Saturday, February 13, 2010

The Boys Are Back

I am currently listening to Thin Lizzy. It happens at this time of life that songs I never thought of buying in the past suddenly creep up on me and I get a hankering.

One of Lizzy's songs is, of course, Dancing In The Moonlight (not to be confused with the Toploader toss). It contains the following lines.

"Now we go steady to the pictures
I always get chocolate stains on my pants"

The first line is clearly how the young Lynott would have spoken, as in 1960s Ireland teenagers would "go steady", as good young Catholic boys would, and he would have gone to "the pictures", the wonderful traditional description of a cinema for those of us growing up in the British Isles.

When we come to the second line, however, Phil is clearly going for the North American market, unless he actually went on dates in his underwear which would have been an arrestable offence in tight-assed Dublin.

Interesting.

Also of great interest to me is from which confectionery product did Phil's chocolate stains emanate. I have discussed this on Twitter and at home and come up with the following list, in order of probability:-

1. Flake (as suggested by Beth) 27%
2. Chocolate Buttons (as suggested by Betty) 24%
3. A finger of Fudge 21%
4. Curly Wurly 10%
5. Ice Breaker 8%
6. Old Jamaica (we know he had a taste for the hard stuff) 7%
7. Revels 3%

Are there any glaring omissions in the list? If only we could bring Phil back to life for just this one question!

12 comments:

  1. The Fry's Five Boys Are Back In Town.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Doesn't Top Loader Toss normally get caught by the filter?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tim - Five boys and Scott Gorham. The big girl.

    Rog - Unfortunately there is no filter on Heart FM.

    ReplyDelete
  4. We always meant trousers when we said pants. And he did live in Manchester as a kid.
    Phil was a man of large appetites - nothing but a giant Mars Bar for him.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Apparently Steps were going to do Dancing in the Moonlight, but were beaten to it by Toploader.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Without question, Phil was referring to a Wagon Wheel.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Chocolate stains on pants (as in underwear) may suggest an unusual sexual practice. A lot of saucy goings on in the back row.
    Must've been Cadbury's Fruit & Nut.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Malc - There's a blast from the past.

    Kaz - I'm sure Phil's Irish grandparents would have knocked that dirty English slang out of him. A giant Mars a day helps you work, rest & play.

    Billy - If Steps had done it, Heart wouldn't be playing it now. I hate Toploader.

    Annie - It's a shame Phil didn't stay on the wagon.

    Istvanski - Now I see Frank Muir in a dirty raincoat.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Maybe he was at the pictures and he undid his jeans and got some of those chocolate Poppets on his pants....? Just a thought.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Blimey - I just can't compete with such an intellectual treatise.

    I hope you feel better soon! Dr King prescribe a Curly Wurly to be taken three times a day after meals.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Romo - Maybe he put Treets down his pants for his girlfriend to search for. Bloody hell, Lynott, you're disgusting. Leslie Crowther was right.

    Laura - I can't think of anything nicer to cleanse the palate.

    ReplyDelete