There’s no better subject line to describe the paradoxical absurdity of Labor Day.
It’s that time of the week when The Nest puts its nose to the turntable as we pour all of our blood, sweat, tears, and maybe some other bodily fluids into rummaging through our lost music vault just so you can enjoy a nice earworm on your Monday morning. Welcome to the Labor Day edition of the Dusty Vinyl Archive! DJ Scratchy knows by now that she never gets a Monday off on my blog, but we’ve supplied her with plenty of cheap child labor in the form of the Sponkies to help share the load of the strenuous job of putting records on a phonograph. Just remember to bend at the knees before picking up those 45’s, or no Safety Unicorn Awards for you!
In trying to find a fitting song for the day that celebrates all of our hard work (and hardly working), I came upon a long forgotten song by a band that achieved cult status simply because they wound up making one of MTV’s most famous music videos. That would be the British rock group Dire Straits, whose iconic video for their 1985 song “Money For Nothing” helped the song to reach #1. And yes, back in the 80’s, nobody thought anything about the second verse of the song which has been forever blipped from versions played on the radio in these pussified politically correct days…
You got a problem with my earring and my makeup!?!?
While that song itself would be a proper Labor Day tribute, it’s hardly a forgotten hit. Three years before they became brothers in arms, Dire Straits released another song about the working man… a strange blend of sarcasm, humor, social commentary and absurdity that managed to make it up to the sky high rating of #75 on the US Hot 100 chart. Here is 1982’s “Industrial Disease”…
Even the song’s Wiki page doesn’t seem to know the real meaning of Industrial Disease, but hey, it’s cute, catchy and good for a giggle or two. To hell with Kim Carnes, Bette Davis knees is a whole lot funnier to think about than her silly eyes…
How utterly revolting….
I’ll be back next week to hardly work on digging up another long lost oldie but goodie…
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
Catchy. Bleach….I don’t remember this one.
Neither do I from the time, but I heard it on a Sunday morning radio show I used to listen to that played nothing but lost songs from the 80’s and 90’s and loved it. I can see why it wasn’t a pop hit, but it’s still a fun song…
what? they really blipped the part about food? what’s wrong with chicken? I like Dire Straits, I never understood why they sure entered the charts but mostly behind such stuff like Modern Talking… or yes… Pete Burns…
Maybe Pete should have joined the band… it’d be funny to watch him sing the second verse.
My local classic rock channel kept that line…I heard it the other day. Rebels!
Indeed! My ears always perk up every time I hear the song start, and I’m always disappointed when it gets skipped…
Did like “Money for Nothing”………..never heard of “Industrial Disease” though………as for Bette Davis – we used to change the words a tad and say “she’s got Bette Davis thighs” which, if you think about it, is a lot scarier than her eyes ever were. EEEEEK.
Pam
Not many famous people want to be associated with their thighs for some reason… I guess with the exception of Suzanne Somers and her Thighmaster…
HAHAHAHA…….
I saw “Brothers in Arms” in Jerusalem. There’s a little valley (the Kidron) in front of the Old City from which the Romans staged their siege of the city. It was also where children were sacrificed to Molock of ill-fame. Now it’s used (or was, back then) for concerts. It has naturally good acoustics … and it’s always chilly and windy. Probably all those ghost babies. Dire/Brothers was very BIG in Israel. I remember partying with their music pumping out sound on someone’s boombox while dancing with a guy from Kenya who seemed to be able to keep going forever. Sadly, this also reminds me of my second husband who I would just as soon forget … but the melody lingers on.
Now that’s a truly historic concert venue… home of the greatest live acts and the ghosts of dead children! Ozzy Osbourne or Alice Cooper might’ve loved doing a show there…
That second verse was supposed to be a parody of the way the blue collar lower-class people talked.
Since I grew up in a blue collar lower class town, that’s probably why I never saw what the fuss was with that verse. We did talk like that….. all the time. Even us kids. Especially us kids. We didn’t call the dorks “dorks” or “nerds” or “dweebs” back then. We used the F word…
Thanks for this post. “Money for nothing” is one of my all time faves but haven’t heard of the other one. But then I like almost anything from Dire Straits.
I don’t remember this one at all. I also didn’t remember (or know) that Dire Straits was British. 1982…wow, it’s hard to believe how long ago that was!
It was long long ago in a galaxy far far away… or just like yesterday to those of us who remember when this was new!
OMG! A bone fide “blast from the past” I remember people laughing over this song but not really understanding it. Now that I have read the lyrics, it is still funny and I still don’t understand it. 😀
Who needs to understand the lyrics anyway? When I was a kid, I sang along to them without a care… then was somewhat disenchanted to find out what the lyrics actually meant when I was an adult!
Oh piggy heavens. Another one that none of us here at the Hotel Thompson have a clue about – that’s hilarious! And I thought dad knew them all because well you know – he’s older than dirt – Snorts with piggy laughter. XOXO – Bacon
When I read your post title my first thought was Dire Straits, but since I’ve never heard of most of your featured artists and Dire Straits makes the list of “world’s most successful commercial artists” I thought “surely not”! But it was true!
I’ve not heard this song before, though, funnily enough.
One thing about being a highly successful artist is that you have so many hits, some of them are going to get forgotten about. I can think of one or two songs I could feature here for just about any artist… well, maybe except for the Beatles. Everyone seems to know more Beatles songs than I do…
Yeah, you can bet your bottom dollar Mer will know every obscure b-side ever released.