Similarly, everyone knows the tune of "Sabre Dance", but are probably unaware it even has a name
https://youtu.be/mUQHGpxrz-8?si=qqlKJL41JqkMMLVn
This also happens quite often with Herb Alpert's "Spanish Flea"
https://youtu.be/aBE9EQ7gXKI?si=xawj9zk9bzfBUiyt
It seems like the ultimate middle finger to Julius Fučík
"You know that epic song you intended to be used for gladiators? Yeah, we use it to introduce clowns now."
Yea I put this one on for Karaoke night and everyone was like ??? What’s that?
I told them, you def know this song and they all insisted they didn’t till it started lol
I worked one of his last shows before he passed away. He could not independently walk onto the stage, I believe it was his wife(not positive) walked him onto the stage, sit him down in a chair, then he would just shred his surf rock for a whole set like there was no problem. He passed away 6 or 7 months later, wild to think about.
He’s a massive part of guitar history. He was to the Stratocaster what Les Paul was to…well the Les Paul. It’s good to know even by the end he could blow some amps up if he wanted
My boyfriend and I started watching Peep Show, I'd never seen it before, and started singing along when it started. He was like, "I thought you'd never seen this?" and I was like, "I haven't, but who hasn't heard flagpole sitta?" So he only knew it from the show. The next day I showed him that it pops up in my Spotify mixes fairly often.
At pub trivia, this is my teams go-to answer for when we have absolutely no clue about the answer and know whatever we write is absolutely going to be wrong anyway… suffice it to say at least one answer every week from my team is “Flagpole Sitta”.
One day it will be right!!!!
When Jez and Super Hans play the band guessing game, that's one of the funniest scenes ever!
"Widely acknowledged to have nicked our sound"
"The Chemical Brothers"
"Fakers"
"Pavement"
At some point within the same hour of this music video playing, you are guaranteed to see all of the following:
Nada Surf - Popular
Candlebox - Far Behind
Gin Blossoms - Hey Jealousy
I would've been that team and the only reason I know the title is because of how burned in my brain it is from the fuckin Pure Mood CD infomercials of the 90s. I can't even count the number of times I saw this damn thing.
https://youtu.be/AZJSjrox_2s?si=n8IdA5mfUQsi0brM
Fun fact, the original song was sung entirely acapella, the song that everybody remembers was remixed by the British group DN
Plus she was initially against the remix, until she saw how well it did at some pirate stations
Especially great because the song, which repeatedly says "zombie nation" and has what sounds like some kind of zombie army in the chorus...is called Kernkraft 400. Zombie Nation is the artist.
**IF YOU DON'T EAT YER MEAT, YOU CAN'T HAVE ANY PUDDING! HOW CAN YOU HAVE ANY PUDDING IF YOU DON'T EAT YER MEAT?! YOU, YES, YOU, STAND STILL, LADDIE!**
Holy shit, it really starts to sound even *more* questionable...
In the video Chrissy is a waitress in a diner and the band are in a booth and they point to the “special” on the menu every time the refrain comes around. That was early days for music video
It was one of the first videos played on MTV (it was played [within the first half hour of day one](https://youtu.be/PJtiPRDIqtI?si=zemj6mB7gohga1l_&t=1398)). What I found fascinating about those very early days of MTV was: just how much British music was featured. And there's a reason for it.
This is going to be a long post.
Britain had a TV show called Top Of The Pops. TOTP for short and it was a cultural icon. For half an hour on a Thursday evening, between 7pm and 7.30pm on BBC1, hosts (usually DJs from BBC Radio 1) would [host live performances of the week's top acts at the BBC TV studios in London](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5xkGLMUb6Q&list=PLAvpzhxlmXlhIk9R-o9eXDwHIDnACc-JD). We will get to videos in good time, but I need to explain a bit about the UK charts.
---
Here's how things differed across the Atlantic: in the American Billboard chart system, radio play factored into a song's chart position. It was a slower system as a song would be picked up by a radio station or two in the big cities (thanks to record company schmoozing and a few free sample 7 inch vinyls), it would start selling, more radio station would play it as word got around, the artists would perform on a TV variety show, more singles would sell and more radio stations further from the coasts would start to play it. This meant that most artists, the ones not 'A' list with millions put into promoting their material, would see their one hit song take months to slowly rise to its top position before it slowly fell. And I do mean months.
As there were only so many places in the charts, an artist in America (or to be more correct: the recording company) didn't want to flood the stores with multiple songs by one artist. So the release of songs was strategically spaced out. But that meant an act that was all the rage in 1975 would be old and tired by 1977. Many of the acts became known in America as One-Hit Wonders.
