33: Frankie Goes To Hollywood - Relax

hopefully in a more regular schedule.

Well, well, regular. Regular is a relative word.

What is time?

Anyway, this is...

We can't rewind, we've gone too far.

A podcast where a Scotsman, an Irishman and a Bulgarian

discuss the silliest, weirdest or downright most memorable music videos.

And we're returning after our small hiatus

with a song that shook up the puritanical world of 1983.

And it is still to this day one of the most absolutely unashamedly gayest filthiest music

videos of the 80s.

And we love it for it.

This is the absolute smash hit single "Relax" by Frankie Goes To Home.

Don't do it.

Relax.

Don't do it.

When you want to come.

Relax.

Don't do it.

When you want to suck it.

Do it.

Relax.

Don't do it.

When you want to come.

How do we do the entry today?

Just the two of us because New is getting married.

Wee!

Congrats!

We are Irish-less today.

We didn't.

Was Brexit but Irish.

Are you...

Are you...

Are you...

No.

Except...

Sure.

Yeah, Neil's getting married, so he's busy doing marriage stuff.

So congratulations to Neil.

I don't remember how you guys did it for when I was getting married.

I listened to that episode, I don't remember it.

So let's just pretend it's the same.

We're all happy for you and blah, blah, blah.

The famous or infamous video, depending on who you ask,

directed by Bernard Rose.

As banned by the BBC and MTV, depicts the banned members at an S&M-themed gay club

and contains pretty much everything you would imagine that would get banned by the BBC.

Buffetta daddies, drag queens, humiliation kings, schoolboy uniforms, police uniforms,

light torches, trumpet, shaving cream, who are you, hold on.

Okay, back on track, banana ennuiens, roman emperors, real tigers, literal iron maidens?

No, seriously, what's going on with this music video?

It's a downward spiral!

It's just a spiral in some direction.

There's spiralling somewhere.

Somewhere. We don't know where, but we're there for the ride.

There are two separate versions of this video.

A PG version directed by our old friend David Mallet,

and this one, which is not so PG, directed by Bernard Rose.

Today, we will be focusing on Bernie's version.

Our old friend Bernie.

A bit of background, Bernard Rose is a very well-respected British filmmaker

who directed Small Town Boy by Brodsky Beat,

another early 80s British banger,

as well as the motherfucking Candyman,

the original Candyman from 1992,

which is such a great movie,

and I implore everyone to drop everything

and go watch it right now.

I've not actually seen it.

Hopefully that sounded convincing.

I'll trust you that it's good.

Everyone pretended David actually wrote this,

which he just said,

and it wasn't written by me.

A horrible movie, a fictional.

Also, you should drop everything

and watch the movie right now, Dave.

Okay.

It's a really good movie.

I can see why it got banned.

Yeah.

I can't think even today it would probably raise a few eyebrows.

I want to say what were they thinking.

I don't think they were thinking that...

Yeah, I genuinely think that they probably didn't expect it to gather that much,

you know, to become a number one top hit.

They were active from 1980 to 1987,

then had a very small three-year active period

between 2004-2007.

I think Relax was a massive hit.

Well, it was a massive hit.

If I, in the 90s, in post-Soviet,

Bulgarian, you know the song.

Not that they knew what it was about,

or understood the lyrics.

I feel like they might have been going for the controversy,

just to kind of make a statement,

if they were big enough for the video to actually get seen.

The reason why I mentioned Bernard Rose

is because he also directed the video for Small Town Boy.

You know Small Town Boy, don't you?

I know the song.

Good, okay.

Don't know the video.

You should play the video just for yourself on the side.

It's basically a story of the...

I think it's semi-autobiographic.

I'm not sure, but basically shows a guy being kicked out of his family because he's gay and

he's moving to the city. There's something very similar about the two videos. They both show

like different coins of the... I'd imagine the 1980s gay culture in the UK. On one hand you have

Section 28 or just prior to Section 28 of bashing and young people being kicked out of their families,

is because of who they are

versus the counterculture of like

underground

SNM team clubs

with fighting

Tiger Cubs

I guess

so it kind of feels like

I've always seen the two videos kind of

thematically related in a sense in a very

Britain be fucked up

in the 80s way

it's kind of shining a spotlight

on a part of the culture that probably

wouldn't have gotten a spotlight at that point.

I don't know if that video was made for the mainstream straight cis audience in the 80s.

Because I presume there's a lot of like, well, I'm sure there's a lot of like wink, wink,

nudge, nudge, that you understood if you were part of that culture.

I'm sure that you didn't actually have to spit on someone's face to get into SM clubs,

not they've been to many or any.

It's not pretty much probably happening.

