Late Night Music Club with Barenaked Ladies
By Howie Klein Tuesday May 13, 2008 10:00pmBarenaked Ladies broke in the U.S.-- they had already been huge in Canada for many years-- because of their raucous and fun-for-all live shows. And one of the most looked forward to moments in a great BNL concert was their performance of the 1989 hip hop classic, "Fight The Power." Once a Barenaked version was released as part of the Coneheads soundtrack, some of the specialness went out of the gag. Not that that's going to stop us tonight!
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Must be 'Serendipity' - I'm listening to 'Barenaked Ladies Are Me" and I stopped by C&L - sometimes its the little things in life that make it worth living :)
Completely OT but do you guys have the video of Buchanan on Matthews? I keep reading about it but can't find it.
Thanks...and now back to the BNL! :-)
Oh, I like Bare Naked Ladies.
Is this aural blackface offensive because it's sincere, or because it's ironic?
Fight the power? Like they ever had to do that.
Now that was a wasted 4 minutes, I was hoping to see some bare naked ladies, what a jip!
creative group.
fuck that
fight the power is not hip hop...its hard core rap
and it came out when rap groups meant something, and werent just singing about bitches and hos and seeing who could top the next group with how many dirty words they could stick in a song
and bare naked ladies took a song about black anger and turned it into shit
here is the original....not to be mocked by a bunch of canadian hacks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jym-RtHHG0s
oh the irony of bare naked ladies covering this song
Elvis was a hero to most
But he never meant shit to me you see
Straight up racist that sucker was
Simple and plain
Motherfuck him and John Wayne
Cause I'm Black and I'm proud
I'm ready and hyped plus I'm amped
Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps
Sample a look back you look and find
Nothing but rednecks for 400 years if you check
Don't worry be happy
Was a number one jam
Damn if I say it you can slap me right here
Fight the Power.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9c6KRFX9Sk
The Isley Brothers.
This is better than that song any day.
Read this!
http://sirs-ava.livejournal.com/
Targeted, corporate, candy-ass, thieving, mocking, garbage.
uncle joe hussein mccarthy @ 7:
As a Canadian, I have to agree -- this is a pretty shitty version. Big disconnect here style-wise. The Bare Naked Ladies are a very talented group though. They definitely shouldn't be singing this, though.
.
.
I don't care for the Barenaked Ladies at all. Their music sounds so wimpy and boring, and almost every song sounds the same. But I do respect them for going all the way to Iqaluit to play a gig.
new low
...bunch of music snobs, the lot of ya.
Howie Klein, can you read my mind? I love BareNaked Ladies (as well as Joni, Neil & Bruce Cockburn) and was thinking of suggesting some of their tunes to you. Enid, for example. Or Lovers in a Dangerous Time, written by BC, and sung by BNL. Ah, heaven.
I fucking HATE the Barenaked Ladies.
Smarmy, unfunny college-boy crap. Not a soul or a testicle among them.
Each to his own. I like being smarmy and unfunny. (Sticks tongue out.)
I may not have testicles, but I possess lots of soul. gzopeze, bite me.
Good night, all. Peace.
STOP George @ 12:
im sorry if i disparaged canada...didnt mean to
canada puts out the best teen soap ever made...degrassi
ive got a thing for girls who say eh
but this was the worst cover ever
shoot, at least when ben folds covered "bitches aint shit" it was obviously done as a parody of one effed up song
fight the power just should never be effed with
i am not a musical snob...there is just something very wrong with a really white group covering this song
calgarylady @ 19:
Peace indeed. Would never intentionally offend a woman who lives so close to the Bow River.
Love Canada, and too many Canadian artists to mention. Just not those guys.
wow...there is some piss and vinegar going down here tonight...I love the Bare Baked Ladies...I think they are fine...and I love alot of canadian music....KDLang, Micheal Buble, and Tragically Hip....so I just came by to say thanks for posting it.....I have not heard them in a long time.....
Their best record is Gordon. Like nothing else they ever did.
"Their best record is Gordon. Like nothing else they ever did."
I'd have to agree with you on that. Although I must admit, I took my 13 yr old to a concert to see them in 1999. I enjoyed the hell out of it; he thought it sucked.