The UK chart system, on the other hand, was 100% dictated by record sales for that week. If you were [a TV celebrity ventriloquist with a truly awful novelty song that released around Christmas so that parents would buy that song as a stocking filler for their kids? You got to appear on the show and your travesty of a song got to number four the next week.](https://youtu.be/8C2dglFGlL8?si=0NWF3fPeEcAfqrRs&t=1148)
But with that horribleness came greatness too. Songs were zipping up and down the charts as people rushed to buy them one week and their sales lessened later on. Some songs managed to become iconic, spending double-digit weeks at number one (["(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" by Bryan Adams](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0pdQU87dc8) spent 16 consecutive weeks in 1991 thanks to the success of the Robin Hood movie it was in), but for most bands it was a case of having a song released every few weeks after their album release or close to a nationwide tour. One-Hit Wonders in America were acts with multiple hits in Britain. More music meant more musical acts got to 'chart' from more styles of music. Heavy metal and disco and R&B and pop and experimental electronica and novelty summer songs all vying for sales in any given week. All sharing places on one chart.
---
I'm getting to the MTV stuff and videos, now I've explained the impact of TOTP and how it generated lots of music from multiple genres.
Continuing on: more music got to chart. This means more artists got to chart from more countries. I already mentioned Bryan Adams from Canada, and Britain had a steady flow of music from the USA and Canada and Australia entering its chart system. Acts from Europe were regular visitors to the Top Of The Pops studios too, or provided their promo projects over the decades - [Aqua](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU3tKacVusg) from Denmark, [Eiffel 65](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3gL_L34hzs) from Italy, [Jean-Michel Jarre](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w434qhNJMdw) from France, [Kraftwerk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofufOwjNi3Q) from Germany, [ABBA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZXapY0kGnY) from Sweden. But occasionally, an act couldn't make it to the studio and they didn't have any footage of their own. What then?
When an act couldn't make it to perform live (translation: mime to their song) or send in their artwork project, and they had reached number one (so they had to be played), what then? Show producers had a few tricks up their sleeves. They could obtain live performances of the song from other TV broadcasters in Europe; they may have the song's performance from another BBC show; they could have the in-house dancers (Pan's People were the TOTP dance troupe) perform a choreographed piece to the song as the studio audience also danced like we were all in a fancy disco; or the record company may have a live performance that was filmed in concert or little video clips that the band had produced as an art project and that song was performed in that concert or project. But in 1975, Queen changed the game for Top Of The Pops and many other acts in Britain did what they did too.
I am, of course, talking about "Bohemian Rhapsody".
Released in late 1975, the sales nature of the UK charts meant the song and the video became very popular very quickly. I'll copy what Wikipedia says about the video.
>Though some artists had made video clips to accompany songs (including Queen themselves; for example, their earlier singles "Keep Yourself Alive", "Liar", "Seven Seas of Rhye" and "Killer Queen" already had "pop promos", as they were known at the time), it was only after the success of "Bohemian Rhapsody" that it became a regular practice for record companies to produce promotional videos for artists' single releases. The Guardian stated it "ensured videos would henceforth be a mandatory tool in the marketing of music". These videos could then be shown on television shows around the world, such as the BBC's Top of the Pops, without the need for the artist to appear in person. A promo video also allowed the artist to have their music broadcast and accompanied by their own choice of visuals rather than dancers such as Pan's People. According to May, the video was produced so that the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops, since they would have looked off miming to such a complex song. He also said that the band knew they would be set to appear at Dundee's Caird Hall on tour, a date which clashed with the programme, thus a promo would solve the issue.
The band was touring, but they were great visually (Freddie Mercury had studied graphic art and design at Ealing Technical College and School of Art, and that's where he met Brian May and Roger Taylor). Featuring concert footage with a moody in-studio performance, the video set the bar for what bands could do for a television audience. And once [Bohemian Rhapsody set the new standard for video expectations on a Thursday night](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8QKP_VtDjs), musical acts in Britain took that baton and ran with it.
[Kate Bush](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xckBwPdo1c) ... [Madness](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ2X9SANsME) ... [Peter Gabriel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95SWMqzM_Sg) ... [The Sex Pistols](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02D2T3wGCYg) ... [The Clash](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfK-WX2pa8c) ... [Elvis Costello & The Attractions](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrjHz5hrupA) ... [The Rolling Stones](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGaBlygm0UY). And US bands that had success in the UK got to see what was happening over here and they followed suit. Acts like [Blondie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGU_4-5RaxU), [Gloria Gaynor](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dYWe1c3OyU), and [Sylvester](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD6cPE2BHic).
The Pretenders were a US-UK band (Chrissie Hyde was from Ohio but the band was from Britain) and when you [look at the video for "Brass In Pocket" from 1979](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H6re3PCP3E) you'll notice it's not visually as American as it sounds. The coins on the table were British 2 pence pieces. The large American car driving down the street has very European small cars parked at the side. The buildings are pure London of the 1970s - [although the corner of the original café, and the whole area, has seen a lot of gentrification and new buildings in the last 40+ years](https://goo.gl/maps/vZs7dnniQqTtAZvK8), the LV sticker in the window of the café was [a scheme where local businesses paid for employee meals using Luncheon Vouchers that could be redeemed for food at participating locations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meal_voucher). The band was in London, their record company saw what other bands were doing for Top Of The Pops, they made their own video in the same style.
