Sloop John B

"Sloop John B" was written by Brian Wilson the seventh track on the Beach Boys 1966 release...Pet Sounds. The album was produced and arranged by Brian Wilson, who also wrote and composed almost all of its music. The LP got its title when Beach Boy Mike Love suggested that dogs were the only creatures that would like it. To keep the animal theme, Wilson put some barking dogs on the album. Thus, the name Pet Sounds. It is regarded as one of the most influential pieces in the history of popular music. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked it second on its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. In 2004, Pet Sounds was preserved in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress for being culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant.

Originally a traditional West Indies folk song "The John B. Sails", Brian Wilson took this influence and gave us the Beach Boys gem "Sloop John B". The folk song was a tune about a sunken boat but the Beach Boys version doesn't indicate that as much as it simply tells the tale of a downtrodden boat and its crew. "Sloop John B" is still centered around the Bahamas like the original (around Nassau town we did roam). The troubles of the boat's crew are told to us in three different verses. The first being "Drinking all night, Got into a fight" followed by "The first mate he got drunk,And broke in the Cap'n's trunk,The constable had to come and take him away" and ending with the last "The poor cook he caught the fits,And threw away all my grits,And then he took and he ate up all of my corn". The "fits" means to go crazy which is why the cook did what he did. These misfortunes leads to our writer telling us..."Let me go home,Why don't they let me go home,This is the worst trip I've ever been on". The use of the word "trip" has a double meaning in this song. It could literally refer to the trip on the Sloop John B but also an acid trip. The line "Sheriff John Stone,Why don't you leave me alone" was never verified...meaning was there a real Sheriff John Stone? The actual ship the song is centered about was a sponger (a strongly built sailboat with a high bow used for obtaining sponges). It was wrecked and sunk at Governor's Harbor in Eleuthra, Bahamas around 1900. Since the early 1950s there have been many recordings of this folk song. The variant titles include "I Want to Go Home", "Wreck of the John B", and "Sloop John B". In the movie Forrest Gump, "Sloop John B" plays when Forrest is in Vietnam, and the camera shows the outhouses. The lines, "This is the worst trip I've ever been on... I wanna go home" are emphasized. I see "Sloop John B" as a metaphor for life. That is to say a ship of fools on the uncertain seas of life with drug induced or drunken outbursts and a wink of incarnation thrown in for good measure.

Видео Sloop John B канала TheUglylucy4