I'm glad that MyRedDice posted lyrics for a Zaphodista Marching song (over on this forum). All this arguing over free speech gets heavy after a while, and those song lyrics reminded me that we can be creative and have fun even in a group like this.

How about a contest for lyrics to our Marching song or theme song¹? What kind of club would we be without a drinking² song?

Here's my suggestion for a special battle anthem that uniquely represents our struggle. Since I'm a big fan of Our Savior³ Jimi, one of the few cds that I leave at work and listen to over and over again is The Jimi Hendrix Experience BBC Sessions. It has a nice mix of some of Jimi's best songs. One of the odd pieces, besides Jimi's improvised radio jingle "Radio One, You're The One For Me," is a version of "Sunshine Of Your Love" performed live on BBC tv for The Lulu Show.

Bristling against the formal atmosphere that demanded pre-arranged performance, Jimi obligingly played "HEY JOE," the hit that everyone made him repeat on every show (including three versions just on the 2 cds in this set!). Apparently the technicians and producers began to freak out a little when Jimi started the performance with a swooping, diving feedback-fest that sounded nothing like "Hey Joe." Soon enough, the group settled into a recognizable version of the song. They play this for two minutes or so, Jimi forgetting lyrics but accompanying imperfect vocals with his usual deity-level guitar playing. Abruptly, the group cuts off and Jimi says, "We're going to stop playing this rubbish," switching instead to "Sunshine Of Your Love," dedicated to the Cream, who had apparently just broken up. This must have been too much for the show's producers, because after only a minute or so of the heavenly instrumental, you can hear Jimi say, "We're being put off the air."

The brief song is excellent in its own right, but reflects our struggle perfectly because it shows another instance of BBC people trying to hold back the creativity of a legend because they could not safely contain him. I'm not sure if the decision to pull him off the air was made because he played a song that had not been approved ahead of time, or because of time limits on his performance. All I know is that improvisation was considered a detriment, so Jimi's real art could only shine through in a glimpse.

This is about power over art, power over communication. Lulu and her producers probably thought they were doing a favor for this wild, young freak by working him into their show at all. When he deviated from their script, they silenced him. The people who thought they controlled the situation will go down in history as footnotes in the career of one they could not recognize as a Master.

This song demonstrates the BBC's history of failing to accomodate creativity. Now ask someone today in Ulaan-Bataar who Lulu was. If they ever heard of her, it may well have been from her mention in the liner notes of their copy of The Jimi Hendrix Experience BBC Sessions.

Now that I got that out of my system...

Anybody interested, please post your suggestions for songs or lyrics in a forum below. (And for gosh sakes, don't write any copyrighted lyrics. If you want to suggest a song that is likely owned by someone, just write the title of the song and why you think it fits the Zaphodistas. Maybe you can get away with paraphrasing the lyrics, if the Modulators think you've been good today.)