Blue Mink - Melting Pot

[mushroom25]

Racist?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2964374/A-little-racist-BBC-DJ-Alan-Partridge-moment-apologising-playing-1969-song-features-words-yellow-Chinkees.html

[Svejk]

///I worked in local radio and often recorded inserts for a live show, and sometimes, late at night, we would mess around and record pieces that were totally unsuitable for broadcast. But we made very very sure that they never reached the ears of the producer, or that there was any danger of them being broadcast by mistake///
Very interesting. Are you equally careful about maintaining a (false) 'right on' image on Answerbank. Care to share the sort of totally unsuitable things you recorded but couldn't air?

[andy-hughes]

Svejk - "Are you equally careful about maintaining a (false) 'right on' image on Answerbank. Care to share the sort of totally unsuitable things you recorded but couldn't air?"

No, I don't maintain any 'image' - 'right on' or otherwise.

I wouldn't want to compromise the host of the show I worked on - he went on to national radio and is a known name, so our childish nonsense must remain a secret between the two of us. Sorry.

[jno]

andy, I can only say that I was around when Melting Pot came out, didn't like it, heard it far too often - and yet never twigged what the words actually were till now. It may be different for those in the business, but the casual listener like me seldom worked out what lyrics were until the Beatles took the giant step of actually printing them on Sergeant Pepper.

[andy-hughes]

jno - "andy, I can only say that I was around when Melting Pot came out, didn't like it, heard it far too often - and yet never twigged what the words actually were till now. It may be different for those in the business, but the casual listener like me seldom worked out what lyrics were until the Beatles took the giant step of actually printing them on Sergeant Pepper"

I am in the same position - again I thought the woung was trite and irritating, but never really thought anything about the suitability of its lyrics.

It is interesting, whenever this debate comes up regarding the changes in attitudes, and cultural differences between then and now.

It is possible to take the view that 'it's only a song ... that's the way things were back then ...' - which is true, but that does not mean that, looking back, we cannot say that we have moved on, and what was acceptable then is not acceptable now.

I think society has to beware complacency and simply shrugging its shoulders because 'that was how things were ...' because if we did that over everything in our society and culture, then black people would still be riding on the back seats of buses.

Large changes occur because simple changes start them off.

[ToraToraTora]

Is someone trawliing through every past song/book/filem looking for things to be offended on behalf of someone else by? gawd help us, this classic song is not racist in fact it is the very antithesis of racism.

[ToraToraTora]

I still hear Oliver's army all the time on the radio and that has the N word in it!

[ToraToraTora]

Then there's guy Gibsons dog in the Dambusters!

[andy-hughes]

TTT - "Then there's guy Gibsons dog in the Dambusters!"

They were going to get WC Gibson to call the dog by banging two dustbin lids together, but in the end, they thought it was easier just to call him Blackie.

[ToraToraTora]

No that wasn't his name andy!

[-Talbot-]

Digger, andy.

If AOG knew the lyrics there could have been a thread about the song ages ago.

♪ And keep it stirring for a hundred years or more
And turn out coffee colored people by the score ♪

[andy-hughes]

TTT - "No that wasn't his name andy!"

Sorry for the confusion - I was referring to the re-make of The Dambusters, where they did in fact call the dog Blackie.

[tonyav]

murraymints
it is only a song...about racail harmony..think it is taking PC too far !


Gotta agree with that, minty. Although I thought it was a rubbish record when it was released in 1969 and still do. I liked Madeline Bell as a solo singer though.

[ToraToraTora]

no talbot but the name rhymmed with digger.

[ToraToraTora]

Hang on Andy, there's a remake? Please no, the Dambusters is a masterpeice, no need for a remake.