36D:  So What Indeed
from various on the LFW:

3 August 1998

JoelPY

Can somebody explain to me why Paul,or whoever draws up the set lists, likes the song "36D" so much. Previously we've heard that the band has so few "anthem" style songs, they play this one (although it's not much of an anthem, it least you can play itloudly) -- but is that really a good reason. I've never thought it was much of a song, and I just noticed that it's onall FOUR of the concert bootleg CDs ...seems a bit of a waste

Northern Dry Grin

Well, at all of the TBS concerts I've been to, when the song has been played, the crowd has tended to chant for it quite early in the show. If you take into account the bands association with soccer etc., you'd realise that it's a very British 'lads' thing to go on about womens breasts. Sound's weird, eh? Well maybe a few other Brits could explain better. I think the song is almost an extension to the chant 'Get your **** out for the lads' etc.

C. Munchenberg

I wouldn't presume to attempt to explain why Paul, or anyone else for that matter, likes 36D, but it's one of my personal favourites, so I couldn't resist a reply about why I like it.

I have a somewhat ambivalent attitude to non violent erotica (is that an expression known to the world at large, or an Australianism?) of which the page 3 girls are probably the most readily available and the softest. I find the arguments on both sides interesting and I think there is merit in most of them.

It seems to me that the attitude being put forward in the song is that the girls are nothing more than prick-teases and the singer gives the impression of being vindictively pleased that the "men who run the business that you sell, they screw you too". When I first heard the song, I was quite surprised at that point of view, but on reflection it made a lot of sense to me that some men would feel that way.

Listening to the song has made me question some of my attitudes and assumptions. And on top of being quite a thought-provoker, it has such a catchy little tune.

I often find myself humming it, or singing snatches of the lyrics under my breath. When I used to work in an office, I'd sometimes catch myself singing bits of it quietly to myself in the corridors. And then I'd worry for days that someone had heard. It would have been difficult to explain why I was singing about a 365 night stand, for example. They may not have believed it was a hit in the UK! Just as an aside, the song I used to worry most about was "Tattoo". I spentweeks getting about quietly singing "B-A-S-T-A-R-D...". God knows what people thought. This is the single greatest advantage of working at home. I can now play my TBS CDs and sing along as loud as I like without a care about being overheard.

JoelPY

Basically, I have two issues with the song:

-- I find it to be a little misogynistic which is fine, because that's just part of life, but I certainly wouldn't make it my anthem -- I really don't like the way Paul screeches when he sings "so what"

M. Hartland

(Arjan: Sorry to disappoint you, but 36D was NOT a hit in the UK)

36D entered the UK chart on 26 September 1992, and reached number 46

Chaney

I have never understood why people view this song as being misogynistic. I know Briana Corrigan did too. I don't get it, because as I see it, they are just chastising those women who settle for being sex objects. The song sounds like it criticizes men more than women.

Examples: - "Close your legs, open your mind" and "Dig a little deeper into yourself..." (advises women to make their way with their minds instead of their bodies. Also, a misogynist wouldn't advise this. Keep them barefoot and pregnant is more the speed of a misogynist.) - Refers to men as "dribbling clowns" and "maniacs" - Criticizes "the men who run the business that you sell, they screw youtoo" - "You cheapen and you nasty every woman in this land" sounds like an admiration for womenkind, not just the ones who use their bodies.

So, I think the attitude of the song is a respect for women instead of hatred.

JoelPY

Point taken. I don't think I actually mean misogynistic in the broad sense, I actually really mean hurtful and shitty. I can't listen to the song without imagining him actually saying it to some poor thing (think Geri Halliwell before she made it "big") who didn'trealize she had an option. I agree the song is pro-women,it's just anti-person.

J. Maddocks

I pulled this off of an interview w/Dave Hemingway:

"We don't just kill women in our songs," he corrects. "We kill a lot of men too. I don't want people to think we're misogynists, because we're not. We are, in fact, feminists," he states unflinchingly. "One of the problems Briana [Corrigan, former female vocalist] had was the focus of the lyrics. She found offense with a number of our songs, and many times we've changed lyrics when we realized that she was right."

JoelPY

Let's not miss the rest of that interview:

"Briana took offense to the lyrics to that song, and she ended refusing to sing on that song," [Dave H.] replies. "But the misogyny of the song was not intended at all. She misunderstood the point of the song. And now looking back at it, I sometimes regret that the song was released at all."

