In the past few months, as I’ve seen some of RMoney’s pathetic attempts to show how well he connects with and understands the travails of middle- and lower-income families, I’ve been reminded of some of the biting lyrics of the song Common People, by the BritPop group Pulp. It tells, in a fairly scathing fashion, the tale of a rich girl who wants to pursue some “slumming” to find out what it’s like to live in a lower-class world. (The Brit term for this kind of jaunt appears to be “class tourism,” which to me is marvelously apt.)
Some of the lyrics, a video of Pulp performing the song, and a surprise bonus Mitt sing-along are below the fold.
Back in the 90’s when I was struggling to come to terms with my sexual orientation, I found a lot of solace and affirmation in the SynthPop, BritPop, and related genres of music that emanated from Great Britain. It seemed like, going all the way back to the early days of David Bowie, the British music scene showed a lot of acceptance for bands with gay, or bi artists – e.g., Queen/Freddie Mercury, Culture Club/Boy George; Soft Cell/Mark Almond; The Pet Shop Boys; Bronski Beat; Erasure; Placebo; The Smiths/Morrissey; Suede – and gay-themed songs, e.g. Smalltown Boy; It’s a Sin; Why?; Accept Yourself; Hideaway. Plus, many members of the BritPop groups (and Boybands) active in the 90’s gave off very sexually ambiguous vibes and made for great eye candy, even if they weren’t gay (or in some cases hadn’t yet acknowledged it).
Pulp was one of my favorite groups from that period, and I developed a "thing" for their frontman/songwriter Jarvis Cocker, even though he was straight. Jarvis was hot and wrote some powerful songs, but the Pulp song that most moved me was, and continues to be, Common People. Like many of the other Brit songs I discovered during that time, it captured some of the angst, alienation, and powerlessness I was experiencing over involuntarily being in an immutable status where I was being looked down on and judged by people who were somehow supposedly “superior” to me. Sucked to be me.
At the same time, however, the song, especially when it was performed live by Jarvis and the band, conveyed to me a message of being able to take pride in my differences and say to the world, “I am what I am. Deal with it!” Great to be Me.
I think the last verses and chorus of Common People best demonstrate these aspects of the song and express perfectly why the Mitt-Bot just doesn’t get, and never will get, the essence of people who are not just like him:
'cos everybody hates a tourist
Especially one who thinks it's all such a laugh
Yeah and the chip stain and grease will come out in the bath
You will never understand
How it feels to live your life
With no meaning or control
And with nowhere left to go
You are amazed that they exist
And they burn so bright whilst you can only wonder why.
Rent a flat above a shop
Cut your hair and get a job
Smoke some fags and play some pool
Pretend you never went to school
But still you'll never get it right
'cos when you're laid in bed at night
Watching... roaches climb the wall
If you called your Dad he could stop it all, Yeah.
You’ll never live like common people
Never do what common people do
Never fail like common people
Never watch your life... slide out of view
And then dance, and drink... and screw
Because there's nothing else to do.
In 1998, I got to see Pulp at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in D.C., which was awesome. But because of a thunderstorm attack (no doubt stirred up by wingers) on Saturday their set got pushed to Sunday and they only had time to do 3 songs. To my chagrin,
Common People wasn’t one of them. I have managed, though, to find a clip online of them performing it that same summer at Finsbury Park in London. I hope you find it as compelling a put-down of the Mitt-bot mentality as I do.
Now, I have an added treat. While I was looking around online for a good video of Pulp doing Common People live, I was surprised to find out that a few years ago a cover of the song was done by … wait for it … William Shatner. Yeppers. On his Has Been album, there’s a version of Common People in which ol’ Cap’n Kirk pretty much speaks the lyrics and Joe Jackson joins in to sing some of them. As surprising as the existence of the cover was to me, I was even more shocked when I checked out a video of it and heard how much Denny Crane sounds like the Mitter. If you’d like you can check out a vid, with the lyrics scrolling on screen, of it here:
Anyway, the serendipity of this discovery prompted me to spend a few minutes with Adobe Premiere throwing together a few pertinent lines from Shatner’s vocal with some video of Mitt from the debate. Not much in the way of production values, and some of the lip-synch is off, but I think it provides a pretty decent portrayal of Mittens as Class Tourist: