Banned Records - (Not what you think)

WOLF ANGEL said:
1967
The BBC refused to play The Who's "My Generation", saying they did not want to offend people who stuttered.
Click to expand...
IIRC the band was trying to represent a Mod hopped up on pills, hence the stutter. I don't have a source for that right now.

Two other Who songs also were banned: I'm a Boy (cross-dressing) and Pictures of Lily (masturbation).

Postscript: So sad to see a young, exuberant Keith Moon. :cry:


 

1966
Sixties doo-wop group, The Swinging Medallions are forced to re-record a cleaned up version of a song that would prove to be their only hit record, "Double Shot Of My Baby's Love", after many radio stations refuse to play the original because ..... it contained the phrase, "The worst hangover I ever had."

The live recording of the second edition became a rock and roll classic.

 
1966
A recording engineer named Jerry Samuels, who billed himself as Napoleon XIV, hit the top of the Billboard chart with a novelty song called "They're Coming to Take me Away, Ha-Haaa!"


The song was banned by many US radio stations because it seemed to make fun of the insane.
 

1966
Van Morrison's group, "Them" had their song "Gloria" banned by Chicago radio station WLS for objectionable lyrics.
The song was covered by Chicago's "The Shadows Of Knight", who took the song into the national Top Ten after changing the words slightly, from "she comes to my room, just about midnight" to "she comes around here, just about midnight."


However - if they thought that was bad - here's Jim Morrison's take . . .
  • WARNING = Not for the easily offended
 
1967
Fresh off the world-wide success of "Friday On My Mind", The Easybeats had a follow-up single called "Heaven And Hell" banned from US radio because of the title and a mild sexual reference in the song. ----- ("Hell is knowing that your face has gone red, Discovering someone else in your bed".)

 
Peter and Gordon's song "Lady Godiva" was banned by the mayor of Coventry, England, who said that the song was obscene.


Coventry is the home town of the real Lady Godiva, who, according to legend, rode naked through the streets to protest oppressive taxation under her husband's rule.

Coventry-125600-Edit-2_1.jpg
 
BANNED -

After the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4th, 1968, many Top-40 radio stations in the US refuse to play Gordon Lightfoot's "Black Day In July", a song about the 1967 race riots in Detroit, saying they fear the lyrics will ignite violence.

 
BANNED -

"Give a Damn" by Spanky And Our Gang was released as a single in the Summer of 1968, and in spite of being banned in several states because of the profanity in its title, still managed to reach #43 on the Billboard Hot 100.


It was also performed 'live' on an episode of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, resulting in CBS' Standards and Practices division receiving numerous complaints about the song's title being used during "family viewing hours".
One such complaint reportedly came from a certain- Richard Nixon.
 
1967

A Denver band called The Rainy Daze saw their song "That Acapulco Gold" catch on locally.


The newly formed UNI label bought the national distribution rights and before long, the single had climbed to #70 on the Hot 100 chart.

Progammers soon caught on to the song's pro-marijuana theme and the 45 was quickly pulled from radio station play lists across the country.
 
1971

New York radio station WNBC banned the song "One Toke Over the Line" by Brewer and Shipley because of its alleged drug references.
- - Other stations around the country follow suit.


The composer of the tune, Tom Shipley, responds, "In this electronic age, pulling a record because of its lyrics is like the burning of books in the Thirties." Brewer & Shipley would also claim that "toke" meant "token", thus the line about "sittin' downtown at a railway station..."
 
BANNED - List - 1990 (1/2) .
  1. Twenty-one U.S. states introduce bills that prohibit the sale of records containing "lyrics that are violent, sexually explicit or perverse".
  2. Four hundred Trans World retail stores announce that they will require proof of age before selling records with warning stickers, to minors. Disc Jockey, another record store chain says that it simply will not carry any record that has the warning sticker.
  3. A Tennessee judge rules that 2 Live Crew's "Nasty As They Wanna Be" and N.W.A.'s "Straight Outta Compton" are obscene under state law. Conviction for selling these records could bring fines from $10,000 to $100,000, depending upon the involvement of minors in the offence.
  4. A Nebraska radio station starts a boycott of k.d. lang records because of her anti-meat beliefs. --- Their action is largely symbolic, since the station rarely if ever played the Canadian singer's records.
  5. In one of the most famous cases of music censorship, police in Dade County, Florida set up a sting to arrest three retailers selling copies of a record by 2 Live Crew to children under the age of 18.
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1971
Songwriter Rupert Holmes set out to write a song that would get banned from radio airplay and thus gain attention for a group he wanted to promote, The Buoys
The result was "Timothy", a tune about three boys trapped in a mine, one of whom was cannibalized.
The song received limited airplay until program directors started listening to the lyrics.
- Some removed it from their playlists, while others added it.
-- As the record started to gain notoriety, it shot up the Billboard Hot 100 and reached #17.
  • Holmes plan had worked to perfection.

