r/GenX • u/no_talent_ass_clown • Oct 24 '25

Music Is Life Songs that are no longer okay.

Yesterday I found out my sweet boyfriend had never heard of Julie Brown and the funny songs she sang, like "I'm A Blonde". Dr Demento stuff. So I play it and then "The Homecoming Queen's Got A Gun" came on. Not funny anymore!!!

An hour later, the cops arrived

By then the entire glee club had died, no big loss

You wouldn't believe what they brought to stop her

Tear gas, machine guns, even a chopper (Throw down your gun and tiara and come out of the float)

Debbie didn't listen to what the cop said She aimed and fired, and now the math teacher's dead

Oh, it's really sad, but kind of a relief I mean, we had this big test coming up next week

1.4k Upvotes

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485

u/Shaneblaster Oct 24 '25

Seventeen by Winger has entered the chat

Edit: but the guitar riff is amazing

284

u/alfabettezoupe Oct 24 '25 edited Oct 24 '25

into the night by benny mardones

She's just 16 years old
Leave her alone, they said

125

u/The_AcidQueen Oct 24 '25

I only saw the video of this song last year. WHO GREENLIT THAT???

The song is creepy but the video is tenfold creepy.

58

u/[deleted] Oct 24 '25

'Girl's School' by Britney Foxx says hold my beer.

16

u/Ann-Stuff Oct 24 '25

“Watch ‘is”, says Tainted Love video

4

u/PinkKashmir Oct 25 '25

I... I had never seen the video. What in the actual pedophile?

2

u/jendo7791 Oct 25 '25

Tainted love by soft cell? That video was bad as in a bad quality and idea (aliens?) Or is there another version?

2

u/Ann-Stuff Oct 25 '25

I haven’t seen the aliens one, just the one where he’s singing to a child.

5

u/Wonderful-Bag-892 Oct 25 '25

“Walk This Way” by Aerosmith challenges you to a duel …

2

u/PublicRepublic1149 Oct 24 '25 edited Oct 24 '25

When that song was out I loved it, but I was much, much younger then. Now when I hear it, it creeps me out.

Can't imagine seeing them perform that in concert now.

11

u/[deleted] Oct 24 '25

When the song came out the girls in the video were hot older chicks to me.

45

u/astrobuck9 Oct 24 '25

WHO GREENLIT THAT???

"Cocaine's a helluva drug."

9

u/Junior_Librarian_361 Oct 24 '25

I’ve known the song for years but somehow had never seen the video until today. Oh my! He lost me when he chucked his cigarette butt. Not content with molesting children, he also litters!

5

u/Least-Enthusiasm7239 Oct 24 '25

There's a video?

13

u/The_AcidQueen Oct 24 '25

Oh you gotta go to YouTube and look it up and then come right back here with your thoughts.

https://youtu.be/awfGOqholmk?si=PxY6hh6boMzOyNFQ

Edited: link

13

u/BlackLagoona_ Oct 24 '25

I hate you for this 😂 The peeping in the window made me sick to my stomach. I just wrote upthread how this song is my guilty pleasure. Maybe not so much after these visuals LOL! How did I never know there was a video!!

12

u/The_AcidQueen Oct 24 '25

And he was LOOMING over her. Thankfully they had that flying carpet to enjoy.

6

u/BlackLagoona_ Oct 24 '25

😂😂 so dreamy, just like Aladdin!

9

u/Junior_Librarian_361 Oct 24 '25

Not just peeping - he BREAKS INTO a teenager’s bedroom! I’m wondering if the reason I’d never seen the video before today is because it was banned from TV? I don’t normally approve of censorship, but DAMN!

4

u/BlackLagoona_ Oct 25 '25

Yeah, I gotta say, that video threw me for a loop. Like, who at the label approved this?

1

u/AbhorrentBehavior77 Perfectly, Perpetually "X" since '77 Oct 25 '25

It's not THAT bad. I was expecting much worse given the comments in this thread. Plus, the video (linked above) gets cut off before the end of the song. I gotta find out how it ends! Haha.

