.

Song Stories

“Born Under a Bad Sign”

Albert King | 1967

One of the most famous down-on-my-luck blues, "Born Under a Bad Sign" found Albert King thankful for bad luck if the alternative was no luck at all, his laments punctuated by some trademark stinging guitar licks. The song reached a wider audience when it was covered by Cream on their 1968 hit album Born Under a Bad Sign. "Astrology and all that stuff was pretty big then," explained William Bell, who co-wrote the song with Booker T. Jones, in Soulsville U.S.A. "I said, 'Hey, we've never had a blues tune done about astrology. I got this idea that might work.'"

prev
Song Stories Main Next

blog comments powered by Disqus

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 »