The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?

Subject: Lyr Add: I STARTED A JOKE (Robin Gibb)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 09:01 PM

The song in question is this one:

I Started a Joke by Robin Gibb
   

I started a joke, which started the whole world crying,
But I didn't see that the joke was on me, oh no.

I started to cry, which started the whole world laughing,
Oh, if I'd only seen that the joke was on me.

I looked at the skies, running my hands over my eyes,
And I fell out of bed, hurting my head from things that I'd said.

Til I finally died, which started the whole world living,
Oh, if I'd only seen that the joke was on me.

I looked at the skies, running my hands over my eyes,
And I fell out of bed, hurting my head from things that I'd said.

'til I finally died, which started the whole world living,
Oh, if I'd only seen that the joke was on me.

****


So, what's the consensus? Is this the wimpiest song ever recorded or is it a deep and meaningful comment upon life, sorrow, trials, and tragedy? What do you think?

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: pdq
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 09:06 PM

It's hard to believe that any song is wimpier than "Feelings".

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 09:57 PM

It depends on how the vocal is handled...

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 10:18 PM

I dunno, LH. Howzabout Watching Scotty Grow?

Jerry

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: catspaw49
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 10:25 PM

I was thinking more like "Honey" but either way its hard to go wrong (or right) with Bobby Goldsboro.......unless you want to go with Red Sovine of course.

Actually, "Scotty" has the one redeeming feature of being written by Mac Davis..........nah, its still a toss up but Bobby all the way! When it comes to wimpy schlock, not even Robin Gibb can beat Bobby and Red.


Spaw

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Dec 09 - 11:49 PM

Well, here it is...

I Started a Joke

I must say that he sings it magnificently. Hell of a good vocalist.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Neil D
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 12:16 AM

I'm not even sure it's the wimpiest song by that band:
"Emotion"

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 12:45 AM

For me it's a toss up between The Voyage and Honey. I'm not a fan of With Pen In Hand or Roses are Red My Love either. There are quite few out there.

Don

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: catspaw49
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 01:08 AM

Hawk, you either like 'em or you don't. The BeeGee sound was vocally tight as you get in blood harmony and they were excellent stylists.....if you like that style. Many of their songs from that early period (pre-disco and pre-Sgt. Pepper) had a sort of, I guess you'd have to say, "wimpy" sound and lyric. Listen to "Words," "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart," "Got to Get a Message to You,"To Love Somebody," and "Massachusetts" and you'll get the idea.

They had one hell of a following and sold a shitload of records. Most of those songs played on every juke in the country. And to be truthful......yeah, I liked them...........still do. Maurice's death was tragic.   He was the somewhat silent genius that bound them.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Amos
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 01:34 AM

"Having My Baby" and "Someone Left a Cake Out in the Rain" have got to be int he top ten ...


A

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: M.Ted
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 01:49 AM

If you think it is a wimpy song, check I started A Joke by Ritchie Havens

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 02:05 AM

Nice melody

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: catspaw49
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 02:10 AM

Gotta agree on the "cake song".......MacArthur Park.   I always thought, "So........Someone left a cake out in the rain............Screw 'em."

Also, along those lines, just what the fuck is a whiter shade of pale? Englsh? I dunno'..........


Spaw

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Smedley
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 02:29 AM

There is an excellent version of I Started A Joke by the wonderful Kathryn Williams on her album of cover versions.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Weasel
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 03:11 AM

I don't understand why so many people seem not to understand the line "A whiter shade of pale" - makes perfect sense to me.

If you really want some lyrics that don't make sense, try "If" by David Gates.

Cheers,

Weasel

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 03:48 AM

I liked the song when it came out (my teens). Now it seems a bit twee, but I think it is because of the melody. It is too sing songy, which such a topic should not be.

If you just read the lyrics as a poem it is ok, maybe not deep but meaningful especially when I judge it with my teenage angst perspective. Would be interesting to see if a darker melody could be laid on and then sung by a Leonard Cohen like voice.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 03:55 AM

Blowin' in the Wind - by far
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 06:43 AM

I'd have to say, Spaw, that I also like the BeeGees. They had a great sound.

Jim Carrol...you've obviously heard too many lacklustre singalongs of "Blowin' in the Wind" at boy scout campfires and similar occasions... ;-) In the context of the time, sung by the right people, it was anything but wimpy. It conveyed a considerable amount of anger, as a matter of fact.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim McLean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:07 AM

Jim Carrol at a boy scout campfire!!!