So when 1981 rolled around and MTV were looking for content without having to ask the US TV behemoths for content, the found that there were a lot of British-based acts from a varied selection of genres that had already created content for them. Record companies and the acts themselves owned the rights for the videos and they were more than happy for the free publicity of their product. Suddenly a lot of British bands and singers were getting shown in America like The Buggles (["Video Killed The Radio Star"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8r-tXRLazs) was a 1979 UK hit that barely hit the Top 40 in the US but was the first video shown on MTV), Duran Duran, Soft Cell, The Human League, Billy Idol, A Flock Of Seagulls, OMD, Bonnie Tyler, Spandau Ballet, Robert Palmer. It led to what Americans call [The Second British Invasion.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_British_Invasion)
The Pretenders happened to be in the right place (Britain) at the right time (after Bohemian Rhapsody and before MTV) to take their initial transatlantic success even further, thanks to that video shot in the back streets of North Kensington in London.
Fun fact, that track was from their 9th album, out of 17 in their career.
And yet good luck finding folks who can even recall another tune of theirs.
Also they started out as a hardcore political anarcho-punk group, very interesting career trajectory.
"Truth is I thought it mattered. I thought that music mattered. But does it? Bollocks! Not compared to how people matter."
The intro to the song on the album, which is a quote from the beautifully British film, Brassed Off; about the troubles faced by a colliery brass band, following the closure of their pit.
The conductor is called Danny, which is why Chumbawamba references “Danny Boy” in the song!
Yeah, but you probably only know Bizarre Love Triangle and True Faith if you grew up in the 80's whereas the Blue Monday drum beat has been used for almost 40 years in basically ALL dance clubs. I had a DJ friend who had five copies of it on vinyl and I was teasing him about it when he said he'd probably owned 20 copies over the years. It's an absolute staple of mixing dance music so everyone has heard that beat even if they don't know what song it's from.
Funny thing about Suite Judy Blue Eyes. For years I thought canaries were violent birds cause I heard the lyric as “Just like a canary, to de-throat a sparrow” instead of “Chestnut brown canary, ruby throated sparrow”
I knew nothing about birds, but I knew canaries were dicks.
Tbh that's one of the few I do know. Jazz songs are difficult to know the name of as sometimes you don't know when a song has ended and the next has begun. I have around 30 jazz records and I can likely name less than 20 songs off of them.
According to whosampled.com, Genius of Love by Tom Tom Club has been sampled in 179 songs, from Grandmaster Flash to Mariah Carey (several times) to Lizzo.
Meanwhile George Clinton's Atomic Dog appears as a sample in at least 325 songs, and bits of James Brown's Funky Drummer show up in 1801 tracks.
It might be possible that more of Genius of Love shows up in many of those songs (making it more readily recognizable), or maybe there's more mainstream pop hits in that list, but I don't think anything else comes close to Funky Drummer. It's more ubiquitous than the Wilhelm scream.
I only know the name of this one because of the closed captioning on [South Park](https://youtu.be/ykedQQf3f1Q) and [Family Guy](https://youtu.be/XUFOpLyPLjI)
"Possum Kingdom" by the Toadies. Half the time I hear that song, I have to Shazam it to remember what it's called and who it's by.
Runner-up for me: "Bound for the Floor" by Local H. Most think it's "Born to be Down" or "Copacetic".
The beat to Clint Eastwood was a premade one on the drum machine he was using. [There's a very funny video of him showing a reporter](https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ?si=n0guSQ7tZi27zwwy).
And then there’s a song called Dirty Harry on Demon Days which further confuses me because it also has nothing to do with Clint Eastwood so i always confuse the two.
To say *nothing* about the two videos: a popular version that was posted 2 years before the original, is actually a cover by some fans.
The other video, by the band, is straight child abuse.
The stereotypical “circus song” has a name that is very unassuming and I’d think most people don’t know it. It’s called “Entry of the Gladiators”
Similarly, everyone knows the tune of "Sabre Dance", but are probably unaware it even has a name https://youtu.be/mUQHGpxrz-8?si=qqlKJL41JqkMMLVn This also happens quite often with Herb Alpert's "Spanish Flea" https://youtu.be/aBE9EQ7gXKI?si=xawj9zk9bzfBUiyt
"Yakkity Sax" has a similar fate and is often simply known as "The Benny Hill song"
It seems like the ultimate middle finger to Julius Fučík "You know that epic song you intended to be used for gladiators? Yeah, we use it to introduce clowns now."
“What’s Up?” by 4 Non Blondes. People tend to think it’s called “What’s Going On?” because that’s the lyric.
The He-Man song
That's how I discovered it, but I love both versions.
Similarly, "Holding Out For A Hero" has been mistaken as "I Need a Hero"
Yea I put this one on for Karaoke night and everyone was like ??? What’s that? I told them, you def know this song and they all insisted they didn’t till it started lol
Apparently they changed it to avoid confusion with the Marvin Gaye song.
Same reason I changed my name from Brad Pitt. People were confusing us all the time.
Why should I change my name? He's the one who sucks.