To each their own, I guess.
I have all their albums and went to one of their concerts in Philadelphia. Still great to listen to.
A more poignant song would be Fun and Games off of Barenaked Ladies Are Men. This song criticizes the war so well it's my favorite BNL song right now. I'd check it out and maybe do another mashup using it for the late night music club.
-yensid
With all due respect to their fans, the Barenaked Ladies are awful and liking them is a sign you have no musical taste OR self respect.
Hey, I said "with all due respect."
gzopeze, you know about the Bow River, one of the best fishing spots in North America? I am impressed.
OK, you are forgiven.
Rusty, Rusty, Rusty. This sure is a tough crowd. Everyone is a critic, I guess.
The thing I love about BNL is their humour and ability to laugh at themselves. Remember when Toronto banned them because they really thought they were a bunch of barenaked ladies. (tee hee.)
For Canadians, the "gag" was ruined right off the bat, because "Fight the Power" appeared on their very first indie cassette, released before they became big.
I don't mind the BNL most of the time -- I think they have pretty good chops, and they have proved the ability to mix humour with seriousness. The utter silliness of the first album can be grating and the huge single that broke 'em in the US was pretty naff I guess but their album tracks are bit better.
That said -- and I don't mean this to be an attack on calgarylady, but I absolutely LOATHED their Cockburn cover for the same reason that uncle joe hated "Fight the Power" -- they took a song with a pretty deep message and made a bouncy pile of nothing. I've always hated their version of "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" and I always will.
Shouldn't truth in advertising laws apply to musical combos?
GlobalH, no offense taken.
Howie, maybe you could do a spotlight on Bruce Cockburn sometime. Lots of material to choose from there. Plenty of antiwar stuff.
Gah!!! BNL SUCKS!
uncle joe hussein mccarthy @ 21:
Got that right.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEH4Cp6jciM&feature=related
Dionne Warwick and Burt Bacharach.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjX2MKaZ-rg
Sly and Family Stone. Everyday People.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ATiORZ4tfU&feature=related
A Sly tune by , The RedHot Chili Peppers.
If You Want Me To Stay.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnaCFxmnYzY
XTC, Melt the Guns.
Rusty Shackleford @ 28:
^^^^
Hey, think of your own pseudonym!
You pathetic narrow crybabies miss the point and don't even know you are living the lives of a Soviet and if it were the 60's you would be spitting on the local police and returning veterans rather than the real monsters because you are the ever present stupid.
Loopy @ 41:
What?
calgarylady @ 33:
Agreed. Just as a start, "If I Had a Rocket Launcher" or "Call it Democracy" for the ones with pretty overt messages. Then off into some of the other tracks for more subtle talk (though I guess anything is subtle compared to "If I Had a Rocket Launcher"...)
Have always liked BNL. Saw them with The Health and Happiness Show at The Bottom Line in Greenwich Village about the time Gordon came out and a few years later with Billy Bragg at The Beacon Theater. They backed-up Billy on a great version of Sexuality. Even had What A Good Boy for our wedding song. If you've never seen them live don't criticize unitl you do. As for covering Fight The Power - yeah probably not the best version, but every group or artist has hits and misses. Give them a break.
Johnny Caldwell @ 44
If you've never seen them live don't criticize unitl you do.
Someone said the same thing to me about Jimmy Buffett, who I can't stand either....not knocking you for liking BNL...but I would rather stick a red hot poker in my eye than pay to see either band live.
'If I Had a Rocket Launcher' is one of my all-time favourite songs.
"Someone said the same thing to me about Jimmy Buffett, who I can’t stand either….not knocking you for liking BNL…but I would rather stick a red hot poker in my eye than pay to see either band live."
Fair enough liberalHUSSEINmoderation@45. I like Buffet a lot, although have not seen him live, just goes to show there are many tastes under the sun.
Johnny Caldwell @ 47:
true, very true.
I'm sure you wouldn't wanna see some of my favorite bands live either...of course, most aren't around anymore...Dead Kennedy's, Misfits, Exploited...stuff like that.
"true, very true.