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:09 AM

Wimpy. But a wellspring of meaning-laden depths compared to Pleez Daddy.

> I always thought, "So........Someone left a cake out in the rain............Screw 'em."

LOL. So did I.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:12 AM

Not Jim-Carroll-at-a-boy-scout-campfire as wimpy. I meant the joke song. But since I'm here again, there's also the puke-propagating Wives And Lovers.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:21 AM

I haven't heard that one. Who did it?

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:27 AM

Jack Jones. DECADES ago (showing my age now).

It starts out something like

Hey little girl [little girl????]
Comb your hair, fix your make-up
Soon He will come through the door

Like she's supposed to celebrate the fact he's coming home from work, and stop doing the housework and looking after the kids to go get dolled up. Every single day?

Subject: Lyr Add: WIVES AND LOVERS
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:30 AM

I'd forgotten the emotional blackmail element in it, which takes it beyond wimpy -


Hey! Little Girl
Comb your hair, fix your makeup
Soon he will open the door
Don't think because there's a ring on your finger
You needn't try anymore

For wives should always be lovers too
Run to his arms the moment he comes home to you
I'm warning you...

Day after day
There are girls at the office
And men will always be men
Don't send him off with your hair still in curlers
You may not see him again

For wives should always be lovers too
Run to his arms the moment he comes home to you
He's almost here...

Hey! Little girl
Better wear something pretty
Something you'd wear to go to the city and
Dim all the lights, pour the wine, start the music
Time to get ready for love
Time to get ready
Time to get ready for love

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim McLean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:49 AM

My comment regarding Jim Carroll should have had a question mark as well as exclamation marks as it really was rhetorical.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 07:58 AM

Never mind, it's a great image...

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Acorn4
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 08:41 AM

Someone mentioned Red Sovine earlier.

You'll really need to get the sick bucket out for this one:-

Little Rosa

Award yourself a medal if you can get to the end!

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 09:02 AM

Holy Mackerel. That is really something all right. I listened to the whole thing. Ye Gods...

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: frogprince
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 09:43 AM

Sheeeesh; ...an therea she was ata my feet, mya littla rosa, with her littla head alla squished...
And I thought "Teddy Bear" was as bad as it could get...

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: catspaw49
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 09:45 AM

Red is coming up (literally and figuratively) from others I see.........and always on a Hawk thread...................hmmmmmmm.............Is this a plea for more from the tear jerkin' trucker or just a request for some verbal syrup of ipecac?

Spaw

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 10:11 AM

"lacklustre singalongs of "Blowin' in the Wind" at boy scout campfires and similar occasions"
Nope - heard it from the lips of the master - and spent the intervening years thinking "Now what tyhe **** was that about?".
Ansers on a postacard please
Jim Carroll (I prefer a double L but feel free!)

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim McLean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 11:27 AM

Jim (Carroll), just couldn't imagine you singin 'dib, dib, dib'.
Slainte

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 11:30 AM

You mean dibb dibb dibb

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: john f weldon
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 11:32 AM

This song, as with some others mentioned, and as with many beautifully drawn animation films, suffers from one of the biggest flaws in art:

The appearance of meaning, without the meat.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 12:13 PM

Get real, Jim, it's totally obvious what "Blowin' In The Wind" is about. It's a broad-ranging philosophical comment on mankind's still unsuccessful struggle to achieve things like social maturity, equality, justice, brotherhood, and peace. Dylan probably wouldn't have written it were he not so inspired as a young man by the example of Woody Guthrie's championing of various social causes in song, but it fit perfectly into the revolutionary spirit of the time (in North America in the early 60s) and that's why it made such an impression on people then. I won't trouble you with explaining it any further than that, because if you don't get what it means by now, no further explanation would help, in my opinion. ;-)

john f - I believe you have just hit on what may be the key problem with "I Started a Joke".

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: robomatic
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 12:40 PM

LOVE THIS THREAD:

My nominee, which dates from the 80's:

-Dear Mister Jesus-

"gwone ups shudent hutt widdle chiddwen..."

(Nothing against the message, everything against the treacle)

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: gnu
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 12:42 PM

It's not chopped liver?

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 02:40 PM

"It's a broad-ranging philosophical comment on mankind's still unsuccessful struggle to achieve things like social maturity,"
Sorry LH - that's almost (but not quite) a pretentious as BITW.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: GUEST,Ebor_fiddler
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 02:53 PM

Kumbayah?