I think that was one thing I found quite interesting about it was just going back to like when I was growing up it was like wasn't it wasn't ages ago but it was still in terms of like culture it was like it's very different you know it's like there wasn't any like out gay people in my school for example so in terms of what we presumed like gay clubs were like I think in my mind at the time this is probably what I imagined it was like so and this is obviously I think a more a very exaggerated version of what

would actually be going on but I think it's quite interesting from that point of view.

So are you thinking that maybe somewhere they were trying to kind of

parody what people thought it was? As in like they clearly were parodying what people thought it was but

were they were they doing it for the purpose of queer people laughing on this or for the

or just trying to be extra exaggerated for extra extra extra exaggerated for?

That wasn't what I was thinking but that's actually an interesting way of looking at it as well.

I apologize I thought that was what you're trying to say.

I think what I was trying to say is that it could be kind of

playing on people's stereotypes

of what it's like, just sort of embracing

the stereotypes and going like, yeah, fuck it, fuck it,

this is what happens. Just to scare people

off, I don't know. Well, the thing is that the end,

it did get banned very, very swiftly and quickly

from BBC and MTV, which

to surprise to none, honestly,

they banned fucking

Queen, which is so

mucked-dosed compared to this.

Yeah, this video is not

hiding what it's about in this list,

which I do, which I have respect, actually.

it's just like yeah fuck it maybe we should do like a very very very quick description about the

video what actually happens in the video because you have the main character um who is a very

trait aged dressed person like in a like in a suit everything um getting rolled to a like the

front entrance of a club on a horse carriage drawn by a uh a person then he gets greeted by a

leather clad guy um get him into the club way to get to be allowed into the club is to spit in the

face of the person at the front again just looking into different you know kings and things of i i i

can only imagine that they there was probably a level of lol this is funny and nobody will take it

seriously but also everyone thought thought it was serious because the britain in the 80s

well no the most liberal places um so they go they all going so they both going there there's

uh people with all shapes and sizes and uh kings uh you know at the club uh partying there's a

really cool bartender lady with a really fucking cool hairdo there's uh like drag queens there's a

guy who is dressed as a roman emperor just showing up being carried on like on a like a

What's the word? Not tray?

Like a... Chariot sort of thing.

Chariot. But yeah, carried by people again.

He has...

I can't think of what the word would be.

He's been carried in by his loyal servants.

Yeah, basically.

At some point, the main character, protagonist in the suit,

sorry, in the office suit, as opposed to the other suit,

gets dragged onto a stage and he gets to fight a tiger,

which we then realize is a tiny baby tiger cub.

Although, because in the beginning,

they show it in like in extreme close-up

and it looks like a big tiger,

but it's actually like a tiny, very, very tiny tiger.

So it's quite funny.

And then there's, at some point,

it kind of goes into a pandemonium of a woman

who we don't really see much,

but you see her for very brief,

dressed up in a very normal, quote-unquote way.

She gets put into an Iron Maiden,

which gets closed on her.

During all of this,

the guy dressed as an emperor

is having his face shaved

or rather he's covered in a shaving cream,

which is...

Is that in the end of something?

I don't know if you have milk here, Dave.

I don't know.

I never thought that.

I don't know.

There's plenty of anywhere else to go around.

So let's just see it.

Well, what was your first gay club experience

and was it as epic as this one?

I kind of got two that sprang to mind.

first time it kind of goes back to what i was talking about my kind of perceptions growing up

you know and not the most enlightened of times shall we say where the first time i went to a gay

bar and i was like oh i don't know i don't know if i want to go because it's probably going to be

like frankie goes to hollywood and there and shit like that and then i went and it was just like a

normal bar with better music and more glitter the second time that was probably more interesting

because it was um not the second time but i became friends with someone who i work with and you've

trying to convince me for ages to go to a night in Glasgow called which is a bit more in this

direction it's not as ridiculous as this but it's a bit more you know people like this kicking about

it's probably not what this music video is about but when i look at the straight looking guy in the

the shirt and tie and all that stuff i kind of feel like i was like that the first time i went in

there where i was like just had this feeling that i was the most bland person in the room i kind of

never got the feeling that the main character

singer in the video was the bland one

I think it's more like he just

rolling off from his work

job or something. But I have another interesting

story from that same club

I've been back many times

since because it's a fucking great laugh

and I remember talking to

this lassie who was in there

who was like worked on nuclear

submarines sort of prim and proper

very kind of militaristic person

not the kind of person you'd expect in a place like that

and I was kind of talking to her

and I was just like

oh you work on nuclear weapons submarines

cool

when she came in

she was very like serious

and all that stuff

and by the end of the night

she was out her face on

dancing with her shirt off

on the dance floor

surrounded by guys in leather

you know outfits and shit like that

wow

it's like this guy

in the video

he probably leads

like a fairly

sort of prim and proper life

where he's like

you've got a respectful job

and all that stuff

and this is where he goes

to fucking

just cutlass

and dance like an idiot and fight tigers and shit like that.

