Dr. Benson
I love it when you unknowingly misunderstand something, and later realizing the truth.
Today I had one of these moments when, for whatever reason, I remembered a song that used to truly give me the creeps. The ditty in question is "Take Some Petrol Darling," the closing track from the Sugarcubes' 1988 debut album "Life's Too Good." The song is definitely an oddity, as it's almost more of a long tone poem than an actual song. Apparently it is considered a "hidden track" as its name was not included on the original tracklisting, although I'm pretty sure it was included in the American version, at least on the actual cassette tape.
As I said, this song always gave me the heebie-jeebies and I never knew what it was about The song is very dark sounding, with some gothic-type bass and drums, some spooky guitar and organ, atonal rumblings from Einar and whisper-singing from Bjork. I thought that I heard Bjork singing "Doctor Benson is going to find out what's in their heads" or "what's in there" and I couldn't make out any of the rest of the lyrics, although I'm sure I had made up something. I wasn't sure who Doctor Benson was, and thinking about what it was he was going to find truly terrified me.
I was also always weirdly obsessed with the running time of the track. Clocking in at 1:27, it was one of the shortest "songs" I was aware of. Being that I was in junior high and forced to participate in or watch many, many sporting events, I would always notice when the scoreboard clock reached 1:27. Sometimes I would even notice when the clock read 2:54 (thinking "I could listen to 'Take Some Petrol Darling' twice - not that I ever really wanted to hear it).
Well, like some other Sugarcubes lyrics that I had often wondered about, it turns out that the entire song is sung in Icelandic.
Here is the Icelandic text:
Taktu bensín elskan
það er allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín elskan
Taktu bensín elskan
allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín
Loftvogin fellur
í gulan sandinn
og borgir þarna stop
borgir þarna stoppa' en það skiptir engu máli
það er allt bannað hvort sem er
Taktu bensín elskan
allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín elskan
Here is an English translation:
Take some petrol darling
everything's forbidden anyway
take some petrol darling
Take some petrol darling
all forbidden anyway
take some petrol
The barometer falls
into the yellow sand and cities over there stop
cities over there stop but it doesn't matter
everything's forbidden anyway
Take some petrol, darling
everything's forbidden anyway
take some petrol, darling
The more you know!
Today I had one of these moments when, for whatever reason, I remembered a song that used to truly give me the creeps. The ditty in question is "Take Some Petrol Darling," the closing track from the Sugarcubes' 1988 debut album "Life's Too Good." The song is definitely an oddity, as it's almost more of a long tone poem than an actual song. Apparently it is considered a "hidden track" as its name was not included on the original tracklisting, although I'm pretty sure it was included in the American version, at least on the actual cassette tape.
As I said, this song always gave me the heebie-jeebies and I never knew what it was about The song is very dark sounding, with some gothic-type bass and drums, some spooky guitar and organ, atonal rumblings from Einar and whisper-singing from Bjork. I thought that I heard Bjork singing "Doctor Benson is going to find out what's in their heads" or "what's in there" and I couldn't make out any of the rest of the lyrics, although I'm sure I had made up something. I wasn't sure who Doctor Benson was, and thinking about what it was he was going to find truly terrified me.
I was also always weirdly obsessed with the running time of the track. Clocking in at 1:27, it was one of the shortest "songs" I was aware of. Being that I was in junior high and forced to participate in or watch many, many sporting events, I would always notice when the scoreboard clock reached 1:27. Sometimes I would even notice when the clock read 2:54 (thinking "I could listen to 'Take Some Petrol Darling' twice - not that I ever really wanted to hear it).
Well, like some other Sugarcubes lyrics that I had often wondered about, it turns out that the entire song is sung in Icelandic.
Here is the Icelandic text:
Taktu bensín elskan
það er allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín elskan
Taktu bensín elskan
allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín
Loftvogin fellur
í gulan sandinn
og borgir þarna stop
borgir þarna stoppa' en það skiptir engu máli
það er allt bannað hvort sem er
Taktu bensín elskan
allt bannað hvort sem er
taktu bensín elskan
Here is an English translation:
Take some petrol darling
everything's forbidden anyway
take some petrol darling
Take some petrol darling
all forbidden anyway
take some petrol
The barometer falls
into the yellow sand and cities over there stop
cities over there stop but it doesn't matter
everything's forbidden anyway
Take some petrol, darling
everything's forbidden anyway
take some petrol, darling
The more you know!
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