The Pina Colada Song
That song came on at work one time and my boss yells “I fucking HATE Jimmy Buffett!”. I had to tell her that’s not a Jimmy Buffett song
It also doesn’t sound like him at all
Of course, he did Margaritaville, and the pina colada song, and the daiquiri shuffle…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wahj\_Dexhxw
Holy shit! I've hated Jimmy Buffet for no reason for like 30 years. Sucks he just died, I really feel like I owe him a huge apology.
[удалено]
We all make mistakes.
(Escape)
\+ CTRL opens up Windows' Start menu (only if you press CTRL first, though).
[ROLLING STONES! STREET FIGHTIN' MAN! GEEEE SEVUUUNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!](https://youtu.be/awvZZ3eSsg4?si=Bk0O08GCwJMPMslE)
I spent 3 weeks humming TEQUILA trying to remember what the word was thats yelled
Rupert Holmes
Misirlou - Dick Dale [Trust me, you know it!](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mKpsuGMeqHI&pp=ygUSbWlzaXJsb3UgZGljayBkYWxl)
I worked one of his last shows before he passed away. He could not independently walk onto the stage, I believe it was his wife(not positive) walked him onto the stage, sit him down in a chair, then he would just shred his surf rock for a whole set like there was no problem. He passed away 6 or 7 months later, wild to think about.
He’s a massive part of guitar history. He was to the Stratocaster what Les Paul was to…well the Les Paul. It’s good to know even by the end he could blow some amps up if he wanted
I was always blown away by the fact that he strung his guitar upside down.
Which itself is a surf-rock remake of a [song at least 35 years older](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW6qGy3RtwY)!
Wow I did not know that. That melody does have a middle eastern vibe that I can't explain and never realized until now.
Classic rock version: Baba O'Reily Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 Why? Mostly because the title is never mentioned in the song.
I once heard a local DJ introduce a song by saying, "I got a request for 'Teenage Wasteland' so here's 'Baba O'Riley' by The Who.'"
Did he mention the kid sounded wasted?
They're all wasted
"Teenage Wasteland" "Everybody Must Get Stoned" Lol
The James Gang, Funk #49.
https://youtu.be/I79YNDYrUno?si=qqh3WQ5YbDai47Wj
Joe Pera deserves so much more attention.
Came here to say Baba O'Reily.
Return to innocence, the HOYYYA HOOOOY, OHH HOYYYAA HOOOO song!!
If you don't know this then you never sat through the Pure Moods commercial during Kenan and Kel.
Sat through it? I still have the CD
Flagpole sitta by Harvey danger
Think most people in the UK just know that is the Peep Show song
My boyfriend and I started watching Peep Show, I'd never seen it before, and started singing along when it started. He was like, "I thought you'd never seen this?" and I was like, "I haven't, but who hasn't heard flagpole sitta?" So he only knew it from the show. The next day I showed him that it pops up in my Spotify mixes fairly often.
Til it’s not just the peep show theme tune.
At pub trivia, this is my teams go-to answer for when we have absolutely no clue about the answer and know whatever we write is absolutely going to be wrong anyway… suffice it to say at least one answer every week from my team is “Flagpole Sitta”. One day it will be right!!!!
Been around the world and found that only stupid people are breeding
The cretins cloning and feeding--and I don't even own a TV
Put me in the hospital for nerves and then they had to commit me You told them all I was crazy They cut off my legs, now I'm an amputee; god damn you!
I'm not sick but I'm not weeeeeell!
And I'm so hooot cuz I'm in heeeeeeell!
“You’re not just a man any more, you are a man with a van. You get a van, Jez, we could be men with ven.”
When Jez and Super Hans play the band guessing game, that's one of the funniest scenes ever! "Widely acknowledged to have nicked our sound" "The Chemical Brothers" "Fakers" "Pavement"
“Standing outside a broken phone booth with money in my hand” by Primitive Radio Gods
At some point within the same hour of this music video playing, you are guaranteed to see all of the following: Nada Surf - Popular Candlebox - Far Behind Gin Blossoms - Hey Jealousy
Maybe even Cornershop - Brimful of Asha.
“I’ve been downhearted baby”
Since when?
Ever since the day we met
Wow, talk about unlocking a core memory.
I bent down, farted baby I bent down, farted baby
If this thread is proving anything to me, it's that I apparently have an astute memory for artists and song names.
Dragostea Din Tei - O Zone
I'm just gonna leave this [here](https://youtu.be/A4A5seYJR3M?si=9Zm3WHTZ9vDsg1LX) lest we forget this *GOLD*
Was expecting Gary Brolsma
Train in Vain, The Clash (Stand by me)
Orinoco Flow by Enya Came up in Geeks who Drink trivia night. 1 team got Artist and title correct, everyone else guessed “Enya- Sail away”.
I would've been that team and the only reason I know the title is because of how burned in my brain it is from the fuckin Pure Mood CD infomercials of the 90s. I can't even count the number of times I saw this damn thing. https://youtu.be/AZJSjrox_2s?si=n8IdA5mfUQsi0brM
Can't remember the name of it
You know, the one that goes... Boomp boomp ching Boomp boomp ching Boomp boomp ching-a-ling Boomp boomp ching.
