Ok, here's a fun little tid bit. I have misplaced the person's name who requested this, but some one did. So here it finally is:

What "We Want A Rock" really means, a hip translation by Dr. Banana.

This was a pretty straight-forward job. Basically the song is about fads and what lengths we will go to in order to get our hands on the currentcool item. I will use myself as a model. For example:

Where was I? I forgot the point that I was making

I got so caught up in being really cool with my pierced butt cheeks and playing my car stereo so loud that the sonic booms made me crash into small animals, elderly people, and road-side flea markets, that I forgot the statement that I was trying to make by doing these things.

I said if I was smart that I would save up for a piece of string
and a rock to wind the string around
Everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around

Pet rocks! That's right, pet rocks. Silliest thing I have ever heard of. What better way to walk your cuddley little pebble than to get some string and make a little leash. Why, you could drag the little guy up and down the sidewalk twenty-thousand-million times!

Throw the crib door wide
let the people crawl inside

This refers to the crafty people who invent these fads. The lines above are like the sayings: "Putty in my hands" or "Like taking candy from a baby". Just start the fad (throw the crib door wide) and everyone who is anyone will eat it up (let the people crawl inside) they are babies that you can mold to your every whim! Muhahahaha!

Someone in this town is trying to burn their playhouse down
They want to stop the ones who want
a rock to wind a string around
but everybody wants a rock
to wind a piece of string around

These are the people who want to end all the fun. These are bad, bad people who say "This is silly!". They are the evil ones who kidnap your pet rock and send you notes that say that they put it in a place where you'll never find it. (They threw it in your driveway with all the other gravel) These are also the people who humiliate you into dropping the current fad just so they can get into it and mock you for not being with it.

If I were a carpenter I'd
hammer on my piglet, I'd
collect the seven dollars and I'd
buy a big prosthetic forehead
and wear it on my real head
Everybody wants prosthetic
foreheads on their real heads

What lengths will we go thru to get the current cool thing? Well I know that when I was in 7th grade and in wood shop I would have gladly hammered on MY piglet to get seven dollars to spend on Garbage Pail Kids cards. Well worth the animal abuse. Big prosthetic foreheads really weren't "in" at this time, but they are all the rage among the scientific community. I think this came from scientists watching too many Lavern and Shirley reruns about the Hubba-Hubba Heiny. They just needed something more intellectual, thus prosthetic foreheads.

Well I had to strap on MY prosthetic forehead for this one, but as I sit back in my bell bottoms and water my Chia Pet I can say that is was well worth it.

Feel free to drop me a line about anything that is on your mind.

DR. BANANA (sdc116@psu.edu) o:-{

DISCLAIMER: I, in no way, shape or form, have anything against the following:

• Pierced butt cheeks or any other pierced part for that matter.
• Playing car stereos too loud (unless it is BAD music, which a lot of it seems to be. You never hear people blasting TMBG, unless it's me blasting "The Famous Polka" and an elderly gentleman sitting in the car next to me tells me that he likes my music. It's true.)
• Small animals or road-side flea markets.
• Pet rocks.
• The people who bought pet rocks.
• The people who made fun of pet rocks.
• Putty (Silly or otherwise).
• Gravel.
• Hubba Hubba Heiny (especially on Lavern or Shirley. ARroooooo!).

4/22/94

Quoth <Jordan1c@aol.com>:

this may sound dumb, but i think the song is from the point of view of a baby, and his baby friends. babys are simple, they dont need expensive toys. they could just have tons a fun with a cardboard box, or maybe...A ROCK!!! with this rock, they could wind a piece of string around it. then of course their is "throw the crib door wide, let the people crawl inside", which is quite obvious. "burn the playhouse down", hmm, this could be a bad babys doing, or maybe they dont need the playhouse and are happy with their rock. now about the whole prosthetic forhead stuff, im confused.

Quoth Dan Ventresca <danno@voicenet.com>:

I'd buy a big prosthetic forehead and wear it on my real head.

Two or three years before this album came out, I got a postcard from my aunt, who lives in New York and is a sci-fi freak. It said that there was going to be a big convention or something in town and all these Trek nerds were walking the streets wearing Klingon-esque (prosthetic) foreheads. Hmmm.

Quoth Dan Seitz <Dansietz@aol.com>:

I personally translate "We want a rock" as a comment on the futility of censorship, at least in part. They want to stop the ones who want prosthetic foreheads on their heads/ but everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads. Someone in this town/is trying to burn the playhouse down. An obvious comment on censorship's love of fire as a censoring implement. Also notice that the minute it changes from rocks with string wound around them to fake foreheads, the "censors" want to stop people from wearing them, and forget all about the rocks, apparently.

Quoth Dan Studnicky <danny@netheaven.com>:

I've bean thinking about what We want a Rock is about. I do believe the idea with the fads, but here is my idea:

There are two kinds of people, the ones who want a rock to wind a piece of string around, and the ones who want a big prosthetic forehead on thier real heads. The ones with the rocks with a piece of string around it, and the ones with the prosthetic foreheads get into a war or something like that, because someone in this town is trying to burn thier playhouses and foreheads down. However, everybody wants a rock with a piece of string around it, and prosthetic foreheads. So they gang up on him/her. The ones with the rocks throw the rocks at the "someone" and the ones with the foreheads headbut him (I guess). I don't know what you think, but it's a thought.

Quoth Vicktd <vicktd@student.montevallo.edu>:

"Piglet" refers to an iron pig, which is a lump of iron that a blacksmith uses to form his neat little blacksmithed stuff out of. Carpentry, being another skill of the same mettle (sorry bout that one) is referred to punningly.

Quoth Matt Shapiro <shapir15@pilot.msu.edu>:

"I'm Gonna Burn Your Playhouse Down" is the name of an old song by the Scottish group The Proclaimers, on their tape THIS IS THE STORY. Maybe there's a link here...

Quoth <tmanson@mccarthy.ca>:

This isn't an interpretation, but may aid others in devising further interpretations. The line about burning the playhouse down is an allusion to the title of an R'n'B classic from the 70s, "I'm Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down," by Ann Peebles, which was covered at one point by Graham Parker. With their encyclopedic knowledge of pop history, TMBG would undoubtedly be familiar with the song.

Quoth <BnWMan@aol.com>:

I believe that this is saying how caught up everyone is in fads and being popular. This one guy finds a rock and winds string around it. He has lots of fun. Other people see this and think it is really cool, so they do it too. It doesn't matter that winding this string is stupid and pointless, all the people know this but still do it because everyone else is. This speaks of the bandwagon and how nobody really wants to be and individual and just wants to be part of the crowd. Opening the crib door compairs people to babies being led in and doing anything that anyone tells them too.

After everybody starts getting rocks, the guy becomes bored with them and decides to get a fake forehead and wear it. So, everybody else follows him blindly and does the same, not minding how dumb it is. The verse about buring down the playhouse refers to how people want to stop this foolishness of following the crowd, hense burning down the playhouse, but won't, hense "everybody wants a rock."

Giantisms:

• Hammer on my piglet/Open my piggy bank.