Rock contest: food

October 25, 2011 • 5:17 am

One of my college friends and I sometimes pass the time by naming words (e.g., different colors) and asking the other to name a rock song in which each words appear.  The last time we met, while hiking through the English countryside, we did a “food challenge,” naming different comestibles and asking the other to name the song and artist in which that food appears.  Test yourself on these items, naming the song and the artist for each of these items of food or drink.

I’m not offering a prize here (my stocks of WEIT are waning), but if you think you know rock lyrics, these shouldn’t be too hard.  The songs have to be rock songs (e.g., the kind of stuff that would have appeared on a top 40 station); no blues or Frank Sinatra-type pop.   And Googling is cheating, though I’ve tried to make some of these Google-proof.

Hamburger and malt (same song)

Hot dog and french fries (same song)

Coke (the soft drink)

Latte

Cake

Cherry pie

Pumpkin pie

Fudge

Fried chicken

65 thoughts on “Rock contest: food”

  1. Fried chicken: Queen, “One Vision” — At the very end of the song, Freddie Mercury sings “fried chicken” instead of “one vision”.

    But likely not the one you were thinking of.

    /@

    1. It’s also in “Slash and Burn” by The Manic Street Preachers (who have reached Dad-rock status on this side of the Atlantic!)
      (“Madonna drinks Coke and so can you”)

      1. “Ashes of American Flags” by Wilco off of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. “For a hundred in twenties and a small service fee / I could spend three dollars and sixty-three cents / on Diet Coke-a-Cola and unlit cigarettes”

      2. Koka Kola by the Clash is about the drug not the drink, but it does contain “Coca Cola advertising cocaine” as a lyric, as well as double entendres with Coke slogans. The “pause that refreshes in the corridors of power,” etc. Coke adds life!

  3. You’ve got to be joking about “Cherry Pie”, right?

    Mr. Coyne, I have a warrant for your arrest. The charges are “Criminal ignorance of 80s glam metal.”

    1. “Cherry Pie” was referred to in “No, no cherry”. It was a doo-wop song in the fifties, but I don’t know the name of the group. It was covered by Frank Zappa on “You Can’t Do That On Stage Any More Vol. 4”. And yes, the reference is as lascivious as you might imagine!

      1. OK, it was killin’ me not knowing the name of
        the group who originally recorded “No, no cherry” so I went and Googled it; it was The Turbans. I pulled the cover version from memory, though; does that count?

  7. Well, I’m dating myself here but,

    “Hot dogs and french fries” = The Drifters, Under the Boardwalk: “From the park you`ll hear the happy sounds of a carousel. You can almost taste those hot dogs and french fries they sell.”

    Only one I got!

    1. Found that one with Google, so I was keeping silent. Interestingly, that appears to be one of the few… I thought there’d be loads of songs with that.

      “Hamburgers and malt” is proving particularly difficult even with Google…

      1. I found one by google but it doesn’t sount like a rock song.
        ‘I can’t stop dancing’ by ‘Archie Bell and the Drells’
        “Let me put this hamburger down
        I don’t want no malt
        I wanna dance
        Oh, yeah
        Sho’ nuff groovin’ now, y’all, look at me
        Huh-huh, oh, yeah”

        1. Archie Bell and the Drells did something besides The Tighten Up? They are certainly within the greater rock genre.

      2. JAC quote:

        …name the song and artist in which that food appears.

        I think the trick might be that the artist name counts as well…

        Hamburger: Mac
        Malt: Whisk(e)y, Vinegar, Bread, Shake

  9. I’m sorry, but anyone who thinks “MacArthur Park” is rock ‘n’ roll must die.
    Honesly, I was stumped by all of these. If only you’d listed AMERICAN pie, I might have had a chance.

    1. Heh, I actually hesitated with that one for exactly that reason. IIRC it at least has a moderate backbeat, so you could call it “rock” by that criterion, but yeah… The only reason I went ahead with it is that Wikipedia has the genre listed as “pop rock”, so I figure if anybody called me on it, I can just cite Wikipedia 🙂

    2. MacArthur Park was on top 40 radio. For that matter, so was Frank Sinatra in the 60s. (“Somethin’ Stupid” with daughter Nancy, 4 weeks at #1 in 1967) Weird time before FM.

  10. I thought Chuck Berry’s “I’m so glad I’m Livin’ in the USA” might have reference to “coke” or “hamburger and malt”, but I couldn’t remember the lyrics, and I didn’t want to cheat by using Google!

  11. “Fried Chicken”—Chuck Berry’s “House of Blue Lights”—“Mama’s cookin’ chicken fried in bacon grease”.

    1. Gosh. Then maybe I shouldn’t mention that the first thing I thought of for “pumpkin pie” was “Apples, Peaches, Pumpkin Pie” by Jay and the Techniques (although quite a bit later than Skip ‘n Flip.

      And who is daring to define what rock and roll is? As far as I’m concerned it is most of the stuff with a beat (other than the pure pap) that I have listened to on Top 40/Fab 50 radio since 1956, or so. If Little Richard singing “Long, Tall, Sally”, and Chuck Berry playing “School Days” is rock, then so is Lloyd Price singing “Stagger Lee” (a personal fave).

  13. “Cherrt Pie’ – 1990 by glam metal band Warrant. Lead singer Jani Lane HATED that song and said he wished he never wrote it. (I agree with him.) Incidentally, he died in August of alcohol poisoning.