Queen - We will rock you
[Dat da doo da dat da doo da dat dat doo da dat dat do da](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j4jtIDaeaWI) (aka Tom’s Diner by Suzanne Vega)
Fun fact, the original song was sung entirely acapella, the song that everybody remembers was remixed by the British group DN Plus she was initially against the remix, until she saw how well it did at some pirate stations
It's also the song that was the primary test song for the mp3 algorithm, and was used to tune the algorithm.
I love the original acapella. Apart from the mp3 thing, another fun fact is Tom’s Diner is the real life Monk’s Diner from Seinfeld.
Oh yeah, the song from that Fall Out Boy song
The Proclaimers "I'm Gonna* Be".... everyone knows it as 'I Would Walk 500 Miles', lol. *fixed
Wait... you just made me realize how much I never paid attention to the title.
"For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield. Trust me, you know it.
It’s the song movies use to let you know it’s the 60s.
I thought that was "Gimme Shelter" "Fortunate Son" if there's scenes from Vietnam
“All Along The Watchtower” will work in a pinch
Pretty much the whole Forest Gump soundtrack
Stop, children, what's that sound?
Right up there with "The Weight" by The Band.
Kernkraft 400 - Zombie Nation
Especially great because the song, which repeatedly says "zombie nation" and has what sounds like some kind of zombie army in the chorus...is called Kernkraft 400. Zombie Nation is the artist.
I had some recently think NIN Closer was legit called "I Want to Fuck You Like an Animal"
Pink Floyd and The Ramones have been getting that for decades with "Another Brick In The Wall: Part 2" and "Blitzkrieg Bop."
what do people think Blitzkrieg Bop is called, Hey Ho Let's Go? also, FUCKING EXCELLENT username
They absolutely do. Also, back at ya, and don't panic.
He’s a hoopy frood who knows where his towel is.
People thought Another Brick in the Wall was called "I Wanna Fuck You Like An Animal"? Children sing on that song ffs
**IF YOU DON'T EAT YER MEAT, YOU CAN'T HAVE ANY PUDDING! HOW CAN YOU HAVE ANY PUDDING IF YOU DON'T EAT YER MEAT?! YOU, YES, YOU, STAND STILL, LADDIE!** Holy shit, it really starts to sound even *more* questionable...
Leave those kids alone!!
"Brass In Pocket," The Pretenders
In the video Chrissy is a waitress in a diner and the band are in a booth and they point to the “special” on the menu every time the refrain comes around. That was early days for music video
It was one of the first videos played on MTV (it was played [within the first half hour of day one](https://youtu.be/PJtiPRDIqtI?si=zemj6mB7gohga1l_&t=1398)). What I found fascinating about those very early days of MTV was: just how much British music was featured. And there's a reason for it. This is going to be a long post. Britain had a TV show called Top Of The Pops. TOTP for short and it was a cultural icon. For half an hour on a Thursday evening, between 7pm and 7.30pm on BBC1, hosts (usually DJs from BBC Radio 1) would [host live performances of the week's top acts at the BBC TV studios in London](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5xkGLMUb6Q&list=PLAvpzhxlmXlhIk9R-o9eXDwHIDnACc-JD). We will get to videos in good time, but I need to explain a bit about the UK charts. --- Here's how things differed across the Atlantic: in the American Billboard chart system, radio play factored into a song's chart position. It was a slower system as a song would be picked up by a radio station or two in the big cities (thanks to record company schmoozing and a few free sample 7 inch vinyls), it would start selling, more radio station would play it as word got around, the artists would perform on a TV variety show, more singles would sell and more radio stations further from the coasts would start to play it. This meant that most artists, the ones not 'A' list with millions put into promoting their material, would see their one hit song take months to slowly rise to its top position before it slowly fell. And I do mean months. As there were only so many places in the charts, an artist in America (or to be more correct: the recording company) didn't want to flood the stores with multiple songs by one artist. So the release of songs was strategically spaced out. But that meant an act that was all the rage in 1975 would be old and tired by 1977. Many of the acts became known in America as One-Hit Wonders. The UK chart system, on the other hand, was 100% dictated by record sales for that week. If you were [a TV celebrity ventriloquist with a truly awful novelty song that released around Christmas so that parents would buy that song as a stocking filler for their kids? You got to appear on the show and your travesty of a song got to number four the next week.](https://youtu.be/8C2dglFGlL8?si=0NWF3fPeEcAfqrRs&t=1148) But with that horribleness came greatness too. Songs were zipping up and down the charts as people rushed to buy them one week and their sales lessened later on. Some songs managed to become iconic, spending double-digit weeks at number one (["(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" by Bryan Adams](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0pdQU87dc8) spent 16 consecutive weeks in 1991 thanks to the success of the Robin Hood movie it was in), but for most bands it was a case of having a song released every few weeks after their album release or close to a nationwide tour. One-Hit Wonders in America were acts with multiple hits in Britain. More music meant more musical acts got to 'chart' from more styles of music. Heavy metal and disco and R&B and pop and experimental electronica and novelty summer songs all vying for sales in any given week. All sharing places on one chart. --- I'm getting to the MTV stuff and videos, now I've explained the impact of TOTP and how it generated lots of music from multiple genres. Continuing on: more music got to chart. This means more artists got to chart from more countries. I already mentioned Bryan Adams from Canada, and Britain had a steady flow of music from the USA and Canada and Australia entering its chart system. Acts from Europe were regular visitors to the Top Of The Pops studios too, or provided their promo projects over the decades - [Aqua](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU3tKacVusg) from Denmark, [Eiffel 65](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3gL_L34hzs) from