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Monday, November 3, 2014

5 Classic Songs Ruined by the Movies

Movies and music go together like peanut butter and an over-heated sheep. That's not how the saying goes? There's something deeply wrong with me? Well, that's an article for another day. Today's topic is the seemingly blissful marriage of classic songs with film. But, like any marriage, things occasionally hit a bump. You come home to find your spouse in a spandex body suit covering herself in glitter and nothing is ever the same after that. Sure, you smile at each other and show up at all the kids' events, but you know, deep down, nothing short of a Tinkerbell/Captain Hook roleplaying session is ever going to please your mate. And you can't, you just can't, wear the hook. Not even for her. I've lost track again. Something about marriage. Or music. No, movies. Music and movies. And the movies that ruin those songs forever.

Sheep have such judgmental eyes.


5. Stuck in the Middle With You- Stealer's Wheel
Stuck in the Middle With You is not a Bob Dylan song despite what every user on Napster circa 1998 would have you believe (and every mis-labled illegally downloaded mp3 since then). The song was recorded by Stealer's Wheels, a band whose most notable accomplishment outside this single was recenlty reforming without any of its original members. The song is rambling, upbeat, sunny and a bunch of other adjectives that could also be used to describe the decade in which it was recorded ("shag-carpeted"?). 

Until, of course, it was completed ruined by Reservoir Dogs. Tarantino's first, and probably best film, blends 70's style, music and swagger with modern day violence and mayhem. And of course this also happens:

You know the scene. You see it even when you close your eyes. Michael Madsen's uber creepy dance with the open razor in his hands. The gasoline. The ear. The blood. So much blood. And all of it set to the tune of Stealer's Wheel chirpy little tune released in the middle of the most harmless decade of all time. Try hard as you might, every time you hear this damn song, you replay this damn scene over and over and over again. It's Tarantino's greatest crime.
Well, second.

4 Q. Lazzarus's "Goodbye Horses"
Q. Lazzarus may as well have titled their biggest hit "Goodbye Horses", the "Penis Tucking Song" instead. In the film Silence of the Lambs, the song supplies the soundtrack to this bit of movie magic.  


Can you imagine how happy this obscure artist was when he found out that his song was going to be used in a major motion picture featuring Sir Anthony Fucking Hopkins and Jodie Foster? Can you picture his face as he sat in the darkened theatre on opening night anxiously awaiting the moment when he'd hear the words he'd written played as the movie unfolded? You can almost hear him bragging to his new lady friend (who in any other circumstance, would have been way out of his league by the way). 

And then this happened.
I can't stop posting this picture!

Like burning down your last place of employment, that's the kind of thing that doesn't come off the ol' resume.

3. Dont stop Believin- Journey
It's hard to ruin a Journey song, seeing as how shitty they are to begin with. In fact, Don't Stop Believin is one of those songs that's been ruined more than once (beyond just by Journey's releasing it). But this song is resilient. This song has returned more times than John Travolta. Check it out. 
  1. Bill Clinton appropriates the song as his unofficial theme. Later, BJ puns ensue.
  2. Glee covers the song in their premiere- more BJ jokes ensue. 
  3. And that takes us to The Sopranos
In the shittiest (or best, depending on how smart you want to appear) finale ever, Tony Soprano is gunned down (or is he?) to the tune of Don't Stop Believin'. What is the significance of this song at this moment? Much has been written. None of it makes sense. It's a shit song that raises my ire every time I hear it. Tony Soprano deserved a lot of things in the finale-- Journey was not one of them.

2. Singin' in the Rain- Gene Kelly
Even if you have never seen the film Singing in the Rain starring Gene Kelly, you know the song. Maybe you hate puppies and rainbows as well, I'm not even going to speculate as to why you'd deny yourself the pure joy that is seeing Gene Kelly dancing in the rain with nothing but an umbrella and a streetlight. 
This is not the rain scene I was referring to.

Go to Youtube and watch it now. Did you do it? Are you smiling? Well, then obviously you've also never seen Clockwork Orange.

Because you've clearly just time traveled back in time from a futuristic society where television and movies are no longer a thing, I'll explain Clockwork Orange as well. It's a movie so violent, it was banned in Britain for years (and this is a country that didn't bat an eye when the Spice Girls arrived). And one of the most violent scenes in the film features the main character beating the ever loving shit out an older man with a cane, all to the tune of Gene Kelly's incredibly bouncy classic song. 

Now whenever I hear Singing in the Rain, I find myself adding 'Whap whap whap' after every verse. I imagine giant concrete dildos and penis masks. And yes, this is all in the movie. I'm not giving you a glimpse into my tortured soul. Quite frankly, you couldn't handle it. 

5. Bohemian Rhapsody- Queen
If ever there was a Queen song that showed off Freddy Mercury's incredible vocal range or ecclectic musical influences, it's Bohemian Rhapsody. This single is probably the unlikliest rock and roll hit of all time, fusing hard rock and opera of all things into an eight minute song that every man, woman in child in America can sing along, too. And, unfortunately, also Canada. Because Canadian Mike Myers liked the song so much he stuck it in his extended Saturday Night Live sketch/movie Wayne's World. 

You know the scene-- a bunch of slacker douchebags head banging in a shitty car, rocking out to Queen. Which is unfortunately what anyone who sings the song alone in their car also looks like. The movie's biggest crime here is holding up a mirror where no one wanted one to begin with. There's a reason why there's no reflective surfaces at the Sizzler. 
Feel the judgmental sheep eyes on you?

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