It's the first day of the summer research session today, which means I'm going to be run ragged getting my three (!) summer students started with their various projects. So, here's a pop-culture post inspired by the wedding Kate and I went to over the weekend:
What's the most inappropriate song you've heard played at a wedding?
This came up because while we were waiting for dinner, they were playing miscellaneous songs, one of which was "Lost Cause" by Beck. Which is a great song and all, but not so much the sort of thing you really want to play at a wedding...
In fact, I'd say that a good rule of thumb would be that any single off a breakup album is probably a bad idea. There really isn't any good wedding material on Blood On the Tracks, either, for example...
So, what's the most inappropriate song you've heard played at a wedding or wedding reception?
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Does it count if it's inappropriate on purpose, rather than cluelessness?
'Cause almost every wedding I've been to involving a certain group of college friends has featured "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" at the reception.
The wife nixed my plan to have "The Thrill is Gone" by BB King played at our reception. Though, as we were headed out to the car, the band did play "Makin' Whoopee".
I've never actually heard it, but I think (My Name is) "Luka" would be a spectacularly bad choice. And it just might be inadvertently included in an '80s mix.
"I Call It Love" by Mel McDaniel would be nasty.
At my niece's wedding the first song was "Keep Your Hands to Yourself."
I don't know for whose benefit it was played but it didn't fool the bride's family. Maybe for his family or the preacher?
At my (very Catholic) friend's reception we requested "Highway to Hell" just to see what his grandmother would do.
I've also heard "Dazed and Confused" but they were stoners so I think was the reference.
I tried to get my wife to allow "Baby Got Back" as our first dance, but she nixed it. I asked her, "Have you looked at your bridesmaids?" We used "Hero" by Enrique Iglesias instead.
"Get your tongue out of my mouth, I'm kissing you goodbye", by Waylon Jennings. My cousin and his bride are twisted rednecks......
We compiled our wedding music on an IPod just a few days before the wedding, clicking and dragging in a rush. As a result several songs got on which didn't belong, of which the most notable was Steeleye Span's recording of "The Elf Knight". Sample lyrics:
`Light down, light down, Isabel' said he
Fine flowers in the valley
`For we're come to the place where you are to die'
As the rose is blown
`It's seven kings daughters, here have I slain'
Fine flowers in the valley
`And you shall be the eighth of them'
As the rose is blown
Fortunately for us, this was background music, not dancing, so it wasn't very distinct.
With no apparent irony, the band at my aunt's 1978 wedding played "It's Sad to Belong to Someone Else, When the Right One Comes Along".
The wedding I was at this weekend played Runaround Sue. It's a nice song and all, until you listen to the lyrics.
The wedding I was at this weekend played Runaround Sue. It's a nice song and all, until you listen to the lyrics.
Tell me this wasn't in the Boston area...
They played "Runaround Sue" at the wedding we were at, too, but the argument was made that it's an old enough song to get a pass.
Last movement of Prokofiev's Piano Sonata no. 7. It's a rather violent piece overall.
I've been to a number of weddings whose reception dance time featured YMCA by the Village People. Um.
MKK
Two of my friends who got married have a wonderfully dark sense of humor, so they put "Ball and Chain" by Social Distortion on their set list. The less hip family members were confused, everyone else was amused.
At a separate (very Catholic) wedding, the DJ absolutely refused the request of "Closer" by NIN; it had something to do with the "I want to f**k you like an animal" lyric.
At my wedding, back in the early days of MP3, I actually set up a computer at the reception to play music from. I carefully selected the song list along with my wife. Perhaps twenty minutes into the reception, a track came on that made my grandmother gasp out loud and rush to the site of where one of my new brothers-in-law was attending the PA.
The song was supposed to be 'Saw Red', by Sublime, I think, but what we got was an interlude that was basically just a string of obscenities, about thirty seconds long. Apparently it was not included in the track numbering, so when my wife said 'track seven', she though we were going to get that ever-so-charming Gwen Stefani duet. Instead we got a big misunderstanding :P
My ex-wife's sister had a singer perform Cole Porter's "My Heart Belongs to Daddy,"* during the service. Apparently, she chose the song without ever hearing the lyrics. She thought it was some kind of tribute to fatherhood. It was the among the most painful three minutes of my life.
* Sample lyric:
When tearing off a round of golf,
I may make a play for the caddy
But when I do, I don't follow through,
'Cause my heart belongs to daddy.
"Don't Roll Those Bloodshot Eyes At Me" by Wynonie Harris. Sample lyrics:
This was evidently requested twice, since the band played it twice. Saving grace was that the polka band played it in a marginally comprehensible manner, and it's not that well known a song (as far as I know); few people seem to have noticed what the song was about.
I'm told Pur ti miro gets used -- it's a lovely tune, but is from an opera about Nero and Poppaea.
A relative's wedding had a perfectly appropriate musical number done exactly wrong. After a series of very sweet readings and light vocal tracks, they nodded to their Scottish heritage and brought in the piper. It may not be immediately obvious, but Scottish bagpipes are frickin' loud! The little church went from 70 decibels of elegant soprano aria to 110 decibels (lawnmower from 5 feet away) of Celtic patriotism!
Moral: put the piper outside and just open the church door to let people hear.
When my wife and I got married, one of my favorite songs was "To get ourselves together" by Hugh Masekela from the Hugh Masekela and the Union of South Africa album.
The lyrics start:
I know you don't want me to go
but I've got to go to be myself
In some ways, it's actually a very sweet song. He's very much in love with her, but as he sings, "I've got to get myself together." By the end of the three minute song, as the title indicates, he's singing "we've got to get out of here" and I always hope that the "we" is the two of them and not him and his friends. Between not really being a lyrics guy and how elliptical the song is, I'm not sure though.
After all of that, we didn't play the tune at our wedding as the opening lyrics just didn't seem right. It is a great tune and a great album. At least if you're into south africans playing their interpretation of the blues and in which the singer would rather being playing the flugelhorn than singing. I can - and do - listen to it all the time though.
I'm a Buffett fan, and I tried to talk my wife into making sure that the band knew how to play "Why don't we get drunk and screw" at our wedding. For some reason, she didn't go for that one.....
Dave