I’m sure you wouldn’t wanna see some of my favorite bands live either…of course, most aren’t around anymore…Dead Kennedy’s, Misfits, Exploited…stuff like that."
liberalHUSSEINmoderation@48 now the DKs I could get into. One of my girlfriends in college loved the song "Too Drunk To F**k" - I'm sure it had nothing to do with me. Back in those days I was into The Ramones, Buzzcocks, XTC, Elvis Costello, among others.....
So listen to (or read) Sell, Sell, Sell and tell me if it means anything... Though if you don't hear it, you're going to miss a lot.
While I'm not happy with their Lovers in a Dangerous Time cover (they were too young to have any meaning in it), their lives and politics do back up this song. These guys are activists and socialists, putting their support behind their beliefs. Well, unless you don't think white people should be allowed to know about politics... After all, it's not like they can do anything about it, right? So why interest them?
Johnny Caldwell: So why aren't you still into the Ramones, Kennedys, Costello, et al? Nothing stopping you!
One wag put it this way, "These guys give barenaked ladies a bad name."
I love BNL and try never to miss a concert. Thank you for posting this.
Y'all remember when rock stars looked larger than life instead of some dweeb working at Barnes & Noble?
ysbaddaden @ 53:
You mean like this guy?
54 Rusty Shackleford Says: ysbaddaden @ 53:
Y’all remember when rock stars looked larger than life instead of some dweeb working at Barnes & Noble?
You mean like this guy?
Hey no dissin' the Bud man, he's god in Texas
But I was referring to this guy
http://z.about.com/d/classicrock/1/0/W/4/zep_3.jpg
Rusty Shackleford @ 54:
Hey! Eeeeeasy now! I have glasses exactly like those...probably nearly as old too. but with blue lenses! And Buddy Holly kicks WAY more hindquarters than BNL!!
Johnny Caldwell @ 49:
Never got in XTC, but I'm down with all the others you mentioned.
liberalHUSSEINmoderation @ 56:
And you're way larger than life, lHIm!
Rusty Shackleford @ 58:
LOL! Thanks...hey waaaait! You been spyin on me? I know i've gained a few pounds, but....
I'm not a fan, not at all. But any band willing to fight against the recording industry's attempts to sue the fans for file-sharing deserves some amount of respect. BNL did. They also put up CD-quality lossless FLAC versions of their music online for sale, not the lesser MP3 and MP4 downloads used by most others. They've been ahead of the curve on this stuff. But if you want to play Fight The Power, and you should, there's really only one version to bother with.
All you people saying that a band as blindingly white as Barenaked Ladies shouldn't cover Fight The Power are just ignorant. Is dark skin now a prerequisite for power-fighting? I don't think that's what Public Enemy was thinking when they teamed up with the equally white Anthrax to re-do "Bring The Noise". If you don't like BNL, or their cover of the song (and I most certainly don't like it on purely aesthetic grounds), fine, but let's not be bigoted about it. Even the whitest of the white can fight the power.
Just to be clear, I like BNL but I hated the song that was featured on this thread. Not my style of music at all.
This is a 'live' bit, a song that a band just liked doing. Nothing more, nothing less. In fact, I'd even suggest that if anyone is being 'borrowed' from, it's Frank Zappa. His live shows were a total exploration of everything 'current' in pop. His band would segue seamlessly from one of their own extended pieces into a dead-on nail of something ludicrous like 'Rock You Like a Ninkompoop (Hurricane)' or Culture Club's 'I'll Tumble For ya'. Frank would do it just so they could screw around with a song they either loved or hated because it really showed their live chops. I suspect BNL do 'Fight The Power' for similar reasons....because it's fun.
Safe corporate "college alternative" with a rather dull, and cliche, stab at that ever cute "ironic" gag. These guys are, quite simply, throw away forgettable garbage. Though, I'm sure they make a pothead giggle for a little bit. ;)
Snnnnooooooooooooooooooore.....................
They actually pulled it off much better than I would have expected.
Not really a BNL fan, but it's good to see they have a sense of humor.
Unlike a lot of the supercilious douchebags on this thread . . .
I guess I missed it. What's funny about it again? Feels like a pile of nothing to me.
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