{"id":11332,"date":"2022-10-05T08:15:21","date_gmt":"2022-10-05T12:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/millheiser.com\/hokeyblog\/?p=11332"},"modified":"2022-10-27T16:34:25","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T20:34:25","slug":"buttkickin-halloween-songs-insanity-oingo-boingo-1994","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/millheiser.com\/hokeyblog\/2022\/10\/05\/buttkickin-halloween-songs-insanity-oingo-boingo-1994\/","title":{"rendered":"Buttkickin’ Halloween Songs: “Insanity” — Oingo Boingo (1994)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"All around the world now
\nLike a big bright cherry cloud
\nTraveling from home to home
\nTV sets and telephones
\nHere it comes just like a storm
\nBathe in it and be reborn
\nTime to let the world know
\nWelcome madness… say hello…
\nSay hello…
\nSay hello…<\/em><\/p>\n

The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo could sing a jaunty three-step number about pelicans and it would still <\/em>make for a great Halloween song, I’m sure.<\/p>\n

But their 1994 epic\u00a0Insanity<\/strong> is not one of those songs. It ain’t jaunty, never a pelican to be found, and this one cuts way too deep.<\/p>\n

At nearly 8 minutes in length,\u00a0Insanity<\/em> sounds inherently Oingo Boingish from the get-go. Ominous strings and horns set that foreboding tone; we’re not exactly going on a happy journey by any stretch. As drum patterns and digital xylophonic assault begins, Elfman’s reverberating voice enters the scene, and the sojourn has long since abandoned happiness. Or sadness. Or any real human emotion.<\/p>\n

And then comes the children choir…<\/p>\n

Insanity\u00a0<\/em>is all about its title, about the constant bombardment of radio waves, TV waves, mass communication, conformity, the perpetual onslaught of images, ideas, ideologies, religion, mind control, racial supremacy, consumerism… and like a seeping, creeping fog, slowly warping minds, degrading souls, and stripping our humanity away.<\/p>\n

There are elements that date the song, like the Dan Quayle reference, which would have been dated even in 1994. The point is well made, of course, and it certainly isn’t anywhere near as jarring as, oh I don’t know, a spoken word interlude about fiscal year 1996 federal expenditures.<\/p>\n

That aside,\u00a0Insanity\u00a0<\/strong>is a sonic expression of that multimedia pervasiveness, Marshall McLuhan “cool medium” as a transformation agent. In all the worst possible ways. These are the inexorable shadows and fog that flow off the marshes by moonlight and seep into our homes, breathed deep into our lungs, flowing into the brain, stripping away layer after layer of sense and identity. You become both the medium and the message.<\/p>\n

I’d love to take you home with me, I’d love to tuck you in<\/em>
\nI wish I could protect you from the wages of our sin<\/em>
\nI’d love to hear you scream tonight, I’d love to hear you cry<\/em>
\nProtect you from the madness that is raining from the sky<\/em>
\nLet’s imitate reality (Insanity)<\/em>
\nLet’s strive for mediocrity (Insanity)<\/em>
\nLet’s make believe we’re all the same (Now that’s for me)<\/em>
\nLet’s sanitize our little brains (Insanity)<\/em><\/p>\n