Archive for September 3, 2008

What the frak!

Posted in TV with tags , , on September 3, 2008 by macmystery

Frak you!

No big deal, huh?

Apparently, the word frak was “invented” by famous TV producer Glen Larson for the original “Battlestar Galactica” TV series. It was used in the scripts as a curse word … without really being one. Therefore, they could get away with saying it on TV. Kind of an inside joke.

It seems, with the SciFi channel’s new version of “Battlestar Galactica,” the word has regained some popularity and is spreading.

The TV shows aside, I find the whole thing kind of interesting because it says a lot about language and how we use it, and that’s something I deal with on a serious level basically every day.

Frak is basically f*&k, in meaning and utility. And the actors and scriptwriters that use it understand this.

But now that the word is becoming popular, you’d think that its usage would be frowned upon by those who typically frown o. that type of language. Well, not so far. It’s still kind of a joke.

And that’s crazy. Because that implies that the issue those who want to control language (teachers, parents, pastors, etc.) take with the word f*&k isn’t the meaning — one of which is to have sexual intercourse with — but instead the word itself.

F*&k … it is a harsh sounding word, with the hard K sound and all. But is that what really makes it offensive to some? Isn’t what the word implies more important?

Are George Carlin’s seven words you can never say on television only “bad” words because of how they sound … and not what they mean? Cock-sucker is really just an unpleasant word because of how it sounds, and it’s not the action going on in the word itself that makes it a “bad” word?

I know what the answer “should be.” But I’m not sure that’s what the answer “is.”

Someone’s confused.

I just can’t tell if it’s me.

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R.I.P. Jerry Reed

Posted in Movies, Music with tags , , , , on September 3, 2008 by macmystery

Maybe if he had taken himself a little more seriously, more people would have know just how good Jerry Reed was with a guitar.  Of course, if he’d taken himself more seriously, he wouldn’t have been Jerry Reed.

Reed died Tuesday at the age of 71 after a long bout with emphysema. He was famous for being Burt Reynolds’ pal and for goofy country songs like “Amos Moses,” “She Got the Goldmine, I Got the Shaft,” “When You’re Hot, You’re Hot,” “The Bird” and, of course, the theme from his best-known movie, “East Bound and Down.”

Forget the rest. That movie is why I liked Jerry Reed. Not because he was going to win any Oscars. But you know how some songs, some movies, some TV shows just have a place in memories because of when you encountered them?

“Smokey and the Bandit” was that way for me.

It came out the last week of May in 1977. I was not quite 6, but this was the first non-kids movie I ever saw at a theater. That is, if by theater, you mean sitting in the back of a Dodge Dart at the drive-in with my parents.

(Coincidentally, another movie came out in that same week of May in 1977 that I would go on to see four times in the theaters as a 5/6-year-old before it’s run ended … “Star Wars.” I’ve seen it hundreds of times since, and now my son has already seen it dozens of times.)

Reed played the Snowman in “Smokey.” He drove the truck and had a basset hound with him. Only later would I realize how good a musician he was. A three-time Grammy winner, in fact.

Brad Paisley, a pretty good guitarist in his own right, as well as a singer of some Reed-like goofy songs, had nothing but nice things to say about Reed upon his passing:

“Anyone who picks a country guitar knows of his mastery of the instrument — one of the most inspirational stylists in the history of country music, a complete master. I’m in debt to him for paving the way for myself and the other guitarists of today.”

Reed was proudest of his musical abilities.

“I’m proud of the songs, I’m proud of things that I did with Chet (Atkins), I’m proud that I played guitar and was accepted by musicians and guitar players.”

I was going to include some clip of Reed playing my favorite of his, “Amos Moses,” but it seems all of his YouTube videos are suddenly “no longer available.”

So the best I could do was a short of him with fellow guitar legend Chet Atkins.

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