Is the surreal title on the front of Yahoo news today: The logic that now, since the war, Iraq will need weapons of mass destruction in order to be secure.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070118/wl_mideast_afp/usiraqmilitarypolitics_070118110714
For the past decade, I´ve been trying to explain what I feel is the greatest existential mantra in rock´n´roll history: The 1963 hit by The Trashmen entitled Surfin Bird. The song is often dismissed as silly… it is silly, but there is genius in its silliness.
The song´s first half repeats variants of ¨everybody’s heard about the bird,¨ ¨bird´s the word,¨ and ¨everybody knows that the bird is the word!¨ So everybody´s heard of the bird, but they might not know it. They might call the Surfin Bird by some other word, but all names in fact are part of the One Universal Bird. These same lyrics repeat over and over, sung with ecstatic energy, changing with slight iterations, invoking repetitive and cyclical natures of expansion and contraction, sunrise and sunset, yin and yang, the ebbing and flowing waves that the Surfin Bird surfs upon. There is no multiplicity, there is only The Bird. It is the sound of one hand clapping.
In the middle of the song, the mantra suddenly breaks into a strange retching sound. At first shocking and absurd, it is understood to be the sound of a hatching egg. The Surfin Bird has been summoned and is cracking out of its shell into life.
Once the bird hatches it speaks. Its first words are the mantra of ¨Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow, ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow¨ repeated again with iterative sinusoidal momentum. The words invoke both papa and mama, the mother and father, as in a baby´s common first words that identify the source of its creation. The end of each line also rhymes with the lyrical ¨mow,¨ a reverse Buddhist aum.
At this point it is worth noting the politics of the Surfin Bird, which I feel is more speculative as relies on the pun of one word. Still, it is not a stretch to mention that ¨mow¨ could also be an homage to Mao Tse Tung (The Trashmen pronounce the word like the Chinese leader while singing). In 1963, when the faith and optimism of the young Chinese experiment was great, before more negative qualities emerged and were revealed, speaking simply of Mao could identify your entire idealism. And given the nebulous origins of the bird, it would make sense that the bird would lean more towards collaborative socialist practices than those of a competitive capitalist.
Following the Surfin Bird´s first words, the previous mantra returns and asks ¨Well don’t you know about the bird? Well, everybody knows that the bird is the word!¨ It is asked in laughter, as if the Trashmen have now made their point clear, and that you too can now surf with the Surfin Bird as the words ¨Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow¨ fades into the nothingness from where it came.
In the beginning there was the word, and the word is the bird. As you sing along, the Surfin Bird is you.
Surfin Bird
(Frazier - White - Harris - Wilson)
The Trashmen (Garret 4002, 1963)
A-well-a everybody’s heard about the bird
B-b-b-bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, well the bird is the word
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a don’t you know about the bird?
Well, everybody knows that the bird is the word!
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a…
A-well-a everybody’s heard about the bird
Bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird, bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a don’t you know about the bird?
Well, everybody’s talking about the bird!
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
A-well-a bird…
Surfin’ bird
Bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb… [retching noises]… aaah!
Pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-
Pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Oom-oom-oom-oom-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-oom-oom-oom
Oom-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-a-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, ooma-mow-mow
Papa-oom-oom-oom-oom-ooma-mow-mow
Oom-oom-oom-oom-ooma-mow-mow
Ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, ooma-mow-mow
Well don’t you know about the bird?
Well, everybody knows that the bird is the word!
A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird’s the word
Papa-ooma-mow-mow, papa-ooma-mow-mow
[repeat to fade]