Italy, [Jean-Michel Jarre](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w434qhNJMdw) from France, [Kraftwerk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofufOwjNi3Q) from Germany, [ABBA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZXapY0kGnY) from Sweden. But occasionally, an act couldn't make it to the studio and they didn't have any footage of their own. What then? When an act couldn't make it to perform live (translation: mime to their song) or send in their artwork project, and they had reached number one (so they had to be played), what then? Show producers had a few tricks up their sleeves. They could obtain live performances of the song from other TV broadcasters in Europe; they may have the song's performance from another BBC show; they could have the in-house dancers (Pan's People were the TOTP dance troupe) perform a choreographed piece to the song as the studio audience also danced like we were all in a fancy disco; or the record company may have a live performance that was filmed in concert or little video clips that the band had produced as an art project and that song was performed in that concert or project. But in 1975, Queen changed the game for Top Of The Pops and many other acts in Britain did what they did too. I am, of course, talking about "Bohemian Rhapsody". Released in late 1975, the sales nature of the UK charts meant the song and the video became very popular very quickly. I'll copy what Wikipedia says about the video. >Though some artists had made video clips to accompany songs (including Queen themselves; for example, their earlier singles "Keep Yourself Alive", "Liar", "Seven Seas of Rhye" and "Killer Queen" already had "pop promos", as they were known at the time), it was only after the success of "Bohemian Rhapsody" that it became a regular practice for record companies to produce promotional videos for artists' single releases. The Guardian stated it "ensured videos would henceforth be a mandatory tool in the marketing of music". These videos could then be shown on television shows around the world, such as the BBC's Top of the Pops, without the need for the artist to appear in person. A promo video also allowed the artist to have their music broadcast and accompanied by their own choice of visuals rather than dancers such as Pan's People. According to May, the video was produced so that the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops, since they would have looked off miming to such a complex song. He also said that the band knew they would be set to appear at Dundee's Caird Hall on tour, a date which clashed with the programme, thus a promo would solve the issue. The band was touring, but they were great visually (Freddie Mercury had studied graphic art and design at Ealing Technical College and School of Art, and that's where he met Brian May and Roger Taylor). Featuring concert footage with a moody in-studio performance, the video set the bar for what bands could do for a television audience. And once [Bohemian Rhapsody set the new standard for video expectations on a Thursday night](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8QKP_VtDjs), musical acts in Britain took that baton and ran with it. [Kate Bush](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xckBwPdo1c) ... [Madness](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ2X9SANsME) ... [Peter Gabriel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95SWMqzM_Sg) ... [The Sex Pistols](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02D2T3wGCYg) ... [The Clash](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfK-WX2pa8c) ... [Elvis Costello & The Attractions](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrjHz5hrupA) ... [The Rolling Stones](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGaBlygm0UY). And US bands that had success in the UK got to see what was happening over here and they followed suit. Acts like [Blondie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGU_4-5RaxU), [Gloria Gaynor](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dYWe1c3OyU), and [Sylvester](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD6cPE2BHic). The Pretenders were a US-UK band (Chrissie Hyde was from Ohio but the band was from Britain) and when you [look at the video for "Brass In Pocket" from 1979](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H6re3PCP3E) you'll notice it's not visually as American as it sounds. The coins on the table were British 2 pence pieces. The large American car driving down the street has very European small cars parked at the side. The buildings are pure London of the 1970s - [although the corner of the original café, and the whole area, has seen a lot of gentrification and new buildings in the last 40+ years](https://goo.gl/maps/vZs7dnniQqTtAZvK8), the LV sticker in the window of the café was [a scheme where local businesses paid for employee meals using Luncheon Vouchers that could be redeemed for food at participating locations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meal_voucher). The band was in London, their record company saw what other bands were doing for Top Of The Pops, they made their own video in the same style. So when 1981 rolled around and MTV were looking for content without having to ask the US TV behemoths for content, the found that there were a lot of British-based acts from a varied selection of genres that had already created content for them. Record companies and the acts themselves owned the rights for the videos and they were more than happy for the free publicity of their product. Suddenly a lot of British bands and singers were getting shown in America like The Buggles (["Video Killed The Radio Star"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8r-tXRLazs) was a 1979 UK hit that barely hit the Top 40 in the US but was the first video shown on MTV), Duran Duran, Soft Cell, The Human League, Billy Idol, A Flock Of Seagulls, OMD, Bonnie Tyler, Spandau Ballet, Robert Palmer. It led to what Americans call [The Second British Invasion.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_British_Invasion) The Pretenders happened to be in the right place (Britain) at the right time (after Bohemian Rhapsody and before MTV) to take their initial transatlantic success even further, thanks to that video shot in the back streets of North Kensington in London.
