Things you were shockingly old when you learned

that the count bishops had hits

They didn't.

A surprising place to learn some of the history of I Want Candy is the Astral Weeks episode of The History of Rock-n-Roll in 500 songs, because co-songwriter Bert Berns was deeply involved in Van Morrison's early career, from Them to Brown Eyed Girl. You also learn a bunch about Neil Diamond. All before getting to Astral Weeks itself.

https://500songs.com/podcast/episode-170-astral-weeks-by-van-morrison/

*eighteen minutes shockingly older* that the count bishops didn't have hits

The Strangeloves were not 3 brothers from Australia. They were a fake studio band created by three NY songwriter/producers including Richard Gottehrer, who has one of the longest running careers in the music biz.

― dan selzer, Friday, May 31, 2024 11:27 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

whose press bio was that they were 3 brothers who grew up on a sheep farm in Australia.
Apparently they couldn't do a good British accent convincingly.

Yup.

wow, so many versions of I Want Candy! We can add Brian Poole and the Tremeloes, Melanie C, Aaron Carter and the Candy Girls.

The Stray Cats are/were American.
I'd folded them in with all the terrible Ted-revival Brit-rockers at the turn of the '80s.

Except the Stray Cats were great!

How do you feel about The Polecats?

Brian Setzer (no relation) had previously been in an arty New York area new wave band called the Bloodless Pharoahs who played Maxs and similar clubs.

They were strayt outta Massapequa iirc.

"Font" is related to 'foundry', where early type sets were cast in metal

I listened to a History Hit podcast Gone Medieval talking about Whisky a few days ago that had various forms of spirits appearing as ersatz wines in the 11th or 12th century directly from attempts to market wine in areas that didn't have the main ingredients growing naturally and then introducing the distillation techniue due to similar local conditions.
I had thought that variation in local forms of alcohol were more natural and based on what had been observed to ferment through chance observation. So things would have evolved much earlier.

Fermentation definitely happened naturally lots of places, but distillation as we know it was an Arab invention that spread by trade and/or conquest: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/distillation-alcohol-invention-muslim

(Fun fact: "alcohol" is an Arabic word)

Tug McGraw started 39 games during his career--most of them his first two years (21), but then scattered around the rest of the way, including a start in 1983 for the Phillies. He wasn't very effective: 7-23, 4.81 (during a good era for pitchers; his lifetime ERA as a reliever was 2.86).

(Many people will die never having learned this.)

Apparently they couldn't do a good British accent convincingly.

How convincing were their Australian accents?

i was just washing dishes and for whatever reason Will Smith's "Men in Black" came on and i realized it was pulled from Patrice Rushen's "Forget Me Nots"

Despite being a regular cinema goer never spotted until tonight that Natasha Kaplinsky is president of the BBFC.

Diogenes was the original G.G. Allin

I know this has mostly turned into a thread for "fun ephemera we only just became aware of".

But recently there are a few things that I remember just assuming about the world when I was much younger that I was completely wrong about.
Mostly extremely naive stuff about pop culture, that was in my head but never really questioned.

For example:

- Until I actually got into reggae in my late adolescence, I assumed it was a long-standing folk tradition that went back centuries, and that Bob Marley etc were just part of that line. So I was surprised to read in a copy of Q one day that reggae as a style of music was younger than rock music. It's not entirely wrong: Reggae does come from a lineage that goes way back. Also that some of my earliest exposures to reggae-style music was stuff like "Rivers of Babylon" (which was written in the 70s but sounds like it should be a hymnal); and the children's song "Mango Walk".

- Speaking of which, I thought "Obladi Oblada" was some sort of Black spiritual song that the Beatles had repurposed and covered. This was based on us being taught to sing it in school assemblies next to a bunch of Christian hymns.

- In a similar fashion, there are songs like "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life", which I thought was an old Vaudeville or music hall tune from the 1930s. Even when I watched The Life Of Brian, I assumed Monty Python were covering it with some added risque verses.

- The first time I heard black metal (Emperor - Anthems To The Welkin At Dusk), it just didn't occur to me that this music could be made by humans. I didn't know how it was made, or who made it, but certainly not a bunch of young men only a few years older than me

BREWSTER'S MILLIONS (1985) was directed by the director of THE WARRIORS (1979)

Speaking of which, I thought "Obladi Oblada" was some sort of Black spiritual song that the Beatles had repurposed and covered. This was based on us being taught to sing it in school assemblies next to a bunch of Christian hymns.

Amongst the songs we had to sing at school were Yellow Submarine and Octopus's Garden. As a 5-year-old I assumed these were songs that had been around for ages. I had no idea they were by The Beatles and had only been released a decade earlier.

in the town where I was born
Lived a man from Gallilee
and he told us of his life
Then they nailed him to a tree

similarly growing up in Scotland I thought Flower Of Scotland was some old Burns era thing, not a 60s folk song

Or that "Scotland the Brave" was written by Cliff Hanley.

similarly growing up in Scotland I thought Flower Of Scotland was some old Burns era thing, not a 60s folk song

I'll not hear a word against the sainted Corries, you heathen.

I guess this kind of thing is common. I was surprised when I learned "Puff, the Magic Dragon" was from 1963 and was a Top 40 hit.

