| Devo – Freedom Of Choice Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| I’m afraid I have to disagree with mqduck; Devo were most certainly promoting “freedom of choice” with this song. The concept which started Devo was that we had stopped evolving and started DE-VOlving. With this and many other songs they were pointing out that a lot of people simply follow the societal herd rather than choosing their own paths. And whereas some of their other songs made this point in much more obscure ways, this one was as straightforward as you can possibly get. At the end of the song they aren’t merely implying that people don’t want freedom of choice, they’re saying it quite explicitly and are criticising people who have that mentality. And as for offering a solution they most certainly are providing one! In the first verse the lyrics are “sink, swim, go down with the ship; but use your freedom of choice”, which can only be taken to mean that you shouldn’t allow the outcome to be determined for you; they are saying – frankly and openly - that whatever happens you should make sure that it is occurring because you used your freedom of choice. | |
| Devo – Whip It Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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I think PursuitofLife's post comes closest to my opinion on what this song is about. Devo - which is short for DE-EVolution - believed that humanity had stopped evolving and had starter de-volving. This was reflected in a lot of their songs at the time - "Freedom of choice; is what you got. Freedom FROM choice; is what you want." They made a lot of comments about society and the herd mentality. If you read the song lyrics and didn't see the video then I think it would be a bit of a big leap to conclude that this song was about masturbation and/or S&M. And the reasons for the video theme are documented elsewhere. With Whip-It I think Devo are having a playful, ironic stab at the whole American self improvement mindset in which people read books and go to seminars etc. in an attempt to be different, to stand out, to be successful. But in the end this just produces a herd of sheep all following an Anthony Robbins type Guru who's the only one of them who is actually original and successful! All the 'followers' – following the Guru’s mantras like “shape it up, get it straight, move forward” are just sheep. See what I mean? And that's why PursuitofLife is right I think; if you don't think about Devo’s songs you miss the point and don't see the underlying ironic humour. As for some of the other posts, I was around when Devo first started out and they were unbelievable at the time; they truly were unique and original. They were helping music – and therefore humanity – to evolve! They inspired a whole bunch of people in music and other fields. People today don't realise that in those days hardly any songs had video-clips and those that did usually had pretty lame ones. Devo were one of the bands who lead the way towards the MTV generation; the irony of the whole is delicious! |
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