I feel like that's kind of a rough analogue

to what this lassie who worked on the nuclear submarines was thinking.

Fair enough.

What was your first one?

I don't remember my first one.

Sorry.

You came out of the womb straight into a gay bar.

It would have probably been at my freshest week in 2009.

Me being completely fresh-faced in Glasgow,

where people are like, let's go to this club.

I can tell you a very funny one.

I was already dating Scott

and we were very early on in our relationship.

It was me, Scott and a gay friend.

And I went to grab drinks

and as it's very usual,

women will just talk at the bar or wherever

because that's just a normal club experience anywhere.

You know, just like waiting for something

and you just start talking to someone, whatever.

So I would just chat into this woman.

And it was very like, we were all like laughing,

whatever, waiting for drinks.

Behind me, there was a conversation happening

where that woman's friends were talking to Scott,

my friend, and apparently the conversation

hasn't been told, went along the lines of,

oh, that's like, that's our power, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Is your friend, is your friend single to Scott?

Just being like, no, she's actually my girlfriend.

next thing I know

unknown to this conversation is

like her

getting dragged by her friends

because we were just having nice chat

and I was like oh yeah bye I'm gonna see you on the dance floor

and it's called my pal dragging me away

so apparently all this

completely oblivious to me

in a gay club because I'm a fucking idiot

I wasn't just having a nice chat with this

woman and she was actually hitting on me

it was very embarrassing

yeah I know

I'm just going to point out here

I don't know if

I'm sure there's a lot of people

who are listening

might notice

or might have

called this out

I'm bi

and I'm fully

fully

completely

oblivious to everything

and everyone

who have ever

hit it on me

I do apologize

to anyone

who's done that

and I'll be just like

hi you're very friendly

thanks bye

so yeah

what else to say

about the video

what else we've got here

innuendos

just innuendos

there's a lot of them

the one thing

like obviously the gist in your end is everything you'd imagine you know like

being sprayed out on the song just talking about you coming and lazy beeps and shit you know

the usual stuff um there was a lot of bananas there was a lot of bananas which was

there was a lot of bananas that's not i'm not just like saying the word there was literally

bananas yeah um including like some very like very close-ups of the lead singer just being very very

very essentially looking on bananas um so that's that was the video was done in 83 i i do apologize

my aids knowledge is not amazing as in like no i mean it's fine just i can't remember the exact

year when you've been kicked off it would have been around then am i going crazy thinking that

all the bananas has condoms on them because i think they did but i don't think they were like

they were not shown

but they were glistening

if that makes sense

as they would

as you said that

I've got the video

playing in a loop

and I did see something

that looked like that

see if another one comes up

it's not very clear

but I think

maybe you might be right

was that video

just incredibly

ahead of its time

when playing safe

so I just

wonder if there was

like a very slight

not just always

always put the condom

on your bananas

yeah

I can't say this

straight face

but yeah

yeah I think you might be right

so the next touch of it is I have to

look closer. I can't believe you're actually

discussing the

symbolism of bananas

in the video about the gay bar, I'm sorry

stop motion

you have, you've put a note about stop motion

what is that about? It's not stop motion

but it's just the one point where they're doing

I don't know if this

phrase universally translates

but vinegar stroke

are you aware of that one? Nope

you're going to have to

you're free to explain it

it's your cum face basically

so when their boats

writhing around on the floor

it's kind of like

all stop motion

not actual stop motion but it's like

I thought that was quite funny

I just found it funny

because that's once again blatantly what they're going for

yeah I mean the whole video is

you know the dance

that's the thing about this video I remember even

when I was hearing this when I was younger

not the most worldly wise person yet

even then going like

hmm they're talking about shit

so it's like

nothing about this is subtle

in this latest which is fine

yeah the funny thing is like when I was doing the

research there's a very funny

description how

in terms of like the

public reception of the song and the video

and I'm just quoting from

Wikipedia here because we always do our

research, due diligence in doing research

by Wikipedia.

Throughout the relaxed

controversy,

the bad continued to publicly

deny that the songs

were sexual, all to

be the earliest of

before the internet where you can just look up the

lyrics. Nevertheless,

by 1984, it was clear that

1984, which is for two years,

it was clear that the public were

aware of the sexual nature of the lyrics,

but the scandal had fueled

sales anyway. In 1985,

with the release of the Welcome to

the Pleasuredome album, which included

the song Relax, the band

dropped any public pretense

about the lyrics.

