Explicit Lyrics Labels on CDs are Fucking Silly

Yeah, I know...startling revelation here. Real circa 1986.

However, I have a specific and recent example of exactly why said explicit lyric labels are silly that I want to share.

So I recently bought the 2 CD set Rogue's Gallery. For those who don't know...and I'm guessing that's most of you, this is a collection of sea shanties and other similar songs covered by modern musicians. The CD was produced by Johnny Depp and Gore Verbinski, who you might remember from a little remembered pirate movie a few years back. There was a sequel this year too, but I don't think it did that well.*

Anyhoo, Rogue's Gallery has no explicit lyrics sticker on it. None. Nothing that cautions folks that there might be terribly naughty words on the songs.

Now I can see a few folks wondering "Well, why would it? I mean it's not like it's gangsta rap."

And that's true. Gangsta rap is much cleaner. In fact, Rogue's Gallery contains what I am fairly sure is the dirtiest song ever, the Good Ship Venus.

No, really.

Really, really.

Fine, don't believe me? Don't think some old sailing songs can match modern music for profanity and suggestive lyrics?

Here's just the first part of the lyrics, but tell the kiddies to go into the other room.

No, I'll wait.

...

...

Okay, here we go:

On the Good Ship Venus
By Christ you should have seen us
The figurehead was awhore in bed
Sucking a dead man's penis.

The captain's name was Lugger
By Christ he was a bugger
He wasn't fit to shovel shit
From one place to another

The second mate was Andy
By Christ, he had a dandy
Till they crushed his cock on a jagged rock
For cumming in the brandy

And then it gets downright rude.**

Now please don't think I like such labels. Personally I think they're stupid and generally useless. But if stores and companies are going to use them, then they should enedavor to be consistent. I mean, don't just stick them on fairly tame "gangsta" and "alternative" music. Try and get the really nasty stuff.

But maybe one incredibly dirty song wasn't enough to warrant a sticker.

Good thing there's more where that came from...

We've got Nick Cave singing about Fire Down Belowwith a virtuous parson's daughter cautioning the sailors "All of you are bound for hell to feed the fucking fires." Pretty harsh for a churcman's get but then the parson did caution earlier in the song "Look here you motherfuckers if you lead a life of sin then there's fire down below!" so she probably comes by it honestly.

We've got the second dirtiest song ever, Gavin Friday's version of Baltimore Whores, which is about four ladies of the evening talking about how large their...ahem...well, how much they can accommodate in a particular orifice. I won't spoil the details, but ships and various animals are used in their boasts.

Now to be fair, some of the songs aren't all that dirty. Sting's Blood Red Roses is clean and Cave's other offering, Pinery Boy, is devoid of profanity. Songs by Bono, John C. Reilly, and other are pretty clean too.

But even with cleaner tracks, a whore sucking a dead man's penis just doesn't get you stickered in the record store like it used to.

Oh yeah, in case you haven't figured it out yet...Rogue's Gallery is awesome. If you can handle the profanity of some of the songs, it's worth the 20 bucks for the 2 CD set.

And who knows? You might learn something about the history of sea travel, song, and even the times when the song's were written. For example, Jack Shit's cover of Boney is a great musical history in brief of a particular diminuitive dictator of the 19th Century.

And if you can't handle the profanity, that's fine. You might want to give it a pass.

Wuss. :D

* Yes, Virginia, that's sarcasm.

** Yes the Sex Pistols covered this song too under the title Frigging in the Rigging but their version added nothing but a chorus and honestly isn't as dirty as this one.