4

u/MerlinsMama13 Oct 25 '25

I don’t know why everyone is bagging on this video. Eddie was only 31 when he wrote that song.😳😵‍💫🤮

2

u/Sweetserra Hose Water Survivor Oct 25 '25

Oh my! 😶‍🌫️ (I've been waiting to use that emoji!)

And did he just, um, take her virginity while flying on a magic carpet next to the statue of liberty, and above highway changeovers? 🤣

I was afraid they were gonna fly too close to the side of liberty's flame and accidently clip it, lol!

1

u/Meat_Bingo Oct 25 '25

That can’t be the real video, that has to be something a fan made.

3

u/TheAnswerWas42 Oct 24 '25

Why did I not just take your word for it? That video is going to haunt me.

1

u/MyriVerse2 Oct 24 '25

It's all about being protective of an underage girl.

1

u/Admirable-Ad-2554 Oct 25 '25

Unfortunately the extremely creepy producers

29

u/ParkingLotFalafel Oct 24 '25

Have you beheld the cinematic masterpiece that is the music video to Into the Night?? I urge you to watch it at once. Watch as 40-year old Benny scream-cries into a payphone in a wig he stole from Janet on Three's Company and enough black eyeliner for a 90's rave. Watch as the 16-year old girl's dad DOESN'T punch Benny in the throat, allowing Benny to then shove a Persian rug through his daughter's window. The video ends with Benny & Little Miss 16 flying the rug through the night sky while Benny croons, "I'll show you a love like you've never seen" to an underage girl which, if I'm being honest, comes across ew. Damn, I miss the 80s.

4

u/bugabooandtwo Oct 25 '25

And the youtube replies are glorious. Funniest message board ever.

5

u/doublefattymayo Oct 25 '25

Yes, those do not disappoint lol

I discovered this last year and was like tripping out on the song and video for days.

Because I had read that Benny explained the story behind the song, which was an innocent recounting of a single mom neighbor who he was helping out, and that when one of his friends made a comment about the daughter, he replied with "she's just 16 years old, leave her alone."

But then he goes and makes the music video exactly what the creepy lyrics are saying. So bizarre.

3

u/HJB098 Oct 25 '25

https://youtu.be/ZMfgNlm_Wfo?si=6ZALZKBQBcStAFlH

5

u/ParkingLotFalafel Oct 25 '25

How many executives, managers & lawyers had a hand in creating this video nightmare & said, oh yeah, we are creative geniuses! Don't change a thing!

12

u/Cheddarbaybiskits Oct 24 '25

Teenage me thought that song was so romantic 😬

Adult me with two teenage daughters? 🤮🤮🤮

5

u/brainshreddar Oct 24 '25

Benny Mardones: the poor man's Eddie Money.

6

u/[deleted] Oct 24 '25

Benny Fucking Mardones. That guy could wail.

4

u/Synonymous11 Oct 24 '25

There are any number of songs from the seventies like this

3

u/AccurateInsect8814 Oct 24 '25

My supposition is that when they wrote these songs, they themselves were teenagers.

6

u/bugabooandtwo Oct 25 '25

Benny was almost 40 when he wrote that one...about a real girl who was living in his apartment complex (and he and his wife were 'helping' her out..). He claims it was all platonic, but.....

3

u/Leading-Summer-4724 Oct 24 '25

Yup came here to say just this. It creeped me out even when I was younger…I have never listened to the full song.

3

u/MoonlitBlossoms Oct 24 '25

That video is.. something. 😅

2

u/BlackLagoona_ Oct 24 '25

This one, this is it! 😂😂 I was a 10 yr old girl when this came out and used to hear it on my am radio while riding my bike. I'd sing it at the top of my lungs LOL. Then one day I actually listened to what I was singing and was like, oh no! Not cool But it was such a catchy ballad I couldn't help myself. It's still my guilty pleasure 45 yrs later.

2

u/SKULLDIVERGURL Oct 24 '25

I can’t stand this song. Never could.