I. Replogle

You can't make a case for the song not being misogynistic by going through the song line by line because the point of the song is between the lines.

If you just look at the words, there's plenty to be offended at, which is why it's a bit disturbing when it seems to be taken at face value. That might have been why Brianna had problems with it.

The "pro-woman" examples given before really aren't:

>- Refers to men as "dribbling clowns" and "maniacs"

Yes, but the song also blames the woman for that ("you turn" them)

>- "You cheapen and you nasty every woman in this land" sounds like an >admiration for womenkind, not just the ones who use their bodies.

How does one woman's sexuality tarnish the rest of her gender? Think about the reasons why that line wouldn't be said to a male prostitute and that is why that line is misogynistic.

Chris Mal

I would like to add that I remember reading an interview of Paul about a year ago where he said that the song is grossly misinterpretted by nearly everyone. He said there are those - like yourself - who believe the song is misogynistic - which Paul said it was NOT intended to be and if you think it is, you are misinterpretting the point of the song.

If the person who wrote the song says it is supposed to be the OPPOSITE of misogynistic, then why try so hard to read between the lines and think that it IS misogynistic?

And - just my opinion - but how can you take the actual words of the song - which someone pointed out - and see that they are actually NOT misogynistic, and then simply blow it off by saying that YOU personally read other things between the lines.

Saying that it is misogynistic just because you chose to read something else into the song other than what the actual words say doesn't make much sense to me.

JoelPY

Is it so hard for you to imagine that people, (even Paul Heaton!) aren't always their own best critics (or lyric evaluators)

Chris Mal

Ummm ... as a matter of fact, yes it is hard for me to imagine that. If Paul says "this is what I meant by this song" then that is what he meant. Are you saying that people who write poems or lyrics don't even know their own intent?

JoelPY

What I'm saying is that plenty of peole write things, say things, do things where they think their own motives are clear and that their actions match those motivations, only to find out after years of costly therapy that they, y'know, drowned their cat because they disliked their high school principal or something.

[Non-Sequitir] To bring this back to dating ... how often are you really dating the person versus your image of the person or what/who they remind you of, what you aspire to, etc.?

I. Replogle

Chris, I think you misread what I wrote, or perhaps I miswrote what I was thinking. I was trying to say that you have to read between the lines in order to see that the song ISN'T misogynistic. If you go through the song line by line, it is very easy to make a case that the song is misogynistic (furthermore, the attempt to find "girl power" in the words of the song are, IMO, based on some fairly questionable attitudes towards women).

J. Chumley

Recent discussions about "36D" have prompted me to perform a search of my Beautiful South archives.

I have transcribed the following for your reading pleasure. It is an excerpt of an interview in "Q" magazine, number 102, January 1995

Q: 36D, you decided soon after writing this that you'd changed your mind about the subject in question (Page 3 Girls), didn't you?

Heaton: I just listened to what Brianna had to say about it and agreed with her. If Sean was here, he's argue in favour of it but I thought if you're offending one woman by it and a woman I consider pretty intelligent then...

Rotheray: I've come around to Paul's way of thinkingm though I think it's clear from the song that it's not the model but the industry that's being attacked. What changed my mind was the blokes coming up to me and saying they thought it was funny and shouting the chorus.

Heaton: We tried, unsuccessfully, to balance it with a video that was never really shown and that people wouldn't have understood anyway. It was my idea and I don't understand it.

Q: Good tune though.

Rotheray: Rousing. Good ending. Good drumming by Steady. Good bit of guitar by me.

C. Munchenberg

The discussion about 36D has set me thinking about the assumptions I make when I listen to songs. Why do I always assume that the song writer agrees with the sentiments of the song? Maybe s/he has imagined a character and written about what that character might think or do in the situation. Maybe s/he has a lot of ideas about a subject that are not necessarily consistent and writing a song about it allows him/her to explore some of them, without necessarily reaching the same conclusions as the song. It seems to me that this might be the case with Paul and 36D.

Enya

Just a (girl's) personal view on the 36D discussion - I hadn't realized people actually worried so much about the song... Anyway, I don't see how the average woman could be offended by it, or even think 36D a misogynistic song, when what it really is (the way I see it) is an attack on the "dribbling clowns" who get turned on looking at cheap photos of naked women they don't know, and also on the hypocrisy of newspapers that print them while on the other hand promoting "moral values". I'd consider that a pretty feminist approach really.

What are you thoughts?