And it's really subversive. There's sexual stuff on this show (at least in the second season) that I think they would have shied away from on The Sopranos. Shocking, I love it.
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Little Boxes, theme song for TV show Weeds.
The song must be one of the most quiet but sardonic attacks on the bourgeoisie I've seen.
And the show is really good, and especially in season two it's very funny.
I like that they have a different version of the song each time.
Also, it's not clear on YouTube, but the people in each scene in the video are identical. Same person filmed several times and put into the shot.
(YouTube's claim to "HD" is dubious at best, it's rather less than DVD quality.)
Ticky-tacky: from wiki:
Ticky tacky or ticky-tacky is a colloquial term for "shoddy [poor quality] material, as for the construction of standardized housing".
It is famously used in this context by Malvina Reynolds in the song Little Boxes - which is used as the opening song to the Showtime series Weeds...
I think the implication that all the lawyers and doctors are shoddy clones of each other like their houses is funny, but harsh. And from one viewpoint it's very untrue and unfair. But from another viewpoint it has a some truth to it, which makes it interesting.
Mary-Louise Parker is perfect for Weeds, she has a down-to-earth quality while still being really cute. She seems vulnerable and strong at the same time.
I remember the song as an attack on suburban sprawl. Masses of shoddily built tract housing. It also was applied to Wimpy and Barratt housing or their progeny in the UK, a slightly later phenomenon as our boomers are about 15-20 years behind their US counterparts.
ReplyDeleteStrange to see songs like "Little Boxes" and "Big Yellow Taxi" have recurring social significance.
I never heard the line against education in that song before. I guess it's true for office workers (lawyers, doctors, solicitors, accountants, CEO's), but for engineers, I think they come out somehow different.
Isn't Ticky Tacky a reference to Scotchtape/Sellotape.
Also, I don't know the show "Weeds", why the Mary Jane shadow at the end of the titles?
Is it US or Aus? Looks US, but there is something about the colour that makes it look down under.
Is the LR3/Disco more pretentious than a H2?
The whaddadawhonow?
ReplyDeleteIt's US.
It's about a housewife who supports her family by selling pot. But it's a better show than that makes it sound.
It's a show in the vein of Sopranos/Desperate Housewives/Six Feet Under.
I think the implication that all the lawyers and doctors are shoddy clones of each other like their houses is funny, but harsh. And from one viewpoint it's very untrue and unfair. But from another viewpoint it has a some truth to it, which makes it interesting.
ReplyDeleteThe whaddadawhonow?
ReplyDeleteBig Yellow Taxi
A Joni Mitchell "tree hugger" song with the immortal line "They closed paradise, put up a parking lot".
LR3/Disco
Land Rover Discovery. Though on second thoughts the one shown was not an LR3, but the earlier Discovery.
Mary Jane
To give her Spanish name Marajuana. So that ties in with the pot selling as per "Saving Grace" (UK film of similar subject).
Engineer
One with excellent insight into the physical world, but can only convey it to other engineers or physical objects. Also the essential interface between scientists (boffins) and people.
H2
Hummer for the really pretentious.
Ah, thank you.
ReplyDeleteIt was mostly the LR3/Disco part I didn't get.
I don't know if any of them are pretentious. What do they pretend to be, big and obnoxious?
The Disco smacks of the Green Welly brigade in the UK. A Landy was mostly something functional, you could get one if you had paramilitary pretensions, but a lot of Land Rover owners in the UK seemed to actually need one.
ReplyDeleteThe Range Rover was designed as an estate managers car, cleaner and tidier than the Land Rover itself. These started becoming pretentious in The City, the implication was you had a country place. So rural affectation started cropping up.
The Discovery seems to be built for a different breed, though it shares the workhorse abilities of the Land Rover, it was built more for showing off.
"Land Rover itself. These started becoming pretentious in The City, the implication was you had a country place."
ReplyDeletePeople *think* like this? I don't get it.
c.f.
ReplyDeleteSloane
Yuppie
Barbour jacket
Green Welly