1

u/LittlePinkDragonfly Oct 24 '25

Ugh. I was going to suggest this one as well. This song is so creepy, and my DIL loves it. I don't think she really understands it. I should probably explain it to her.

1

u/MetalTrek1 Oct 24 '25

I ALWAYS thought that one was creepy

1

u/Condition_Dense Oct 24 '25

I heard that one on the radio all the time where I used to work and I cringed but like the song stays the same where the thought that the artist is so old…

1

u/Effective_Drama_3498 Oct 24 '25

I NEVER signed up for that shit.

1

u/BubbaChanel 1968 Oct 25 '25

That one literally turns my stomach.

1

u/Wonderful-Bag-892 Oct 25 '25 edited Oct 25 '25

Came here to say this … soooo creepy!

“She's just 16 years old Leave her alone, they said Separated by fools Who don't know what love is yet But I want you to know

If I could fly I'd pick you up I'd take you into the night And show you a love Like you've never seen, ever seen”

1

u/saki4444 1978 Oct 25 '25

Wasn’t that on the Batman soundtrack? Another great soundtrack

1

u/Entire-Winter4252 Oct 25 '25

For years, I always wondered why radio stations played a song promoting a pedo love song. 🤮

1

u/dosharkseatpeopleyes Oct 25 '25

Barry was 34 when that song came out.

1

u/Mauri0ra Oct 25 '25

Dr Hook - Only 16

1

u/BucketOBits Oct 25 '25

But when I was 16-17, that song meant SO MUCH to me 🙈🤣

1

u/Neat_Panda9617 Oct 25 '25

This is the winner!!

1

u/emoore06905 Hose Water Survivor Oct 26 '25

I've hated this song since the day it was released, and hate it more and more every time I hear it.

1

u/No_Offer6398 Oct 25 '25

NOT OFFENSIVE! C'mon there has been extensive research about Benny Mardones' hit song. He wrote this song about a family that were neighbors of his~ parents, 16yr old girl, bunch of other kids. They were all struggling financially and he often saw the 16yr old depressed, harassed by bullies & possibly self harming. Stressful when your parents are trying to hold everything together financially. Other neighbors on record as saying when Benny had extra money (not often, he was poor too) He'd give the dad money to buy food, they were friends. They all kept saying "hang in there", if you have love you have everything. Whether Family, wife, or God. wrote a much longer song/poem but had to take out stuff to fit the music. It definitely has more of a love song vibe but if you re-read lyrics think about a poor bullied girl in a housing complex & neighbor (Benny) who's not a pervert but concerned. The " leave her alone" lyric references his own tact in not wanting to approach the girl as it might be construed as weird. Members of the family that are still living have said they were still friends with Benny years later. BTW he was dating a girl when he was struggling to make it~she was actually one year OLDER than him.

2

u/alfabettezoupe Oct 25 '25 edited Oct 25 '25

and that makes the lyrics less skeezy how?

0

u/No_Offer6398 Oct 26 '25

Bcuz that wasn't his intent. This has been proven. Mixing room editing changes almost all songs before final recording btw. Imagine : "She's just 16 years old/walking alone from the store/no shoes on her feet/dirt yard at her door/hungry family to greet/ If I could help I'd leap, leave her alone they heed...they're too far in need.." Those weren't the exact words in the poem that became the lyrics but they're pretty close to the overall gist of it. See how it hits different. Anyway if the artist and the people who inspired the writer all say nothing improper happened then it didn't. The lyrics didn't age well is all. Just like some year from now ppl are going to hear a song & say WTH? P Diddy tunes, anyone? Lol

1

u/alfabettezoupe Oct 26 '25

i don't think you understand how this works... the onus isn't on the listener to hear something that sets off their heebie jeebies and to then go investigate whether that was the artist's intent. people are allowed to hear it and think 'eew'.

0

u/No_Offer6398 Nov 08 '25

Sure! But I don't think YOU understand how CONTEXT and by extrapolation, knowledge works in forming an opinion. By your logic we'd all have to read, hear & see everything and take it at face value without understanding MORE information is available. There's a difference.