  15. The only fudge song I can think of is the classic:
    “A finger of fudge is just enough, to give your kids a treat”
    But I think that was an advert rather than a top 40 song.

    1. I was going to do “Whole Latte Rosie” by ACDC but didn’t want to be the first to start punning!

    1. Yeah! C’mon Jerry, offer something:

      email a photo of your cat, send us an unpublished article, some deleted chapters from WEIT, Etc.

  19. I don’t know who did it originally, but Mando & the Chili Peppers did a tremendous cover of Cherry Pie in 1957 on their only LP (On the Road with Mando…

    This obscure group should not be obscure. (The car on the cover is a ’53 Packard limo, which is the basis of how I tripped over them.) The album, released on CD in 1998, cuts across standards from many genres and re-invents them into their own tejano blues/rock style. On hearing it, a friend commented, “Why have we never heard of these guys?” Find a copy and buy it!

    1. Thanks for the link, Hempenstein. I’d never heard of these buys, but I’m playing some of their music on YouTube right now, and it’s good stuff!

      3. PS. One of the members of ZZTop was a great fan of theirs, and for many years pursued their whereabouts. He was finally successful. It turned out that Mando had been with Eddy Clearwater in Chicago and they showed up at Ponderosa Stomp in 2005. Sadly, I’ve never seen any footage of that, and I don’t think it’s been repeated.

        Also (disclaimer), the first track of the album is perhaps a somewhat forgettable semi-novelty tune, so don’t judge the rest by the first.

        1. I checked the only Eddie Clearwater album I have (“The Chief”), but that had Joe Harrington on bass and Lurie Bell on guitar instead of Mando Cavellero and Chucho Perales. Mando and the Chili Peppers sound like the kind of music Doug Sahm was playing in the 50’s/early 60’s before the Sir Douglas Quintet days, and WAY before the Texas Tornados. It makes sense that someone from ZZ Top would also like them.

  20. “Fudge”. OK, it’s a stretch, but on the version of “Trouble Every Day” that appears on “The Greatest Band You Never Heard In Your Life” as “More Trouble Every Day (Swaggart Version)”, Frank Zappa changes the line “every day is just another rotten mess” to “every day is just another voodoo FUDGE”.

    Damn you, Professor Coyne! I’m trying to get some work done, but now that I’ve read this post my obsessive little pea brain has turned on “brain radio” and I can’t stop searching the files for these silly food references! Aw…….fudge!!!

    1. The American rock band Vanilla Fudge hit the charts with a cover of “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” [originally by The Supremes]

  21. “Pumpkin Pie”
    OK, there’s a song called “Apples, Peaches, Pumpkin Pie”, but for the life of me, I don’t
    know the name of the group, and I’m not gonna rely on Google to find out. Anybody know who recorded that annoying little ditty?

    1. I could tell you who did that awful song, but then you’d be another 44 years trying to forget all over again.

  22. Many different kinds of chicken, including fried chicken, are mentiond in the song “Chicken” by The Spark Plugs. It is also a pretty great song.

    1. At least, boiled chicken, fried chicken, then there’s chicken pie, any old kind of chicken and finally cotton pickin’ chicken (although I’m not sure how this one is prepared)…

  23. Hot dog and french fries: Try “Hot Dog and a Shake” from David Lee Roth’s Skyscraper album. I’m a huge Steve Vai fan, who was Roth’s guitar player at this time, and that’s why I know this tune. If you get a chance, check out the guitar solo in this song—it’s amazing.

  24. “Lola”
    I met her in a club down in old Soho
    Where you drink champagne
    It tastes just like Coca Cola C-O-L-A cola
    Kinks

    I believe that they had to change Coca Cola for cherry-cola on the single version to have it played on the BBC, or it could have been the corporation that made them do it, I’m not sure.

    1. On the radio (in the US) I’ve only ever heard cherry cola. I suspect the corp had something to do with it.

  25. JAY AND THE TECHNIQUES
    “Apples, Peaches, Pumpkin Pie”
    Hmm a bit “oldies” maybe too pop? but I liked it at the time 😀

  26. Train- Drops of Jupiter

    Can you imagine no first dance freeze dried romance, five hour conversation

    The best soy latte you ever had, and me

  27. Sam Cooke’s We’re Having a Party – “The cokes are in the icebox, the popcorn’s on the table…”
    Not strictly rock, but close…

  28. A bit obscure for U.S. audiences, but definitely rock: Vasco Rossi – Bollicine. Big hit in Italy in 1983-1984.
    The entire song is about Coca Cola (but intended also to be about cocaine).

  30. The two that come to mind have alredy been mentioned:

    1. Hot dogs and french fries (“Under the Boardwalk” by everyone)

    2. Coke (“Lola” by the Kinks, “Let it Bleed” by the Rolling Stones)

    3. Fried chicken (“Down the Road Apiece, by everyone again, including the Stones

  32. The band Fudge Tunnel, who released a brilliant album called “Hate songs in E minor”, called their first single “Fudge” but I don’t have it so I don’t know if there’s a song by that name.

  34. “You were sweet as cherry pie,
    wild as Friday night.
    Sweet as cherry pie,
    wild as Friday night.”

    Sade
    “Cherry Pie” from her debut “Diamond Life” album about 1984

  35. Don’t know how many people count it as rock, but Weird Al Yankovic’s Grapefruit Diet has fudge and and maybe a few other ingredients from the list. I think The Food Album covers just about everything else.

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