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: GUEST,seth in Olympia
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 03:45 PM

I had a really good friend in the Air Force who turned me onto Bob Dyaln, by way of the "Freewheelin'" album. Me and about 60gazillion other people. Of course it had "BITW' on it but other stuff was there that I liked better and still do. The same really good friend may he rest in peace, was a huge fan of Bob Lind. Who was/is Bob Lind you might ask. All I can say is if I was your prisoner and you threatened to play "Bright Elusive Butterfly of Love" pumped into my cell in BL's
wonderful Kansas monotone, I'd confess, hell yeah, yeah yeah "I killed Kennedy!"
seth

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 04:53 PM

Yeah, I remember it, seth.

Read Kahlil Gibran, Jim. Perhaps you will find his material pretentious too. He has the nerve to discuss great human issues that have haunted mankind for millennia in symbolic and poetic form! How pretentious can you get? ;-) Who did he think he was writing stuff like that? Hmm.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Joe_F
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 04:59 PM

'50s schmalz:

If I Knew You Were Coming
Dear Hearts and Gentle People
You Gotta Have Heart
Love and Marriage

Subject: Lyr Add: WHIFFENPOOF SONG
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 05:23 PM

Then there's The Whiffenpoof Song:

To the tables down at Mory's
To the place where Louie dwells
To the dear old Temple bar we love so well
Sing the Whiffenpoofs assembled with their glasses raised on high
And the magic of their singing casts its spell

Yes, the magic of their singing of the songs we love so well
"Shall I Wasting" and "Mavourneen" and the rest
We will serenade our Louie while life and voice shall last
Then we'll pass and be forgotten with the rest

    We're poor little lambs who have lost our way
    Baa, baa, baa
    We're little black sheep who have gone astray
    Baa, baa, baa
    Gentleman songsters off on a spree
    Doomed from here to eternity
    O Lord have mercy on such as we
    Baa, baa, baa

The Whiffenpoofs were a singing club at Yale (yes, that's right, grown men) who used to finish with this number. Can you imagine any of today's college jocks (a) calling themselves the Whiffenpoofs, and (b) singing Baa Baa Baa with a straight face? (And shouldn't it be 'have mercy on US'? Still, I suppose 'we' fits the rhyme scheme better.) Hmmmm, lessee...

Gentleman songsters off on a bus
Doomed to eat only asparagus
O Lord have mercy on...   NOPE

Must admit though, I do rather like the phrase "from here to eternity". Hey... might make a good name for a book... even a movie...

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 05:37 PM

All that's needed for schmalz to become subversive is sing it with a harde-edged sneer in the voice. Something Dylan always understood.

"Hey Little Girl", for example, could be turned on its head, treated that way. So could any of that last bunch Joe put up to be shot down.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Weasel
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 05:55 PM

"Such as we" is correct, (short for such as we are) but the rest of the thing is a travesty of a poem by Kipling. What Kipling wrote was good, what they sing isn't.

Cheers,

Weasel

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 05:55 PM

I nominate Suzanne

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: NOMADMan
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 05:58 PM

Well actually, The Whiffenpoof Song was a total ripoff of a Rudyard Kipling poem - "Gentlemen Rankers." No one ever claimed otherwise, as far as I know. Th Kipling poem did indeed include the the phrase "damned from here to eternity." Also, "We're poor little lambs who have lost our way / Baa baa baa," "We're little black sheep who have gone astray," etc, etc.

Like much of Kipling's, poetry this had a military tone to it. Kipling wasn't known for being wimpy at all, I would say.

Here


Regards,
John

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 06:09 PM

Kipling wasn't wimpy, no. But I wasn't referring to him.

Baa-baa choruses, yes. Thanks for the interesting info though.

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: Gurney
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 06:33 PM

I think 'Paper Doll' is so wimpy that I'm tempted to send it up by just doing it straight. In a suitably downtrodden and abashed manner, of course.

"As I was saying to (the compere), they get smelly by the second week...."

Subject: RE: The wimpiest song ever? Or is it deep?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 09 - 06:34 PM

"Can you imagine any of today's college jocks (a) calling themselves the Whiffenpoofs, and (b) singing Baa Baa Baa with a straight face?

Doesn't that imply that the song in question is the reverse of "wimpy"? And that it is the "college jocks", panic-stricken at the thought off singing it, who are wimps? But that is hardly surprising, I suppose.