Entertainment For Lively Minds
Spinal Tap's influence on quotidian language
Posted by Patrick Crowther on 5 September 2010 - 8:38am.
Has any work of art contributed more to everyday language than This is Spinal Tap? Amps turned up to 11, appeal becoming more selective, none more black, dobly. Just a few of the choice words and phrases that have journeyed effortlessly from the silver screen into our noggins and stayed there, to be used repeatedly thereafter in all manner of contexts.
William Shakespeare did well. Hamlet gave us some choice lines about living and dying and stuff. But more than Tap? The jury's out on that one. Now if you'll excuse me I have to make sure that my special friend Cindy isn't feeling too lonely...
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Perhaps the King James bible,
but it's a close run thing. You'd need to get Melvyn Bragg in to sort this one out. Maybe get Simon Schama and Melvyn out for one of the Massive get togethers. Few pints, pie or two, and a healthy debate.
Disqualified
for its failure to mention St Hubbins, the patron saint of quality footwear.
Who's in here?
No-one.
Shark Sandwich?
Shit sandwich.
More from Derek Smalls
"We're done for, we're done-diddly done for, we're done-diddly-doodily, done diddly-doodily, done diddly-doodly, done diddly-doodily!"
"And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords"
Brothers and Sisters
Anyone see the recent episode where Calista Flockhart and Rachel Griffiths elected to unleash their Nigel Tufnel impersonations? Jesus.
BBC iPlayer
Is someone responsible for BBC iPlayer a 'Tap' fan? I only ask because the volume level on iPlayer goes up to 11!
Potentially interesting
interview with Harry Shearer on radio 4 on Friday 6.30 was spoilt because Ruby Wax wouldn't shut the F**K up. Odd because sometimes she can be quite good as interviewer but on this occasion just kept cutting him off mid anecdote it was a shame.
Harry Shearer's podcast is consistently interesting and amusing
I listen regularly. Le Show on KCRW (http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/ls)
What's wrong with being sexy?
"into our noggins"
If 'our' equates to the habitues of this blogge then I tend to agree. Not sure the same would be true out in the real world though.
The patron saint of quality footwear.
"Certainly,in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock,having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful."
"We've got Armadillos in our trousers.It's really quite frightening."
Marvellous.
A good solid piece of wood in your hand
"It's a totemistic thing" - Ian Faith
'Too much...
fucking perspective'
I've lost count of the times I've applied that to my own life.
So many
any backstage corridor = "Hello Cleveland!"
any dodgy attempt at harmony singing = "Sounds a bit raga... don't want to go raga on this stuff"
Sometimes junior reporters submit a news story where they've missed the point and the real angle is buried three paras in. This is known on our subs' desk as a 'Puppet Show'. (Janine: "I've told them a hundred times - put Spinal Tap first and Puppet Show last.")
And you've forgotten the fine line
Between clever and stupid
Used on this fine site by my good self
Not a month ago.
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/the-most-stupid-thing-you-ever-hea...
working in Government
I have cause to use this a lot...
Have a good time
All the time
The ultimate put-down?
"Someone who looks like an Australian hairdresser's nightmare".
Is it me...
or have you added the word "hairdresser's" to this yourself?
You're absolutely right LS!
I'd always remembered it as I said, but now I've gone back to check it out (how sad is that) I see you're correct.
I prefer my version though!
Listen to the sustain
"You could go .. go and have a bite, you'd still be hearing that one"
"I'm not hearing anything"
"You would if it was plugged in"
It won't effect my performance
I'm a professional
I used to say "sex, drugs, and rock and roll" As long as there's sex and drugs, I can do without rock and roll.
Well, Nigel and Dave are two extremes, like fire and ice. I see my role in the band is to be somewhere in between... like lukewarm water
You can't dust for vomit
"Here lies David St. Hubbins... and why not?"
Oh, yes
One I use a lot.
Hope you
enjoy our new direction.
