Good Ship Venus

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

" Good Ship Venus ," also known as " Friggin 'in the Riggin' " (sex in the rigging) is an obscene drinking and Seemannslied that in embellished form lust and corruption of a crew and the accompanying captain family describes. The author and date of creation are unknown. The melody normally used, especially for the chorus , probably dates from the middle of the 16th century and is also used for the children's song "Go in and out the windows".

song lyrics

The lyrics of the song vary and have undergone various additions and changes due to distribution across the entire English-speaking world. Usually the song begins with the opening verse:

'Twas on the good ship Venus,
By Christ you should have seen us,
The figurehead
What a whore in bed,
And the mast a rampant penis.
It was on the good ship, Venus
By Christ, you should have seen us
The figurehead
was a whore in bed
the mast a wild penis

Already in the last line of the first verse there are variations such as “Our crest a rampant penis” (“our coat of arms a wild penis”) or “Sucking a dead man's penis” (when blowing a dead man's penis).

The rhyme structure of the song corresponds to the Limerick structure AABBA.

origin

Possibly the origin of the song goes back to an actual event at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1806, ex-prisoner Charlotte Badger traveled with her underage daughter on the brigantine The Venus . Here she is said to have brought the crew, including her lover, to mutiny and to take command of the ship. Both The Venus and Charlotte Badger's whereabouts are ultimately unknown. This incident caused a stir in the UK and Australia. One of the verses of the song refers directly to a "Charlotte":

The captain's daughter Charlotte
Was born and bred a harlot
Her thighs at night
Were lily white
By morning they were scarlet.
The captain's daughter Charlotte
was born and raised as a prostitute
Your thighs at night
were white as lilies
in the morning they were scarlet

Recordings

The first known recording from 1952 is by Oscar Brand ; the best known version of the British punk band Sex Pistols , which was released in 1978 under the title Friggin 'in the Riggin on the soundtrack to the film The Great Rock' n 'Roll Swindle . As a double A single , it reached number 3 on the UK Singles Charts in 1979 , making it the band's best-selling single.

A cover version of this version is included on the EP Penikufesin by the American thrash metal band Anthrax , which was released in 1989 , but Anthrax changed the text and targeted the peculiarities of their roadies . Another version exists by the Serbian punk rocker Toni Montano under the title Frigidna je bila .

In 2006 Loudon Wainwright III recorded another version of the piece as part of the Rogue's Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs, and Chanteys project initiated by members of the Pirates of the Caribbean film series.

Use of the piece

In the Goon Show , which was produced by the BBC from 1951 , ships were regularly called “Good Ship Venus” or “HMS Venus ”. This was one of the many hints of rubbish that escaped the BBC's self-censorship at the time .

The chorus of the Sex Pistols version was used with slight text variation as the title melody of the British sitcom Captain Butler from 1997. The text was spoken by then lead actor Craig Charles .

British director Ken Russell released the Hot Pants Trilogy in 2005 , a series of short films . The film The Goodship Venus was announced as a "musical journey around Cape Horn with a horny crew made up of the most sex-obsessed sailors who have ever sailed the seven seas" and was shown for the first time at the Oldenburg International Film Festival in September 2005.

Remarks

  1. ↑ Melody and text of the song "Go in and out the windows" in the Google book search

Bibliography

  1. ↑ Cray, Ed. The Erotic Muse: American Bawdy Songs (University of Illinois, 1992). pg 316.
  2. ↑ Sebastian Hogbotle and Simon ffeckes: Snatches and Lays . Sun Books, Melbourne 1973, pp. 87 .
  3. ^ A b Loudon Wainwright III - Good Ship Venus (Rogue's Gallery). In: Rogue's Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs and Chanteys. MetroLyrics, accessed June 2, 2015 (licensed text provider).
  4. ↑ Sex Pistols - Friggin 'in the Riggin'. MetroLyrics, accessed June 2, 2015 (licensed text provider).
  5. ^ Lyrics of the version of Anthrax. Retrieved January 3, 2016 .

literature

  • Joseph Lanza: Phallic Frenzy: Ken Russell and His Films . Chicago Review Press, Chicago 2007, ISBN 1-55652-669-5 ( limited preview in Google Book Search [accessed June 2, 2015]).
  • Cray, Ed. The Erotic Muse: American Bawdy Songs (University of Illinois, 1992).
  • Legman, Gershon. The Horn Book . (New York: University Press, 1964).
  • Roud Folk Song Index 4836