Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Fowl Play, Molly Ringwald and The Super Bowl Champions of the World!!

So here I am, suffering through CD after CD of random polka madness trying desperately to find anything I could connect with, anything familiar..anything!!
And to prove that there is indeed a God in the heavens and she has a wicked sense of humor I finally ran across a song I recognized.
A song that I always avoid at all costs.
 A song that has made me cringe since I was a child.
 A song I react so strongly too that I will actively avoid anyone who claims to like it because based on that alone they can't possibly be trusted.
Many of you feel the same way as I do and I asked that you gird your loins and be brave for the next few minutes..this part will be over soon and I promise that before this post is done I will infect you with another song that will blot this one out of your mind..
So, yes...the song...I never knew it was a polka...I should have.
What song do I refer to?
The.
Chicken.
Dance.

                                                                                                                                                                                                 
Chilling!!     

                                     It figures that when I finally find a polka I recognize it triggers my gag reflex !! 
Still, it must have been a karmic right of passage because after I found it the flood gates opened and I started to recognize alot. It turns out that because most polka songs aren't very original there is a common pool that most artists pull from  and thus alot end up in the public domain and over the years have served as back drops in Looney Toons, The Three Stooges and even more!!
The next big revelation knocked me off my feet. I had no idea that I was going to find a polka song that I liked and have known since I was 16 years old but also one that that has been an icon of not one but two major motion pictures, one of which  won an academy award, This song is so entrenched in the popular culture I bet everybody reading this knows it well.
I, of course, refer to the "Colonel Bogey March"!
What are you looking at me like that for?
Of course you know it!!
Yes, you do!!
Not only do you know it but in then less then 30 seconds you're going to be humming, singing and whistling along to it.
Don't believe me?
By all means ...take a peek











                                  
  Ahahahahaha!!!  Suckers!!
That song is gonna be stuck in your head ALL NIGHT!!!!       
Not only did The Breakfast Club secretly bring polka to a whole generation but it also paid tribute to another film in the most hilarious and subtle in-joke I've seen in Hollywood.
You see, before "The Breakfast Club"  The Colonel Bogey March was highlighted in a film called "Bridge Over the River Kwai". Wherein Obi Wan Kenobi, long before he became a Jedi, was the leader of a group of POW's captured by the Japanese during WWII and forced to work at hard labour. The captured soldiers used to whistle the march each time they were gathered as a show of defiance to their captors and to prove that their spirit wasn't broken. Kinda funny John Hughes had his kids use the march the same way and never told anyone..when I finally realized the parallel it made me laugh!!
And it would have been impossible with out polka!!!
Geez, after that little nugget could it get any better?
You know it!
For those of you who don't know, I'm a diehard Greenbay Packers fan and after they won the super bowl I was so psyched I decided I wanted an "NFL Champion" T-shirt. I ran to Google and searched for Greenbay Packers not even realizing that I had already had the word polka in my search box from when I was doing research earlier. 

The sky opened up and I was blessed with a great gift!!!!

Ahahahahaha!!!
Packers Polka!!!!!
Maybe there's something to this Polka stuff after all!!!!
I'll have to give it another chance...but I gotta go grab my cheesehead now!!!
See you soon,
 Greg
                                   

2 comments:

  1. HAHA!! It's true! It was stuck in my head all damn night. Meanie.

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  2. The chicken dance? And the Bridge on the River Kwai? Oh my gosh...I'm speechless. My husband the musical expert.

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