Chart Roundup: Rod Stewart Still Makes the Ladies' Hearts Flutter

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• Rod Stewart, the man who topped the charts this week, selling 184,304 copies of his new album Still the Same - Great Rock Classics of Our Time, used to play in a cool band, which is why he can get away with wearing polka dot bow ties. Also noteworthy on the charts this week:

• Jimmy Buffett debuted at Number Four with his new album Take the Weather With You, which sold 121,361 copies.

• Did all the distinguished ladies buying Rod's album snap up copies of Jessica Simpson's record...  for their granddaughters? Simpson's album Public Affair jumped 14 spots to Number 117, selling almost as many copies this week as the Blood Brothers' new album, Young Machetes.

• Sting, who is rocking the classical music world with his new album Songs From the Labyrinth is also apparently rocking the rock world. The record sold 23,518 copies in its first week on the charts.

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  MUSIC 100 Greatest Debut Albums
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  MOVIES 'This Is the End' Brings the Goods
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  TV The Women of 'Mad Men'
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  POLITICS No Price Big Banks Can't Fix

Song Stories

“V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.”

Fishbone | 1985

Quite a few musicians have utilized initials for song titles -- Michael Jackson's "P.Y.T.," Abba's "S.O.S.," Donald Fagen's "I.G.Y.," etc. But the more curiously initialed tune has to be "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.," short for "Voyage to the Land of the Freeze-Dried Godzilla Farts." Fishbone's original guitarist, Kendall Jones, explained to Rolling Stone, "When Norwood [Fisher] wrote it, he introduced it to the band saying, 'Man, I've been hearing about all these Nazi right-wing groups on the news saying the Holocaust was staged. So what if America said it never dropped two atom bombs on Japan, that it was actually Godzilla popping a couple off?' Only Norwood would come up with something that out." The same year "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F." was released, the film Godzilla 1985 appeared in North America.

More Song Stories entries »

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