Andy Andy on Louie Louie

I know that many of you were astonished I had nothing to say about yesterday's news.

A school in Benton Harbor, Michigan banned its student marching band from playing Louie Louie at an upcoming weekend performance because of the supposed dirty lyrics contained within the song.

[SIGH!] Here we go again!

Some background...I have a collection of over 250 versions of Louie Louie and have something of an odd fascination with the song. I have a section of my main website dedicated to the obsession and it is among the most popular Louie-related sites out there.

The reason why I didn't scoop the world about this or even blog about it right away is pretty simple. I was waiting to find out if I was going to go on national television to discuss the issue.

Early in the day, during my daily check of other blogs, I received an e-mail from Brandyn Hull, producer of the MSNBC program "Connected Coast to Coast", with Ron Reagan & Monica Crowley. They were the first folks I was aware of to know anything about the story (later in the day Limbaugh, Yahoo News, and a few other places had covered it). They found my site and figured I was something of an authority on the subject, which I suppose is true.

This particular show is very web-centric. More specifically, it is very blog-centric and it often features news found on blogs throughout the internet. They found my site, saw I had a blog, and we began to chat about the possibility of making an appearance on the show.

Unfortunately, I do not run a Louie Louie Blog, which is what they were really looking for. No TV time for me or my blog. So I did what any good friend would do. I put them in touch with the world's leading expert on all things Louie Louie, Eric Predoehl. Eric has been working on a documentary film about the saga of the famous song and knows more about the song than any living soul, I dare say. Just today he put the first post to an actual Louie Louie blog.

I frantically sent out some e-mails and posted to a Louie Louie newsgroup to get Eric in touch with MSNBC. He also was besieged with many e-mails from friends and other curious Louie folks. Gotta love the instant nature of the net. I figured it could generate some great publicity for him and his film and all that.

Eric spoke with MSNBC and was booked to do the show. Eric, being the generous and well-connected soul that he is, suggested that they talk to Jack Ely, the original lead singer for the Kingsmen, and the famous voice that mumbled through the Kingsmen version of the Richard Berry classic. A great guest for such an unusual topic. Unfortunately, his generosity led MSNBC to the conclusion that they really didn't need two Louie experts for this story and went with Jack Ely alone.

In all, Louie Louie has gotten some amazing press, all because some people in Benton Harbor are too fucking stupid to know that the lyrics to Louie Louie are not dirty at all. They never have been dirty and aside from a few acts that chose to dirty them up (Intense Mutilation, Iggy Pop, to name a couple), the song is about as harmless as a cotton ball hitting you in the head.

Here are some brilliant ironies in this story.

The McCord Middle School decided not to allow the band to play the song because of its dirty content. This was a band performance and did not feature any vocals. That means the tune was banned because of the vocals...Which would not be present anyway. Thanks to my pal, Theo for pointing that one out.

The FBI investigation about the song was conducted and concluded about 40 years ago and the findings are public knowledge, as are the lyrics (Click here to read the actual lyrics as well as many dirty versions people have created over the years). This institution, a place that likely encourages students to do their homework, did not in fact do any homework of their own to find out the song is not one bit obscene. I guess they don't have Google in Benton Harbor.

Rush Limbaugh covered the story and played the song, going over it lyric by lyric to show it has no dirty words. Isn't this fucker supposed to be deaf anyway? How would he know? LOL!

I also had to work yesterday and hadn't the time to chime in on the story, with all the phone calls, e-mails, and other stuff going on. Today, I can look at it and laugh my ass off. So that's my take on this silly mess. People are so willing to believe the myths and rumors before believing the truth. I guess that's why I like to tell so many people I have a HUGE penis and am worth a go-zillion dollars. Sooner or later, somebody will believe it, right?

To find out how YOU can help Eric complete this epic film and bring it to the world please visit...

www.louielouie.net.

www.louielouie.net/blog

www.octalouie.com