irishgrl · #21 03-12-2006, 08:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eclipse

You youngins'..obviously have no respect for the Space Cowboy...
He was excellent- at the time, just think about other songs like:
Cadilac Jack or
How about Mary Lou?
Fly like an eagle?
The original "Jack and Diane"...This is the story of Billy Joe and Bobbie Sue, 2 young lovers....
or... that's all I can think of..
He really had a few good tunes...when you were really stoned/wasted and singing along....
Not that I have any first hand knowledge

(At least that is what I have read in a book...hee)

This here's a story bout Billy Joe and Bobbie Sue
Two young lovers with nothing better to do
than sit around the house, getting high watching the tube
and here's what happened when they decided to cut loose....

I always thought that "Mercury" song was kinda strange tho...
about a guy who had to buy a Mercury because the girl he liked would only go out with guys who had Mercury's.......very odd...

SteveMacD · #22 03-12-2006, 09:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishgrl

and I believe that last bit goes:
Some people call me "Maurice"
cuz I speak of the properties of love......

Nope. It IS pompatus. Steve Miller says he invented the word, and that it means absolutely nothing.

Here's something I found on the net:

Dear Cecil:

What does "pompatus" mean? There's a movie out now called The Pompatus of Love, and of course it contains the Steve Miller song as a theme. I can't find "pompatus" in the dictionary. Any clues? --Cane95, via America Online

Cecil replies:

Clues? Pfui. We have cracked the freaking case, thanks to some outstanding legwork by Jon Cryer--actor, cowriter, and coproducer of the movie Pompatus of Love--and my new assistant, J.K. Fabian. J.K. has what it takes to make a real impact in this business: pluck, luck, and an outstanding record collection.

"Pompatus" mystified millions when Steve Miller used it in his 1973 hit "The Joker": "Some people call me the space cowboy. / Yeah! Some call me the gangster of love. / Some people call me Maurice, / Cause I speak of the Pompatus of love."

"Space cowboy" and "gangster of love" referred to earlier Miller songs. Maurice was from Miller's 1972 tune "Enter Maurice," which appeared on the album Recall the Beginning ... A Journey From Eden. "Enter Maurice" had this lyric: "My dearest darling, come closer to Maurice so I can whisper sweet words of epismetology in your ear and speak to you of the pompitous of love."

Great, now there were two mystery words. What's more, it appeared even Miller himself was uncertain how pompatus was spelled. It appeared as "pompatus" in at least two books of sheet music but as "pompitous" in the lyrics included with "Recall the Beginning."

Miller has said little about the P-word over the years. In at least one interview, fans say, he claimed "it doesn't mean anything--it's just jive talk."

Not quite.

Some sharp-eared music fan noticed the "Enter Maurice" lyric above bore a marked resemblance to some lines in a rhythm and blues tune called "The Letter" by the Medallions. The song had been a hit in R & B circles in 1954. J.K. found the record. It had the lines, "Oh my darling, let me whisper sweet words of [something like epismetology] and discuss the [something like pompatus] of love." J.K. tried to find the sheet music for the song, but came up only with the Box Tops hit ("My baby, she wrote me a letter").

Then came a stroke of luck. Jon Cryer the movie guy had stumbled onto the secret of pompatus. Eager to reveal it to the world, he sent it to--who, Rolling Stone? The New York Times?

Of course not. He sent it to us.

Speculation about "pompatus" was a recurring motif in the script for The Pompatus of Love. While the movie was in postproduction Cryer heard about "The Letter." During a TV interview he said that the song had been written and sung by a member of the Medallions named Vernon Green. Green, still very much alive, was dozing in front of the tube when the mention of his name caught his attention. He immediately contacted Cryer.

Green had never heard "The Joker." Cryer says that when he played it for Green "he laughed his ass off." Green's story:

"You have to remember, I was a very lonely guy at the time. I was only 14 years old, I had just run away from home, and I walked with crutches," Green told Cryer. He scraped by singing songs on the streets of Watts.

One song was "The Letter," Green's attempt to conjure up his dream woman. The mystery words, J.K. ascertained after talking with Green, were "puppetutes" and "pizmotality." (Green wasn't much for writing things down, so the spellings are approximate.)

"Pizmotality described words of such secrecy that they could only be spoken to the one you loved," Green told Cryer. And puppetutes? "A term I coined to mean a secret paper-doll fantasy figure [thus puppet], who would be my everything and bear my children." Not real PC, but look, it was 1954.

Green went on to record many other songs and is still writing today. He can be reached at P.O. Box 1394, Perris, CA 92572.

Steve Miller must have loved R & B. Another line from "The Joker" goes "I really love your peaches, wanna shake your tree. / Lovey dovey, lovey dovey, lovey dovey all the time." A similar line may be found in the Clovers' 1953 hit "Lovey Dovey": "I really love your peaches wanna shake your tree / Lovey dovey, lovey dovey all the time."

When I spoke to Miller's publicist Jim Welch about these remarkable coincidences, he said Miller's comment was "artistic license." Pressed a bit, Welch said Miller acknowledged that he'd been "influenced" by earlier artists. Not perhaps the most forthcoming statement in the world. But at least we now know it didn't come to him in a dream.

FADE TO GREEN

From Rockin' Radio News:

Vernon Green, leader of the Medallions, died Dec. 24th [2000] in a hospital in Los Angeles. Best known for "The Letter" and "Buick 59," they were the first doo-wop group to record for Dootone Records. Their first release, "Buick 69," (based on Todd Rhodes' double-entendre R&B hit "Rocket 69"), backed with a ballad called "The Letter," was a double-sided West Coast hit. Green's famous recitation on "The Letter" contained the nonsense lyric, "the pulpitudes of love," which was later picked up by Steve Miller as "the pompitudes of love"—which became the title of a 1990s film.

So, yet another spelling. But at least Vernon gets the credit he deserves.

--CECIL ADAMS

catinthedark · #23 03-12-2006, 11:13 PM

I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want,
So tell me what you want, what you really really want,
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna really
really really wanna zigazig ha.

never said they weren't catchy.... but definitely a little silly.

irishgrl · #24 03-13-2006, 06:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

Nope. It IS pompatus. Steve Miller says he invented the word, and that it means absolutely nothing.

Ok. I stand corrected. MY version makes more sense however

SuzeQuze · #25 03-13-2006, 08:51 AM

That stupid Barbie song and I cannot put the lyrics here lest the drivel be emblazoned on my mind all day!

Violet · #26 03-13-2006, 09:54 AM

My pick for silliest lyrics:

Spring was never waiting for us, girl
It ran one step ahead
As we followed in the dance
Between the parted pages and were pressed,
In love's hot, fevered iron
Like a striped pair of pants

MacArthur's Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet, green icing flowing down...
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don't think that I can take it
'cause it took so long to bake it
And I'll never have that recipe again
Oh, no!

If someone can explain what the hell is the significance of the cake (or any of the lyrics, really), I'd appreciate it.

Carol

chiliD · #27 03-13-2006, 11:07 AM

I have no time, nor patience to defend Steve Miller (or his lyrics), but just let me remind you all of...

WHO LET THE DOGS OUT? (WOOF...WOOF, WOOF)