The Ballad of John and Satan

I know Yoko was a lousy singer who broke up the Beatles, but Satan? Come on.

How do they explain the rise of High School Musical, those crap Dan Brown novels and those shitty Twilight Books?

Lennon had genuine talent.

I’ve tried reading Dan Brown and heard some HSM because I could not escape it. Dan makes my “work” coherent and a prime example of Strunk and White style. HSM stuff just shrinks my balls.

If so, it would put him in good company with Robert Johnson, King of the Delta Blues, who supposedly met the devil at a crossroads one night and sold his soul for success. His musical clue is in “Hell Hound on My Tail”.

There was a fan rumor about 15 years ago that Metallica had made a deal with the devil in exchange for the massive wave of success they’ve been riding since the mid 80s. About that time self-styled true or hardcore fans declared that they sucked (and Re-Load and S & M *did* suck). Plus that, there’s the sort of demonic POV song from The Black Album “Sad But True”. Whatever. It is interesting to note that the openly satanic metal bands are grinding away in obscurity. The Judas Kiss from Metallica’s Death Magnetic does have a sell your soul message, though, and the band is at a new peak, so ….

Bow down
Sell your soul to me
I will set you free
Pacify your demons

Into abyss
You don’t exist
Cannot resist
The Judas kiss

Judas lives recite this vow
I’ve become your new god now

Follow you from dawn of time
Whisper thoughts into your mind
Watched your towers hit the ground
Lured the children never found
Helped your kings abuse their crown

The devil jumped the pond to Liverpool, he was looking for a soul to steal.
He was in a bind ‘cos he was way behind: he was willin’ to make a deal.
When he came across this young man strumm’ on a guitar and playin’ it hot.
And the devil jumped upon a row house step and said: “Boy let me tell you what:

“I bet you didn’t know it, but I’m a guitar player too.
“And if you’d care to take a dare, I’ll make a bet with you.
“Now you play a pretty good guitar, chap, but give the devil his due:
“I bet a Hard Day’s Night against your soul, ‘cos I think I’m better than you.”
The boy said: “My name’s John Lennon and it might be a sin,
“But I’ll take your bet, your gonna regret, ‘cos I’m the best that’s ever been.”

Lennon you pick up your pick and play your guitar hard.
‘Cos hells broke loose in Liverpool and the devil deals it hard.
And if you win you get this record Hard Days Night.
But if you lose, the devil gets your soul.

The devil opened up his case and he said: “I’ll start this show.”
And fire flew from his fingertips as he tightened up his strings.
And he pulled his hand across his strings and it made an evil hiss.
Then a band of demons joined in and it sounded something like this.
When the devil finished, Lennon said: “Well you’re pretty good ol’ bean.
“But if you’ll sit down in that chair, right there, and let me show you how its done.”

It’s been a hard day’s night
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away .
She’s got a ticket to ride, but she don’t care
Hey Jude why you so sad?”
Let it be.

The devil bowed his head because he knew that he’d been beat.
He laid Hard Day’s Night on the ground at Lennon’s feet.
The Devil said: “You might have won this round, but I’ll get you back.
“Ringo will sing, George goes weird, and you’ll meet Yoko Ono”

It’s been a hard day’s night.
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away .
She’s got a ticket to ride, but she don’t care
Hey Jude why you so sad?”
Let it be.

Note:
1) In case you’re wondering… Those Beatles lyrics fit the Charlie Daniels song chorus and make about as much sense.
2) I can’t “sing” the words without going into the Beatles song instead of the Charlie Daniels tune which is how ingrained they are in my head.

@ManchuCandidate: What the hell do they put in the coffee up there?

@redmanlaw:
I don’t drink the stuff.

Whenever inspired, the song just shows up.

@ManchuCandidate: Brilliant. Except for the songs that Lennon didn’t write, but I’m a purist.

In any event, whatever the fuck the 20 year thing means, in 1960 the “Beatles” still included Pete Best and Stu Sutcliffe; sure they began their first tours of Hamburg bars, but they weren’t even popular there until 61 or 62.

Brave of you to go to WND and poke around. I can’t do it. It’s on par with American Thinker in delivering the stupid, but I use up all my reserves over there.

@Nabisco: Stu Suttcliffe and Cliff Burton were the human sacrifices made to the Dark Lord by their other band members. Had Stu not given his life for the Beatles, Sir Paul would be playing skiffle after work in the pubs. Brian Jones, too, for that matter.

@redmanlaw: Hmm, and the lyric “When you were young, you shone like the Son” was about Syd Barrett…by George, I think you’ve got it!

I’ll never miss the Weekly World News as long as Wingnut Daily is still around.

@blogenfreude: @Serolf Divad: What I find endearing about WND is that they’re old-school reactionaries — even trying to make an issue out of John Lennon is manifestly quaint.

Plus, they’re not embarrassed about finding gremlins in the closet — unlike our think-tank friend in the later post, they’ll come out and say that Lennon literally made a deal with the actual Devil. I applaud their forthrightness. Makes life easy.