34 :: Lost Legs and Fingernails :: A Slow Drag with "Invasion Hit Parade"

Today’s slow drag is with “Invasion Hit Parade,” from “Mighty Like a Rose,” released in 1991. The songwriting is credited Elvis Costello’s birth name.

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Written, produced, and narrated by Remedy Robinson, MA/MFA

Twitter: @slowdragremedy

Email: [email protected]

Podcast music by https://www.fesliyanstudios.com

Rate this Podcast: https://ratethispodcast.com/slowdrag

References:

Elvis Costello Wiki Resource, “Invasion Hit Parade”: http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/index.php/Invasion_Hit_Parade

 

“Invasion Hit Parade”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7Slp9rDxQU

 

Disco Tex and The Sex O Lettes “Get Dancin’”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwUQWamRNiY

Disco Tex & the Sex-O-Lettes bio: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/disco-tex-and-the-sex-o-lettes-mn0001202301/biography

 

Pet Shop Boys’ 2013 “Electricity”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIk1qEjI1mA

 

Hit Parade definition: https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/hit-parade

 

Gil Scott-Heron “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGaoXAwl9kw

 

Background information of Scott-Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”: https://www.songfacts.com/facts/gil-scott-heron/the-revolution-will-not-be-televised

 

Butcher’s Hook Cockney Rhyming Slang: https://www.cockneyrhymingslang.co.uk/slang/butcher_s_hook

 

Who is Gil Scott-Heron?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NH14L0IlduQ

 

"Invasion Hit Parade" Lyrics:

Now that you set everybody free
Whatcha gonna do about me?
Don't want to be treated like some poor grateful clown
I'd rather go back in the sweet underground
Where I can tell the time by the color of my skin
And I know my neighbor 'cos he's the one, yes he's the one
Who always turns me in

A woman works the tunnel in the middle of the night
Picking up every lost object in sight
Handbags, toupees, lost legs and fingernails
The black market eats up all your failures
Her transistor offers no salvation or regrets
No pool, no pets, no cigarettes
Just non-stop Disco Tex and the Sex-o-lettes

(chorus):
There's no name, no name for the place
Or pain we'll cause you again and again
If you do not cooperate with the Invasion Hit Parade

The liberation forces make movies of their own
Playing their Doors records and pretending to be stoned
Drowning out a broadcast that wasn't authorized
Incidentally, the revolution will be televised
With one head for business, another for good looks
Until they started arriving with their rubber aprons and their butcher's hooks

(chorus)

They're hunting us down here with Liberty's light
A handshaking double-talking procession of the mighty
Pursued by a T.V. crew and coming after them
A limousine of singing stars and their brotherhood anthem
The former dictator was impeccably behaved
They're mopping up all the stubborn ones who just refuse to be saved

(chorus)