10 Well-Known Songs Banned by the BBC (For Ridiculous Reasons), 1955-1964
On the surface, our British cousins appear to be a lot more liberal than we Americans are when it comes to censorship. After all, the newspaper/tabloid The Sun started running pictures of topless models on page three as far back as 1970, and in 2015, you still aren’t going to encounter that in the Colonies. Even in the 1960s, their television programs were fairly innuendo-laden (check out old chestnuts such as Are You Being Served?), and although programs in the US have caught up on that count, British programs have surpassed us in what they show and say on the airwaves. Suffice it to say that for a long time, the Brits have come off as far more accepting and less stodgy than Americans when it comes to censorship.
Except for the BBC controlled airwaves. Amazingly, the BBC repeatedly censored and banned music that we didn’t bat an eye at in this country, and songs were often banned for what seem to be ridiculous reasons. Below is a chronological list of 10 songs chosen from a list of literally hundreds of selections that were banned from airplay on the BBC. Today, I’ve focused on the period between 1955 and 1965, and I’ll follow next month with a list selected from the next 10 years.
1) “Maybelline,” Chuck Berry (1955)
Though you might think this was due to Maybelline being the name of a cosmetics company, and that it was banned based on the BBC’s strict rules about free advertising (see “Beep Beep” below), even the BBC found it obvious that Berry was singing about a girl and not lipstick or eyeliner. What the BBC did care about was that Maybelline wasn’t “true,” and since Maybelline obviously slept around, the BBC labelled the song “immoral” and refused to play it.
2) “Be-Bop-a-Lula,” Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps (1956)
The BBC claimed this song was “offensive and the lyrics can’t be understood.” I suppose what they meant by not being able to understand the lyrics was that the nonsensical phrase “be-bop-a-lula” makes up more than a third of the song’s lyrics, but as for the “offensive” part, only the line “She’s the one that gets more more more” might qualify. They certainly banned a lot of other songs for a whole lot less.
3) “Love is Strange,” Mickey and Sylvia (1956)
Please listen to this song and see if you think it would encourage a woman to become a prostitute! That’s what the BBC thought, claiming that the lyric “love is money in the hand” might cast a favorable light on the world’s oldest profession.
4) “Beep Beep,” The Playmates (1958)
The first song on my two lists (but far from the last) that was censored due to the BBC’s very strict rules about mentioning products by name. In their eyes, it came off as free advertising, and that was a strict no-no. The lyrics say “While riding in my Cadillac/What to my surprise/A little Nash Rambler was following me/About one third my size.” That was enough to get the song axed from the airwaves.
5) “Charlie Brown,” The Coasters (1959)
Apparently, the word “spitball” (“Who’s always writing on the wall/Who’s always goofing in the hall/Who’s always throwing spitballs”) was a “disgusting, delinquent word” according to the BBC censors and warranted banning the song.
6) “The Battle of New Orleans,” Johnny Horton (1959)
Horton’s “Battle of New Orleans” was a big hit in America, going all the way to the top of the Billboard charts in 1959. The BBC refused to play it, saying that the word “bloody” (“We caught the bloody British in the town of New Orleans”) “didn’t comply with proper language.” In order to get the BBC to air the song, the word was deleted entirely on English records.
7) “Tell Laura I Love Her,” Ray Peterson (1960)
The early ’60s must have been tough for the censors at the BBC. They didn’t like songs about teenagers dying or automobile accidents, and there were an abundance of both on the air at the time, including Peterson’s song. Tommy is a teenager in love with Laura, and he enters a stock car race to win enough money to buy Laura a wedding ring — only to crash and burn. His dying words? “Tell Laura I love her.” In the BBC’s opinion the song was “tasteless,” and was, of course, banned.
8) “100 Pounds of Clay,” Gene McDaniels (1961)
“100 Pounds of Clay” told the story of God creating woman, but BBC banned the song and wouldn’t allow British radio stations to play it. The controversy arose not from the fact that it was a religious song, but instead the objection was that censors interpreted the song as suggesting women were created simply to be sexual beings, and the BBC felt this was blasphemous. British pop singer Craig Douglas was not about to miss an opportunity like the banned McDaniels record presented, and decided to rewrite the “offensive” lyrics so they would pass the BBC censors, which resulted in the following changes: “He created a woman and a lots of lovin’ for a man” became “He created old Adam then He made a woman for the man”; “For every kiss you’re givin’” was changed to “For all the joy He’s given”; “For the arms that are holdin’ me tight” became “For my world full of beauty and life”; “Doin’ just what he should do” was changed to “Makin’ land and sky and sea”; and “To make a livin’ dream like you” became “And doin’ it all for you and me.” Basically, the changes seemed to de-sex the woman in the song and dispel the idea that God would have created a being simply for man to love. Douglas knew how to work the censors, and he was given BBC approval to release the song and saw the revised version soar to #9 on the British charts.
9) “The Monster Mash,” Bobby “Boris” Pickett (1962)
Remarkably, this Halloween classic was banned by the BBC because it was “too morbid.” Censorship at its most ridiculous.
10) “The Leader of the Pack,” The Shangri-Las (1964)
Though this girl-group song hit #1 in the US in 1964, it wasn’t aired by the BBC. While it could have been the equally-distasteful-to-the-BBC teenage death theme (see “Tell Laura I Love Her,” above), reportedly it was because of its violent content; the BBC feared it could lead to gang violence between Mods and Rockers.
Next month I’ll cover the years 1965-1977, when the Beatles, the Stones, the Kinks – even Paul Simon and Jimmy Buffet! – were banned.
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