-*-*-*-*-*-

1972
Radio stations across the country ban John Denver's hit song "Rocky Mountain High," fearing that the song's "high" refers to drugs.
.
 
1972 = The year of the Ex-BeaTles:

On February 19th, Paul McCartney releases "Give Ireland Back to the Irish," his commentary about the Britain-Ireland conflict.
The song is immediately banned by the BBC, but the notoriety the song receives from the banning only increases its popularity in England, and it soars into the Top Twenty.


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In mid-April, one of John Lennon's most controversial singles, "Woman Is the ****** Of The World" is released.
The song actually reaches #57 on Billboard's Hot 100, despite virtually every radio station in the country refusing to play it.

*****************************************
Lennon explains: =


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In November, Paul McCartney's Wings release "Hi, Hi, Hi" which is banned from the BBC because of its "unsuitable lyrics."
The song still managed to be a hit, reaching #5 in the UK and #10 in the US early the next year.

 
BANNED - List - 1990 (2/2) .

  1. Objections to 2 Live Crew started with the break-thru of their hit "Me So Horny". Similar prosecutions regarding 2 Live Crew record sales happen in Alabama and Tennessee. No prosecutions result in standing convictions. ---Members of 2 Live Crew were also prosecuted for performing the material live in concert.
  2. Members of the rap group N.W.A. receive a letter from the F.B.I. saying the agency did not appreciate the song "F*ck The Police". Law enforcement groups all over the country agree.
  3. A Florida grand jury determines that four rap albums (including "Freedom of Speech" by Ice-T) are legally obscene.---Area retailers quickly pull the records from the shelves to avoid prosecution.
  4. Metal band Judas Priest is sued by the family of two young men. The families contend that "hidden" messages in the band's "Stained Class" record prompted them to beat and choke one of their mothers, walk around town exposing themselves, and steal money.
  5. Representatives of the Italian Catholic Church announce they'll attempt to put a stop to Madonna's concerts in Rome because of her alleged inappropriate use of crucifixes and sacred symbols. ---The group was successful in halting the shows.
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BANNED - 1973:

BBC Radio refused to play Dr. Hook's "The Cover Of Rolling Stone" because it contained the name of a commercial publication (Rolling Stone magazine), and could therefore be considered advertising.

***** A new version with the words "Rolling Stone" replaced with "Radio Times" was done, not by the group, but by various producers and executives at London's branch of CBS Records, who merely sang over the single master.
- Radio Times was the name of the weekly TV and Radio Guide published by the BBC.

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BANNED - 1975

Loretta Lynn's country song, "The Pill" is banned by radio stations across the United States because of its references to birth control.


The Pill (song) - Wikipedia
 
Pearls Before Swine's song "Miss Morse"


  • The song was banned in New York when it was discovered that lead singer Tom Rapp was singing F-U-C-K in Morse code.
- After disc jockey Murray The K played the record on the air, local Boy Scouts correctly interpreted the chorus and phoned in a complaint.
 
A song called "Try It" by The Standells was banned by Texan radio chain mogul Gordon McLendon, a Christian fundamentalist, who considered the song's lyrics to be obscene.
Actually the lyrics by today's standards were pretty tame. Even though the record was the number one seller in many markets, including Los Angeles, most of the radio stations followed McLendon's lead and refused to play it.


The group even debated the Texan on Art Linkletter's Let's Talk TV show, and by most accounts defeated him handily by pointing out his hypocrisy.
- But it was all to no avail. The song died and so did the group's popularity and hopes of another hit record.
 
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