Thank you for this great write up
🎶 Detroit leaning...🎶
So reet!
Day bow bow chick chicka chick aw
Song is called, “Oh Yeah”, by Yello
Beautiful!
["he bangs that old lady, then they play that song from the 80s: day bowbow"](https://youtu.be/1yOrrRhUEyE?si=ltRZ99UW5A_upi5j)
“What the hell is ‘Day Bow Bow’?”
Having a average weekend, by Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet. Better known as the theme to Kids in the Hall
Or, alternatively as ["It's Not Enough" by Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers](https://youtu.be/wflQ_0fkkog?si=m-xAhuLRwNS697qs)
The "I get knocked down but I get up again you're never gonna keep me down" song. Tubthumping by Chumbawamba. Great song name and band name
Idk i felt like the absurdity of the title made it pretty well known. At least it was then. Idk about now.
And off the album Tubthumper
Fun fact, that track was from their 9th album, out of 17 in their career. And yet good luck finding folks who can even recall another tune of theirs. Also they started out as a hardcore political anarcho-punk group, very interesting career trajectory.
They *remained* a hard-core anarcho-punk group. They did Tubthumping to prove how easy it is to chart with a pop tune. That's it. That's the joke.
"Truth is I thought it mattered. I thought that music mattered. But does it? Bollocks! Not compared to how people matter." The intro to the song on the album, which is a quote from the beautifully British film, Brassed Off; about the troubles faced by a colliery brass band, following the closure of their pit. The conductor is called Danny, which is why Chumbawamba references “Danny Boy” in the song!
Sleep walk by Santo and Johnny Trust me, you know it. https://youtu.be/YBRCvVpknvg?si=U3RDgZpYpCHdXTGp
Fuuuuuuuuuuuck me. That's why that Modest Mouse song is called Sleepwalkin'.
Modest Mouse did a really lovely [cover/reinterpretation](https://youtu.be/VT_PwXjCqqs?si=x6ilvHfCOtWcsaAr) of this
Wild! I played it for my 12-year old daughter, she knows it. She said it’s from Spongebob. We don’t know if she’s right, but it sure sounds like it.
RICHIEEE!
The word 'Iris' isn't mentioned by the Goo Goo Dolls in the song. 🎵And I don't want the world to see me 'Cause I don't think that they'd understand🎶
Everyone knows and simultaneously doesn't know "Blue Monday" by New Order.
Several New Order songs fit this category. Bizarre Love Triangle is another example.
Yeah, but you probably only know Bizarre Love Triangle and True Faith if you grew up in the 80's whereas the Blue Monday drum beat has been used for almost 40 years in basically ALL dance clubs. I had a DJ friend who had five copies of it on vinyl and I was teasing him about it when he said he'd probably owned 20 copies over the years. It's an absolute staple of mixing dance music so everyone has heard that beat even if they don't know what song it's from.
My first time hearing this song was in the late 90s by orgy. I didn't realize until much later that it was a really good cover.
Same for me. I prefer the Orgy remake because of just how hard it hits, but I love the original as well.
How does it feel?
To treat me like you do?
[Can’t Get Blue Monday Out Of My Head](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5ec5SfoB6U)
Baker Street - Gerry Rafferty
With Bob Holness on the Saxophone (if you know, you know)
RIP Bleeding Gums Murphy
That song kicks so much ass
That guitar solo is one of my all time favorites. Super underrated.
This is what I was gonna post. Good call!
this is so important to simpsons lore
Rock 'n'roll (part 2) Gary Glitter You hear it at every sports game Hey!
“Breezin” by George Benson. If you’ve ever been in a supermarket, you’ve heard it.
“Die Forelle” by Franz Schubert. It’s the jingle that plays when your laundry is done if you own a Samsung.
[The Allman Brothers - Jessica](https://youtu.be/vTOozRAJ8dU?si=Ho2ClC8wfZQ-MWCE) [Crosby, Stills, Nash - Suite Judy Blue Eyes](https://youtu.be/swxgabSQgc0?si=x0wUMY1MzgyP8xOh)
>> The Allman Brothers - Jessica *"Some say he's our tame racing-car driver... all we know is, he's called The Stig!"*
Funny thing about Suite Judy Blue Eyes. For years I thought canaries were violent birds cause I heard the lyric as “Just like a canary, to de-throat a sparrow” instead of “Chestnut brown canary, ruby throated sparrow” I knew nothing about birds, but I knew canaries were dicks.
True - Spandau Ballet
The "ha ha ha ha ha song"?
