Elvis Costello asks radio stations not to play Oliver's Army

VillageIdiot71 · 12-01-2022 3:29pm #1

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-59950583

Yeah, there's a lot of This Sort of Thing. I just found it a little sad, coming from the guy who wrote "Radio Radio"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eD_24nDzkeo

TooTired123 · 12-01-2022 11:25pm

Everything will eventually go very quiet. There’s hardly a hit song without at least one lyric that will offend someone, or will have been performed by someone whose lifestyle is or was offensive in some way.

So slowly but surely they will all have to pulled and we will all sit in silence.

standardg60 · 12-01-2022 11:29pm

Yep i think sad is the only word.

[Deleted User] · 12-01-2022 11:34pm

In fairness to E Costello I think he's just getting 'ahead' of the 'curve'. All in all, I think it IS a great song & never felt it had any negative connotations...... but, I Guess, that's just the society we live in nowadays. Without sounding like a parrot.......i find it SAD

Quantum Erasure · 13-01-2022 6:07am

they should just say 'sorry, but Oliver's army is here to stay...'

Mad_maxx · 13-01-2022 9:14am

WOKE wanker

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 9:26am

from reading the article, i think you're jumping to conclusions. he's not saying he shouldn't have written the song, the two reasons he mentioned was that by bleeping the song the BBC etc. makes it sound worse, and that people were misinterpreting the song and i guess he's probably sick of having to explain or defend himself.

foxsake · 13-01-2022 9:30am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465752#Comment_118465752

context seems have been a forgotten concept.

in this case he seems to be placating the perpetually offended before they even got offended.

[Deleted User] · 13-01-2022 9:42am

Most exciting thing this musical bore has done in decades. :)

is_that_so · 13-01-2022 9:46am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465724#Comment_118465724

Nah, he's just pretty annoyed at being labelled as something by people who just see a single word in a song about the 1970s. The expression also includes the word "white" as well and is very much a bygone era comment. Great song and a regular listen for me but quite surprised it hasn't been targeted before now.

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 9:48am

on his comment that bleeping it only draws attention to it, it's quite obvious what he means; that song could be on the radio and most people wouldn't be listening to the lyrics, but the bleep would be an immediate attention grabber.

i remember when i was younger, and the first time i properly copped the phenomenon, when 'dirty boulevard' by lou reed was released as a single; the censored word here was 'suck', but the bleep really caught the attention; and as in oliver's army, the word rhymes with the previous line so it's fairly clear to the listener what the bleeped word is anyway (though in this case people might think it's another word rhyming with buck, as i did):

"A small kid stands by the Lincoln Tunnel

He's selling plastic roses for a buck

The traffic's backed up to 39th street

The TV whores are calling the cops out for a ****"

alias no.9 · 13-01-2022 9:58am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465769#Comment_118465769

Not sure he is to be honest. What he seems to be saying is that they're going to to come and take one word out of the context it was written to make it a problem. Rather than wasting his time trying to explain or ruining the song by beeping it out, he'd just prefer they didn't play it / listen to it.

Mad_maxx · 13-01-2022 10:04am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465814#Comment_118465814

He offered himself up on a plate to the WOKE gestapo

Artists need to defend their work , words are often about context

Art will be effectively dead in twenty years the way things are going

quinnd6 · 13-01-2022 10:09am

We're gone back to the 50s, it's worse than ever. Everything has to be censored, can't say anything anymore. We're in the most backward, annoying, stupid censored era of all time. Actually worse than the 50s it is. Freedom of expression is dead. All you have is leftist Nazis. Music is being ruined, comedy is being ruined, everything is being ruined, I hate it. It's a word in a song, nobody should care and if they do let them go take a hike.

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 10:21am

We're in the most backward, annoying, stupid censored era of all time

hard to take you seriously if that's the sort of guff you're saying?

[Deleted User] · 13-01-2022 10:25am

When will The Prodigy follow suit and ask Radio stations to stop playing "Smash my Bitch up" due to the insensitivity of the lyrics.

foxsake · 13-01-2022 10:26am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465848#Comment_118465848

in some way I think we saying the same thing. he could just not engage.

quinnd6 · 13-01-2022 10:27am

No it's a fact, think about it. Everything is censored. Words are taken out of songs that might offend someone, replaced with garble effect. Comedians have to tiptoe in case they might offend someone. Simpsons and family guy voice actors required to be same colour as the character they're portraying. It's more backwards and censored than ever. Leftists want to take the fun out of everything and they're winning because they shout the loudest and they're the loudest, naggy voice and want to shut everyone up.

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 10:27am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465966#Comment_118465966

i don't think i've heard that on the radio in years. i don't think you're that familiar with the song either?

Patrick2010 · 13-01-2022 10:29am

What was the word in question?

MEGA BRO WOLF 5000 · 13-01-2022 10:29am

Pathetic man cancells himself.

[Deleted User] · 13-01-2022 10:38am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465983#Comment_118465983

Does that matter. It is a provocative and "insensitive" song title. Oliver's Army isn't bringing in huge royalties for Deco McManus these days but he got some headlines out of self-cancelling.

Of course I'm familiar with the song as it was shown regularly on Music TV stations late at night when I was younger but you're just a man dragging a grudge around with you from sub-forum to sub-forum so your comments are only to be expected. Stop stalking me.

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 10:42am

that was intended to be a humorous reference to you having got the song title wrong.

i apologise for the attempt at humour, and by stalking you into a thread i was posting in before you were.

CGI_Livia_Soprano · 13-01-2022 10:42am

There's a lot of perpetually offended, sensitive snowflakes in the thread. It's his decision as an artist not to play it when he feels that it has outlived its cultural relevance. It's his song, and he wrote it almost 45 years ago. As for the radio stations, it's up to them if they want to play it or not as well.

quinnd6 · 13-01-2022 10:43am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118466040#Comment_118466040

I think he meant it's smack not smash.

Anyway 🙄.

Seth Brundle · 13-01-2022 10:44am

There is a certain irony with those taking offence at Costello's move because of their perception that he is trying to avoid offending listeners

Seth Brundle · 13-01-2022 10:47am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465995#Comment_118465995

******

magicbastarder · 13-01-2022 10:49am

my uncle was quite proud of the fact that his band once had a song of theirs banned from RTE radio - it obviously attracted enough attention that they wrote him and the band he was in a letter stating (maybe not the exact words, it's been 25 or 30 years since he showed me the letter) 'we wish to clarify that we have not banned the song, instead we have taken the decision not to play it due to the political content of the song'

monseiur · 13-01-2022 10:52am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118465891#Comment_118465891

Agree 100% quinnd6. Once upon a time censorship - the supression of words, images & ideas that a few may find offensive, was associated with the middle aged conservative righ wing brigade. Now it's the young lefties who are pushing the woke & cancel culture and woe betide anyone who dares to challenge them The very rights that thousands gave their life to defend and uphold is now being oblitareted by the key board warriors who have lived a charmed existence form the cradle, spoiled brats who never experienced cold, hunger, hardship or did a decent days work in their short lives.

The Raging Bile Duct · 13-01-2022 10:54am

Do people just read headlines these days to get offended and/or angry without getting proper context from the actual article?

[Deleted User] · 13-01-2022 11:04am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118466113#Comment_118466113

What was the song and who was the band?

Elvis Costello asks radio stations not to play Oliver's Army

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