There are middle class people of my acquaintance, say Bryan Ferry, who think traveling by bus is analogous be being carried in a cattle truck. Having now spent two days in a cattle truck, I can tell them that the number 73, even on the busiest day on the Pentonville Road, is to nothing compared to being crammed with seventy people in the back of a open top lorry. When I wasn’t passing out due to the heat, or the stench, I was irritated by some people singing to keep their spirits up. In my opinion there is only one way of keeping your spirits up, and that involves getting some actual spirits.
And so, unable to stand it any more, I jumped off the back of the lorry. Only to find myself surrounded by armed US troops, waving guns at me suspiciously.
“What’s going on.”
I was so distracted by him name checking one of the worst albums of all time that I did not notice what I said until it was out of my mouth.
“Officer, I’m so very sorry. But I fell off the back of the lorry.”
Kill me know for quoting Denim lyrics. Luckily (or unluckily) I was in a particularly dangerous place, namely Baghdad, and therefore could be killed any minute.
OUTKAST – Bombs Over Baghdad
Of course the song isn’t called Bombs Over Baghdad really. It is actually called BOB. Why? There are a number of plausible reasons
a) OutKast don’t like words of more that three letters in their song titles (cf Hey Ya)
b) They were too scared that politically the title might be a touch insensitive, big fat scaredy cats
c) They weren’t sure what the correct spelling was.
Frankly c) is a rubbish reason for a band who are happy to be called Outkast. A big red sp goes by the side of that. But b) as a reason is plausible. It could also be why they sing it so fast that it is actually impossible to understand any of the words. Which suggests that there is some sort of subliminal message. And when you consider that it was recorded in 1999, suddenly all is clear.
OUTKAST ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE SECOND IRAQ WAR.
Imagine George Bush swinging his feet during the election campaign along to an infectious (like syphilis) Hip-Hop tune. He is trying to show, in a Bulworth style, that he is down with the kids. Worming into his brain and that of the pliant American population, is the idea of normalising the horror of another Iraq war. On top of that, the horror of the actual track normalises the pain and suffering of all war casualties, it being the sonic equivalent. Don’t protest about the war to George Bush, protest about Outkast.