I was well into my 20s I think when I discovered that I should not scratch my balls and then rub my eyes.

i learned that yesterday, hence why i no longer have eyes

that and because it is the year 4545

some of my earliest exposures to reggae-style music was stuff like "Rivers of Babylon" (which was written in the 70s but sounds like it should be a hymnal)

1 By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.

2 We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

3 For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

4 How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

via wikipedia:

A common misconception is that the Cape of Good Hope is the southern tip of Africa, based on the misbelief that the Cape was the dividing point between the Atlantic and Indian oceans. In fact, the southernmost point of Africa is Cape Agulhas about 150 kilometres (90 mi) to the east-southeast.[1] The currents of the two oceans meet at the point where the warm-water Agulhas current meets the cold-water Benguela current and turns back on itself. That oceanic meeting point fluctuates between Cape Agulhas and Cape Point (about 1.2 kilometres (0.75 mi) east of the Cape of Good Hope).

The Portishead song "Wandering Star" has these lyrics -

Wandering stars, for whom it is reserved
The blackness of darkness forever

I found the same phrasing (or close to it) in Mark Twain's "The Innocents Abroad."

Upon looking further it is from the Bible (Jude 1:13):

Raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever

You're not supposed to drink the Alka-Seltzer while it's fizzing, you drink it once it's stopped.

have you actually drunk a fizzing alka-seltzer?

"we hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof"

this line is why psalm 137 was never going to chart unadjusted

similarly growing up in Scotland I thought Flower Of Scotland was some old Burns era thing, not a 60s folk song

Yes, "Fields of Athenry" is also a 1960s folk song that seems like it's been around forever.

There's so many Burns era songs they could have chosen for a "national anthem" but we've been saddled with this ropey old pub singalong.

"In a similar fashion, there are songs like "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life", which I thought was an old Vaudeville or music hall tune from the 1930s. Even when I watched The Life Of Brian, I assumed Monty Python were covering it with some added risque verses."

I'm probably not alone in saying this, but I didn't learn until relatively recently that "I'm going to be a part of it, New York, New York" was written in 1977. For the film New York, New York. It's literally "Theme From New York, New York". It's a contemporary of Never Mind the Bollocks. And the version I was specifically thinking about was the 1979 Frank Sinatra cover (in the film it was sung by Liza Minelli). I thought it was much older. I'm scared that I've written this before. It's not an unusual mistake. I learn from the internet that it's quite common. But I'm not just copying this from Cracked.com, I made the same mistake myself.

It also dawned on me that it's "New York City, New York State", which is why Sinatra sings it twice. That's two things I learned in quick successful. This my mind performed one hundred eighty backslash. Down, dog. Degrees or whatever.

Along similar lines I always assumed that "Who do you Think You Are Kidding, Mr Hitler" was an old standard. But no. Oh no. It was written specifically for Dad's Army. And it was also written specifically to annoy people who use headline case. "Who Do You Think"? "Who do you Think"? "Who do You Think"? Each of those - let me finish - each of those interpretations is equally valid. But they can't all be right. Because that way madness and chaos lies. Lays. That way lies madness and chaos. Madness and chaos is over there. Over there.

huh, I also assumed "New York, New York" was much older, I've never seen the movie, but have heard of it and assumed the movie was possibly named after the song (I guess it's just boringly named after the city and state)

i also did not know that abt "kidding mr hitler"! furthermore i had no idea till just now that it was sung by bud flanagan of flanagan and allen (his last recording, made the year of his death)

(it was written for the series as an affectionate pastiche of the kinds of war songs F&A did sing, so its likeness was worked for and achieved)

Liikewise the film New York, New York is set in the 1940s thus the theme song is supposed to sound of that period.

I'm absolutely astounded by that 'New York, New York' fact. I assumed it was from the 40s or 50s, but it was a (surprisingly minor) hit in the summer of 1980. This reminds me of something else I was shockingly old to learn. When I was a little kid, there was a song that went 'New York, New York: so good they named it twice, New York, New York: all the scandal and the vice, New York, New York, oh isn't it a pity....what they say about New York City". Those words might not be 100% correct, it's not as if I've heard this song a lot since the 70s. Anyway, for some reason I got it into my head that it was sung by Elton John and I believed this for about 40 years. Hold on, I need to do some googling....

So at some point during lockdown fever for some reason I was looking to see what had been Elton John's biggest hit and couldn't understand why that song wasn't listed. And then when I googled the lyrics I discovered that it was actually by some bloke called Gerard Kenny who I've never heard of. And apparently it wasn't even a hit in Britain. And yet as a 4 or 5 year old I convinced myself itself it was a chart topper by Elton John and nothing shook this belief for many decades. It doesn't even sound anything like Elton John now that I hear it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsi5lXxzByU

wtf

Although it only reached number 43 on the UK Singles Chart, it remained on the chart for two months.

... also wrote "I Could Be So Good for You!

I remember that song! surprised it wasn't a bigger hit in the UK, the radio must have played it a lot.
these days sounds more like a sitcom opening song, like Cheers.
Gerard Kenny also wrote the Minder theme song "I Could Be So Good For You"!

xpost dammit Tom!
wouldn't be surprised if there was a clip of him singing New York New York on 3-2-1