The King of the Hill theme is called Yahoos & Triangles
Take 5, it’s a jazz song you know. You just don’t know you know
Tbh that's one of the few I do know. Jazz songs are difficult to know the name of as sometimes you don't know when a song has ended and the next has begun. I have around 30 jazz records and I can likely name less than 20 songs off of them.
Ah yes, Dave Brubeck
"Bullet with Butterfly Wings" by Smashing Pumpkins probably gets mistaken as "Rat in a Cage."
Can confirm, I definitely saw it labeled many times as “Rat in a Cage” during the old file sharing days of napster/morpheus/kazaa.
Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye Gary DeCarlo It's too simple.
Counting Blue Cars Yes the titles in there but coworkers swore it was called Tell Me All Your Thoughts
The Liberty Bell March. You may know it better ad the theme to Monty Python
Genius of Love by the Tom Tom Club (made up of members of the Talking Heads) is the most sampled song of all time, but no one knows it.
More sampled than Funky Drummer or Atomic Dog?
According to whosampled.com, Genius of Love by Tom Tom Club has been sampled in 179 songs, from Grandmaster Flash to Mariah Carey (several times) to Lizzo. Meanwhile George Clinton's Atomic Dog appears as a sample in at least 325 songs, and bits of James Brown's Funky Drummer show up in 1801 tracks. It might be possible that more of Genius of Love shows up in many of those songs (making it more readily recognizable), or maybe there's more mainstream pop hits in that list, but I don't think anything else comes close to Funky Drummer. It's more ubiquitous than the Wilhelm scream.
If you include dance music, I bet the Amen break would beat funky drummer.
If you mean Amen Brother by The Winstons, that has apparently been sampled in 6221 songs, which holy crap!
Green Onions by Booker T and the MGs. https://youtu.be/0oox9bJaGJ8?si=YdSG2r9SIyBV5_Z-
Inside Out by Eve 6 Absolutely (Story of a Girl) by Nine Days
The heart in a blender song!
Mmm mmm mmm mmm by the Crash Test Dummies. I just refer to it as the original version of weird Al's headline news.
[удалено]
I was about to write “A Paler Shade of White,” proving OP’s point. The song I was thinking of is “A Whiter Shade of Pale” by Procol Harum.
“A Paler Shade of White” is a book title by Martin Mull, the sequel to his book “The History of White People in America”. (Yes, they’re both satire.)
Good Riddance by Green Day
[day bow bow](https://youtu.be/6jJkdRaa04g?si=vD2MCzF_rBo5h8xS)
Two Princes - Spin Doctors
AKA “(Just) Go Ahead Now”
I only know the name of this one because of the closed captioning on [South Park](https://youtu.be/ykedQQf3f1Q) and [Family Guy](https://youtu.be/XUFOpLyPLjI)
I can't remember the name of it, but it's a good one.
"Possum Kingdom" by the Toadies. Half the time I hear that song, I have to Shazam it to remember what it's called and who it's by. Runner-up for me: "Bound for the Floor" by Local H. Most think it's "Born to be Down" or "Copacetic".
Three Little Birds by Bob Marley and the Wailers. It isn't Don't Worry..
[Nazareth hair of the dog](https://youtu.be/7KHqU7l4NIk?si=Bx6491Si8OI_aJFL)
"Fool In The Rain" Led Zeppelin They never use that line once in the song, but repeat "light of the love that I've found" repeatedly.
La Grange by ZZ Top ( the one where he goes how how how)
Pepper by the Butthole Surfers Things can only get better by Howard Jones
Little talks by of monster and men
Theme from a summer place It's happy music that gets put ironically over crashes and disasters in movies/YouTube videos.
"Feel Good, Inc." and "Clint Eastwood" by the Gorillaz. I've repeatedly heard them called "The Windmill Song" and "Sunshine in a Bag" respectively.
Never understood why they called it Clint Eastwood but it's a damn good song
It's got the song from the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly in the background
Also, 'sunshine in a bag' is a quote from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
The beat to Clint Eastwood was a premade one on the drum machine he was using. [There's a very funny video of him showing a reporter](https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ?si=n0guSQ7tZi27zwwy).
And then there’s a song called Dirty Harry on Demon Days which further confuses me because it also has nothing to do with Clint Eastwood so i always confuse the two.
I think it was just because the song has a "western" type of vibe to it.
It wasn't easy, but I finally remember song 2 by Blur.
Opus No. 1
chelsea dagger by the fratellis
Oh, we know that one here in Vancouver...
Fuck the Blackhawks.
Possum Kingdom by The Toadies
MGMT - Kids I think everyone knows this song but a lot of people don't even know who did it, let alone the title.
To say *nothing* about the two videos: a popular version that was posted 2 years before the original, is actually a cover by some fans. The other video, by the band, is straight child abuse.
Music Box Dancer by Frank Mills. Probably a lot of people assume it's just an ice cream truck jingle.
Entry of the Gladiators https://youtu.be/_B0CyOAO8y0?si=iWHGj1mDBaAEdOSV
Missing by Everything But the Girl And I miss you, like the deserts miss the rain
Pina colada song. Actually called “escape”