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it's been requested we don't play "Rape Me"


Hamer Player

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Originally posted by zookie

There are 2 songs in our standard setlist we have to careful when performing. We put them both in our second set and usually take a quick look around the venue to see if there are kids present.


It's nothing really bad, but we play "If I Had a Boat" by Lyle Lovet, and it contains the line "Kiss my ass, I bought a boat/And I'm heading out to sea". If there are kids present, we sing "Kiss me goodbye".


The other song is Mary Ellen Carter which contains the line "...with smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go...". The whole song loses a lot of its impact if you don't snarl out the word "bastards", so we'll just drop it or save it for a time when it's all grown-ups.


The moral is you do have to direct your set to your audience. The level of compromise is still up to your discretion, though.

 

 

I do those tunes, too....in the Lovett one, I just substitute "heiney" for ass...it gets a smile, but offends no-one (thus far, anyway!). The other I wouldn't change, as "bastard" is one of those words that you can use (in some contexts) politely.

 

But, yeah, I know what ya mean about considering your audience...and I "G-rate" my show when appropo, although I pretty much keep it "PG-13" as a rule anyway!

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Originally posted by zookie

There are 2 songs in our standard setlist we have to careful when performing. We put them both in our second set and usually take a quick look around the venue to see if there are kids present.


It's nothing really bad, but we play "If I Had a Boat" by Lyle Lovet, and it contains the line "Kiss my ass, I bought a boat/And I'm heading out to sea". If there are kids present, we sing "Kiss me goodbye".


The other song is Mary Ellen Carter which contains the line "...with smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go...". The whole song loses a lot of its impact if you don't snarl out the word "bastards", so we'll just drop it or save it for a time when it's all grown-ups.


The moral is you do have to direct your set to your audience. The level of compromise is still up to your discretion, though.

 

Kiss my ass? Bastard? Is this parental advisory grade material? I think not.....

 

:rolleyes:

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Originally posted by Sleepin' Deeper



Kiss my ass? Bastard? Is this parental advisory grade material? I think not.....


:rolleyes:

 

Depends on the audience. If an event is billed as a family event, it is reasonable to expect that all lyrical content will meet a certain standard. Whether or not that standard is plain silly isn't up to me in my role as a paid performer.

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i believe the original, or alternate lyrics that kurt himself wrote were "waif me"....you can do a little research on that...i believe the record company was a bit uncomfortable or kurt himself was actually uncomfortable with the lyrics cause when he did "polly" in concert he had " a bunch of dumb jocks singing along that didn't realise that the song was actually against female violence" and he didn't want to repeat that scene with "rape me"...hence the alternate lyrics...if i recall correctly

 

so do "waif me" instead....

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What the {censored} kind of shows are you playing where people complain about that kind of stuff? NEVER listen to complainers. Don't give in to those PC fascists. Unless you want to make money. In which case, go ahead.

 

In all seriousness, it depends how you want your band to be/who you're marketing yourselves to. If you want to be a family-friendly band available for just about anything, don't play it. If you want to be the rebel badasses that don't give in to pressure from conformists or something like that, then play it and tell the people that don't like it to {censored} off. Really depends on what crowd you're after. If you're a strictly cover band, I'd assume you're going for the former.

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Originally posted by Hamer Player

when we do "all-age" events, twice now we've been asked not to play Nirvana's "Rape Me" because it's.. well... kind of... "not suitable for all audiences."


I'm fine with not playing it. To be honest, I couldn't care less either way.


Others in my band want to "stick it to the establishment" and play it anyway.


What would you do? Have you ever encountered a similar situation?

 

 

"....so we're going to play Closer instead."

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