My wife showed me a story
from her antiques magazine last week about a chap who ordered a chest of drawers. When it arrived, it turned out he had mistaken inches for feet and it was actually designed for a doll's house.
You can't get much more Tap than that!
Presumably the chap commented that
it was in danger of being crushed ... by a dwarf.
I wonder if
he sketched it out on a napkin....
"Fuck the napkin!!"
I think Airplane also contributed ...
... phrases that still kick around the language, 30 years on
Rumack: You'd better tell the Captain we've got to land as soon as we can. This woman has to be gotten to a hospital.
Elaine Dickinson: A hospital? What is it?
Rumack: It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now.
(lol)
PS: read through these and not laugh and i suspect you are clinically dead
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080339/quotes
to this day if anyone passes
me a memo, letter etc on a piece of paper and says "what do you make of this?" I have to really fight the urge not to scrunch it up and say "a hat , a brooch"
Surely you can't be serious.
I am serious, and stop calling me Shirley.....used many times unfortunately.
"I don't know - what are the hours?"
I've used some choice quotes from Tap many times in real life:
"I can do that - I've got two hands here"
"This much talent"
"Simple lines, intertwining..."
"Quite exciting, this computer magic"
"But hey, enough of my yakkin'!"
Me too
"Grown men!"
"I'm...er...joking, of course"
"I'm just as God made me, Sir!"
That's pretty. What's it called?
That one's called Lick My Love Pump.
Only outquoted by
Life Of Brian ?
Or perhaps The Simpsons?
D'oh!!
Ubiquitous isn't it....
If I have to sit in more sales pitch where the salesman says after extolling the perceived benefits of their ropey piece of software
"But hey, what have the Romans ever done for us?"
I will forcibly eject them from the 15th floor with the aid of my size 9's...
I have a mate who's an
I have a mate who's an administrator at a centre for mime. Strangely, I find the phrase "Mime is money!" funnier than he does.
Well then test him professionally
Get him to do the dead bird
i think get smart is up there
sorry about that chief
missed by that much
ziegried..."we dont do [insert] that here"
that 's the second biggest .......
etc etc
It's a fine line between stupid and clever...
This thread neatly encapsulates the dangers of quoting from comedy films/tv.
Parrotting a quote and laughing at its innate hilariousness = not very funny.
Subtly weaving a quote into conversation, especially a very serious conversation, and seeing a flicker of recognition from another believer = funny.
but monsieur
zat eez neurt mah dog
Absolutely
A bass player of my acquaintance was telling us how the band then known as Earth had debuted their new song 'Black Sabbath' at a venue in his home town. "Don't look for it" he said, "it's not there anymore"
Just brilliant.
I'm just as God made me, Sir...
No Monty Python yet?
So many phrases and shared references, but to pick one or two:
Whenever I'm out hiking, and we stop to admire the view, I will say "One day son, all this will be yours... What, the curtains?"
Or alternatively, when spying a building from afar: "Camelot! Camelot! Camelot! (It's only a model)."
But recently the funniest came at an informal meeting in the dining room. The folk at the back were straining to hear, and there came a couple of calls of "Speak up!"
"He said 'Blessed are the cheesemakers'" came the reply.
Similar
This occurence made me laugh, if no-one else.
Some years ago I worked in a gleaming tower on St Katharine's Dock. All open plan. Desks arrayed as far as the eye could see, the only solid structure being the lift shafts in the middle of the floor.
One day one of the most popular of our number arrived at work a little late. A chap called Brian (wait for it...)
Everyone else was in situ, sat at their desks and tapping away. Brian made his way from the lifts to his desk to an approaching audible welcome from most. 'Morning Brian!', 'Hello Brian', Hiya Brian', Morning Brian', 'Alright, Brian?', and so forth.
Among this friendly clatter of greeting I picked out a voice from behind me. Neil, the team wag, chirped up with a beautifully timed 'Mornin' Saviour'.
That isn't very funny in print but it had me exhaling coffee at the time.
No. You're wrong.
That is very funny.
Outtakes
"It's the Anti-Tourettes Syndrome of the gorilla."
Becoming popular these days
"we're cancelled here, but don't worry, its not a big college town
"Their appeal is becoming more selective"
"wallows in a cess pool of retarded sexuality"
"Saucy Jack, you're a naughty one"
"Well I would be angry if I wasn't on such heavy medication"
"don't look for it, ist not there anymore"
A blues jazz, well jazz blues festival on the Isle Of Lucy"
Has someone asked already or ...
... can I ask a practical question at this point?
PS My Captcha word for this submission is "git".
No
we're not
Unless I missed it in the thread..
.."documentary, if you will, rockumentary"
"Enormodome"
Brilliant...
Two great examples - both are now used constantly.
Wanker
Whenever someone from my footie team heads off early from the pub, we do the usual hearty and genuinely heartfelt farewells, only for the remaining drinkers to invariably mutter 'wanker' as soon as they're out of earshot.
'Still booing them when we came on' - another beauty!
To go off on a tangent
I was disproportionatly pleased when catching up on the French football news to find that Groundhog Day is used as extensively in French as in English (with the French title, bien entendu) viz:
Kanga Akalé à Lens, c'est un peu le remake d'Un jour sans fin. Sauf qu'en l'occurrence, l'international ivoirien ne revit pas inlassablement la même journée encore et encore. Non, l'ancien Auxerrois semble condamné à revivre les mêmes saisons galères.
HHGTG etc
I let Douglas Adams write my lines for so long I forgot he was doing it. "I know nothing of these...........of which you speak" "brain the size of a planet" and various key words from "The Meaning Of Liff" ("epping" - trying to attract barpersons attention with minute gestures).
Are you reading Yes I Am by Sammy Davis Jnr?
Bobbi Fleckman's put down to Ian Faith
"Money talks and bullshit walks..." used frequently by some football agents of my aquaintance.
Also - from the cruelly underrated "More Bad News"
"It's political innit"
Our first name was The Originals
But we had to change it because there was already somebody called that.
(I was reminded of this reading Eamonn Forde's article about band names and copyright. It may not have passed into everyday language, but shows many a true word is spoken in jest)
"Well, I suppose I could work in a shop of some kind or
... or do freelance... selling of some sort of product, you know...
MARTY: A salesman, you think you ....
NIGEL: A salesman, like, maybe in a haberdasher, or maybe like a...uh a chapeau shop, or something...you know, like:“Would you...what size do you wear, sir?” and then you answer me.
MARTY: Uh...seven and a quarter.
NIGEL: “I think we have that...”, you see, something like that I could do.
MARTY: Yeah...you think you be happy doing something like....
NIGEL: “No! We’re all out, do you wear black?”, see, that sort of thing, I think I could probably muster up.
MARTY: Yeah, do you think you’d be happy doing that?
NIGEL: Well, I don’t know, what are the hours?
THE END
"Well, I suppose I could work in a shop of some kind or
... or do freelance... selling of some sort of product, you know...
MARTY: A salesman, you think you ....
NIGEL: A salesman, like, maybe in a haberdasher, or maybe like a...uh a chapeau shop, or something...you know, like:“Would you...what size do you wear, sir?” and then you answer me.
MARTY: Uh...seven and a quarter.
NIGEL: “I think we have that...”, you see, something like that I could do.
MARTY: Yeah...you think you be happy doing something like....
NIGEL: “No! We’re all out, do you wear black?”, see, that sort of thing, I think I could probably muster up.
MARTY: Yeah, do you think you’d be happy doing that?
NIGEL: Well, I don’t know, what are the hours?
THE END
What are those assholes doing on the porch?
Those aren't assholes. It's pronounced *azaleas*.
Man With Two Brains,
wasn't it? Great film!
Wayne's World
Not.
Derek Smalls on bass - he wrote this
Whenever we hear any poor jazz/prog rock noodling my wife and I hand the writing credits to Derek