Brain is on random

[lapsedmodernist]

There are plenty of completely absurd and nonsensical Soviet pop songs. There's a power ballad about a man who has a ticket for the ballet, but not for the tram car, and has nightmares about the tram car chasing him down in the street as all he can do is plead "I only have a ticket for the ballet, not for the tram car!" There is a protopunk tune about a soccer ball that falls in love with a hen but once they get married she won't let him play. There is one where the energetic refrain can be translated as:

Oh why why why, why why why, why why why
Was the streetlight green?
Because because because because
It was in love with life.

You think I am kidding? I am not.

So, in honor of my tentatively planned trip to Rapa Nui (shhhh), I give you a selection from one of the most perplexing and beloved pop songs of my childhood, concerning the fate of a young woman from Easter Island and her unfortunate lover.

In Russian it goes...

U devushki s ostrova Pashi
Ukrali lyubovnika tigri
Ukrali lyubovnika v forme chinovnika
I syeli v sadu pod bananom.

I kazhduyu pyatnitsu, lish solntse zakatitsya
Kogo-to zhuyut pog bananom...

In translation it means

A young woman from the Easter Island
Has had her lover stolen by tigers
Her lover was stolen,
Her bureocrat lover,
And eaten in the garden under the banana tree.

And every Friday as soon as the sun sets,
Someone is being chewed under the banana tree...

Back to the rainforest at the crack of dawn.

Comments

[contrasoma.livejournal.com]

Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me
There lie they, and here lie we
Under the spreading chestnut tree

This stuff sounds awesome. Would love to get a hold of some of these. At its most insidious, pop can (and who knows, perhaps should) be exploited by governments to promote apathy or ( as in this case) anger.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

But the chestnut tree song is English, no? I feel like it's an old folk song although I have only really ever seen it referenced in 1984.

Totally with you on the pop bit. Am surprised the gov't has not conscripted Willie Nelson or cloned Willie nelson a la Wag The Dog in order to pen The Ballad of Jessica Lynch or whatever.

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

I assumed that was the point behind Toby Keith.

[contrasoma.livejournal.com]

I always assumed it was, but couldn't find any non-Orwellian references to it.

Didn't the Jessica Lynch TV movie come out almost instantly after her "rescue"? Apparantly Harrison Ford's been tapped to star in a flick about Fallujah.

Music-wise, it seems like everyone's been a bit slow on the gun this time 'round, on all sides. Outside of Tom Waits' relatively harmless but gorgeous "The Day After Tomorrow" and Merle Haggard's (!) "That's The News," I haven't heard anything (outside of the Warped Tour circuit) that sums it all up. I've been thinking about this a fair bit for the past couple of days, as I've fallen in love all over again with "Bonzo Goes To Bitburg."

[boymaenad.livejournal.com]

I remembered the original song from childhood as "underneath". found this:

http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,772266,00.html

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

I am beyond charmed. Does the Easter Island tiger song have more verses? I am especially happy that it is her bureaucrat lover who is being chewed under the banana tree.

So, you're going to Rapa Nui. Man, you are hitting teh tourist spots. Galapagos. Rapa Nui. I think you may have to buy a pith helmet soon.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

it does have another verse but it would sound kind of racist in translation even though it wasn't in the original

basically the young woman in question gives birth to a brown (or blackfaced, depending on the version, but the word has different connotations in Russian) baby, and he is stolen too, totally naked, and eaten under the banana tree.

She just can't catch a break.

I don't know yet for certain if I am going, I have to figure out how much it would cost. But I would like to.

Pith helmet???

[ochame.livejournal.com]

LOL! I just watched a "Nu Pogodi" episode with my 3yr old, and the "Oh pochemu, pochemu, pochemu, byl svetofor zelenyj" played in the background in that episode. (It was like WTF? green light is what??) I had to stop and think about it for a moment - and you know what? that song was not completely without artistic meaning. There was no irony, and the words in those couple of lines made no sense. Yet if you look at the full text:
http://www.karaoke.ru/song/534.htm
it begins to make sense :)
They loved songs-slash-plays back then, lots of drama and all that.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

I don't remember that Nu Pogodi episode...I do remember the one where the Wolf and the Hare redid Alla Pugacheva's Iceberg, where the Hare dresses up in drag and with make up and sings "takoy holodniy kak iceberg v okeane" and then the wolf sings "A ti takoy prekrasniy kak letom Eskimo."

[mysteryjesse.livejournal.com]

I. Love. That. Song.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

you should cover it!

I think you would be great at covering Russian songs in translation!

[yaghvali.livejournal.com]

Oh why why why, why why why, why why why
Was the streetlight green?
Because because because because
It was in love with life.


makes perfect sense to me.
(happens to me all the time)

for the sake of reference,
the hen and soccer ball love affair makes nonsense to me.

oops. nope... that one makes sense too.

oh dear. so does the first.

but not the last. your childhood pop-tune remains perplexing.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

really? you must have a very...carnivorous? approach to love.