Now we're quoting Mark O'Toole.

Everything I say is complete

lies. Like when people

ask you about what Relax

is about, when it first came out

we used to pretend it was about

motivation. I find

it so... This is why I keep

thinking like this video was not made for like the straight public.

Actually, I totally respect the fact that they were feigning ignorance just going like,

oh yeah, it's not. But when in the song, there's literally the sound of like water flowing after

he says, it's so fucking blatant. But I find that hysterical that they were like, no, no,

no, it's about getting up and going for a jog in the morning. Yeah.

It's just going with your laser beams. It's just, you know, just.

It's laser beams of productivity.

Yeah, definitely productivity of some form.

Yeah, it's great, isn't it?

The sort of old saying that all songs are about sex or drugs,

no exceptions, but it's usually more subtle than this.

Usually it's like, you know, a metaphor alluding towards

being off your face or fucking someone.

It's never usually quite blam in your face.

Well, if you pardon the expression.

Yeah, we talked about the sledgehammer, which is against the ball chugging.

And it's kind of obvious once you listen to the lyrics a bit, but it's again, it's not

directly saying, like, I want to fuck my wife or whoever the person was.

Although the video just literally starts with sperm flying around, not flying.

Flying sperm sounds dangerous.

That's what this video is about.

So we've got swimming sperm for that one.

We've got flying for this one.

It's just flying everywhere.

Anyway.

Fucking hell.

Can't believe we put this shit on the internet.

Okay, final point.

Do you want to start?

This video just doesn't give a fuck.

It's, yeah, it doesn't give a fuck.

And I respect that.

That's it.

I'm going to say it gives a lot of fucks.

as long as you've wrapped your banana before you give the fuck then you're good

my favorite favorite part it's just this is just a random one there's lots of good shit but i think

one bit that sticks out to me is uh the guy with the fan who's fanning like the emperor up on the

balcony uh he there's just one split second shot where he just has this incredible intense look in

his face like he's just like totally into waving this fan he's like he's living for this moment and

the runner-up is just which is isn't technically the music video that's the song but it's funny i

wish everyone could see the face of david just made you'll have to imagine it and the worst part

is i don't think the emperor ever finishes shaving yeah he's just constantly being shaved maybe maybe

his beard grows really fast he just hits like uh like that bridge in san francisco where they start

painting it one side and then by the time they finish they've got to start again that sounds

not very effective or efficient they should use probably better paint my final points are that

this video is fantastic it's budget crazy it's not bad at all but you need to be prepared and you

need to be warned that um there's a lot of things there that you will see that you might like you need

been the right mindset to not freak out about trigger warning weird weird chair happening

yeah trigger warning which is happening um not necessarily bad it's fun it's a really fun video

but you need to be prepared it literally starts with someone's beating in someone's face i can't

underline enough how everything that we see is very clearly consensual despite the fact it's all

this depravity and all this stuff.

Depravity, wow.

I mean, it is a point.

But it all feels like it's in good fun

is the point, which is nice.

Yes. Good clean depravity.

Yeah, except for the couple things

that are not, which is the

woman in the Iron Maiden,

which is, I guess the joke is like, we do that

to, I don't know what's supposed to be

straight, but it's what we do to people.

I'm like, just throwing someone

to a tiger cub and be like,

it's what we do to people.

Oh, like enough, obviously.

Okay, so my favorite part is Batting the lady with the fucking great hairdo and just kind of dancing around.

And I think she's supposed to be sort of a dominatrix because she kicks some guy who is in her feet a couple of times.

You do, you lady.

But also at some point, there's a split second video, like, shot of her pulling her top up as in, like, just adjusting it.

And I just felt, for a second, it just felt so funny and relatable to me when I saw that.

And I was like, she's just having the time of her life and she just doesn't give a fuck.

She's just dancing around and putting her top up.

And yes, lady, whoever you are, props to you.

Worst part for me was that I don't think there is a worst part because I don't think that video was made for us.

And I don't think it's up to us to judge whether something was bad or not.

Also, it's for a year old video, fuck.

Gay clubs are still funny.

There you go.

Some things never change.

some things never change

I've never been to an SNM club nowadays

I don't know if you have to spit in someone's face to get in

maybe some you do and that's also consensual

I hope

and with that in mind

take a look at our show notes

to links to today's video

our show links

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and our social medias and Twitter

and all of that

also please email us

but nothing not consensual

to go to

gfarcast at gmail.com

com

dot com

we'd love to hear your thoughts

and your recommendations for videos

if you have any thoughts

on this yeah

oh yes

that was a chaotic one

we need Neil to keep us on the straight and narrow

no pun telling