Devo - "Uncontrollable Urge"

Happy birthday Danette!!!

Last year, I was back to picking a song that reminds me of Danette, independent of whether or not she actually liked it ("The Story").  This year, I'm picking a song she actually likes, while still being especially relevant to her.  

The song is "Uncontrollable Urge", from Devo's 1978 debut LP "Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!".  Due to the unlikely and meteoric success of 1980's "Whip It", it's tempting to think of Devo as a one hit wonder, but a closer inspection reveals that's not even close to true.  They got a lot of MTV airplay back in the day, even if "Whip It" might have been the only song to make the radio.  Some minor hits they had include: "Love Without Anger", "Girl U Want", "Freedom of Choice", "Through Being Cool", "Peek-A-Boo", and of course, "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction", a cover of The Rolling Stones classic for which "Uncontrollable Urge" was the B-side (bonus: our shared love of B-sides was covered three years ago).  

I suspect it was similar for Danette: I always liked Devo since my exposure to them in 1980, but I was really too young to fully get the message: de-evolution, Bob & The Church of the SubGenius, etc.  The pre-teen me detected something more than just silly novelty songs, but it wasn't until college that the full context was exposed to me.  Like Danette, you can enjoy Devo on the surface, or you can take the time to really explore their deep point of view and aesthetic.  Or, preferably, both.  

But the reason for this particular song?  It's the opening theme song for the MTV series "Ridiculousness", a show that Danette is obsessed with.  MTV will run daily marathons of this show, and she'll watch them all.  The show consists of the hosts and the special guests reacting to short videos from social media, mostly people doing stupid things (frequently due to testosterone poisoning), making bad decisions, falling down, etc.  The videos are sometimes positive (cute animals, people avoiding catastrophe), but they're almost always silly.  "Low brow" is not what one thinks of when they think of Danette, but this guilty (?) pleasure for her allows her to disengage from the gravity of her normal circumstances, and nicely captures her duality: though not everyone knows it, she can be quite fun and silly.  Danette is like Devo wearing their energy domes and playing purposefully and awkward classic rock covers: it might appear silly on the surface, but it's 10X more mischievous, biting, and clever than you anticipated.  

Though the members of Devo are baby boomers, their music is more closely associated with GenX, and is part of the soundtrack of the misfit intellectuals, weirdos, lost souls, geeks, and punks of our generation.  If you are to understand us, you must understand songs like "Uncontrollable Urge".  

Devo: "Uncontrollable Urge"  

Previous birthday songs:

2023: Brandi Carlile - "The Story" 
2022: Plastic Bertrand - "Ça plane pour moi" 
2021: Adam and the Ants - "Christian D'or" 
2020: Walk Off The Earth - "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall"
2019: Nicki Minaj - "Monster"
2018: Bear Hands - "Giants" 
2017: Alvvays - "Archie, Marry Me" 
2016: Molly Hatchet - "Flirtin' With Disaster" 
2015: Avett Brothers - "Kick Drum Heart"
2014: Ani DiFranco - "32 Flavors" 
2013: The Green Pajamas - "Kim the Waitress"
2012: The Cure - "High"
2011: Blink 182 - "Josie"
2010:  Dead Milkmen - "Punk Rock Girl"  

Neil Young and Devo - "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" (forgotten song)

 Bob Casale, or "Bob 2", of Devo died this week.  Devo unfairly gets labeled a one hit wonder because of the success of 1980's "Whip It", but they actually had a surprising number of minor hits on MTV and even radio, including: their cover of "Satisfaction", "Freedom of Choice", "Through Being Cool", "Love Without Anger", "Girl U Want", and "Peek-A-Boo".  The fact that they were popular at all is nothing short of amazing, since the band itself is a mix of a long-running joke (see also: "Church of the SubGenius"), discordant anti-music, and biting social commentary. 

But arguably their weirdest video is one that you probably haven't seen...  "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" is a Neil Young song from his classic 1979 LP "Rust Never Sleeps", and one you still here on classic rock radio.  What you probably don't know is that the first version was recorded in 1978, with Devo, for Neil Young's movie "Human Highway", that wasn't released until 1982.  Mark Mothersbaugh, in his Booji Boy persona, sings the lead vocals.  Bob 2 is one of the guitarists (I'm not sure which one) behind Neil in the picture above.

To the best of my knowledge, this version is not available outside of the movie itself.  There's so much that can be said about Devo, but I'll mark the passing of Bob 2 by acknowledging their role in reinvigorating Neil Young in the late 70s.

Devo & Neil Young: "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)"



Edit:  Apologies for missing the passing of drummer Alan Myers in 2013.