RFI: The origin of that stereotypical "oriental" song that plays in movies and is also featured in "China Girl"

But I thought it went . . . .

Dee dee dee dee duh duh, duh duh, DUHHHH

or something.

you're wrong about that.

there's a melody in the song that alludes to this "generic oriental song" (just before bowie goes "oh oh oh oh oh")

By the sound of that joke, he at least needs to hurt a little bit.

Dee dee dee dee duh duh, duh duh, DUHHHH

yeah, that's it.

well his whole shtick is, he's pretty much asking for it all the time. but he's really quite smart, and quite funny, and quite strange. his vh1 talk show, which lasted maybe six weeks, was sheer brilliance.

well, the last "duh" is often emphasized if the melody comes after a kind of punchline, or effects a transition to a different locale. this song is part of a very precise semiotics.

I agree with Spencer (about the hurt a little bit part.)

actually i think it was canceled because nobody watched it. which was too bad. strangely, they kept him on the air for a couple of weeks after announcing the cancellation, and he started getting even more pointed with his anti-vh1 humor at that point.

However:
gilbert and sullavan?
You didn't mean Margaret Sullavan did you, Amst?
(Prepares for inevitable pot:kettle=black comment)

http://www.moviestarsmagazine.com/pictorial/frontcovers/fp3604cd.jpg

This response proves that we need him alive. Zach is cool. Not so sure about you.

Oh, I'm cool. But are you cool? Because like being cool is where it's at. Do you even know what it means to be cool? Maybe Zach is cool. Perhaps I need some cool context. Clearly judging people on whether they're cool or not is cool.

"Why do you always kick me in the nards when you come into the room?"

"Because you are a juvenile asshole?"

-- fact checking cuz (factcheckingcu...), February 3rd, 2005.

I always thought he was cancelled due to the anti-Vh1 stuff. Especially when he said the reason he was cancelled was because he "bit the hand that feeds."

By the way, of course it's juvenile! Jesus.

http://www.genkienglish.net/genkijapan/koto.htm

At the bottom of this page on koto, there is a little utility that will play "Sakura Sakura" for you.

He did this joke when I saw him open for Janeane Garafalo.
He actually noodled on the piano for more or less his entire show, and that was a total dumb throwaway joke in context.

i think that's the name of a butthole surfers LP.

(seriously, see cliff carlisle's "shanghai rooster yodel.")

and c'mon guys, give "china girl" credit to iggy, pls.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=5801473

2) I like when the Oriental song ends with a gong hit.

But Bowie wrote the music for "China Girl" did he not? Plus I don't think there's any dee dee dee dee duh duh dee dee duh going on in Iggy's version.

-- Amateur(ist)

BRAVO, Amateurist! I was gonna post the exact same joke. (It practically writes itself.)

i was going to start a thread about this but it's been done. i was inspired by hearing that Thompson Twins song "LIES" (i think) that has some line where they mention Japan and then you hear this stereotypical shit. usually pretty dud, tho can't completely hate the use of a gong

Zach Galifinakis had a bit about this. He said he played it on piano every time his Asian room mate entered the room. When she asked "Why do you play that every time I enter the room?" he said "Because I don't have a gong."

-- David Allen (David Allen), Thursday, February 3, 2005 5:17 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Link

ROFL.

I love how 85% of this thread is arguing whether a comedian is funny after someone repeats one of his jokes on a message board without any delivery or context.

Great time to revive this thread, I was thinking about it just a few days ago. (Not the thread itself specifically, just the bit upthread where amateurist & myself made the same joke a week apart)

Weird, I was just wondering about the origin of this musical theme after hearing Urge Overkill's "Vacation In Tokyo" for the first time in ages.

Not quite the tune, but the same pentatonic scale and intended effect in Debussy's 'Et la lune descend sur la temple' I think.

pee pee/coke

In the case of Bowie's "China Girl", it was Nile Rodgers idea. There was this debate between him and Bowie about wether it should had a nod to oriental music (or in this case, stereotypical/almost cartoony oriental music) or not. Rodgers thoughts were something like "you can't release a song called CHINA Girl without it having an orient-influenced arrangement!" while Bowie thought the exact opposite (see Iggy's version).

((apologies for bad english, it's been a while since I last posted))

And Peter Bjorn and John's "Young Folks" as well.

Bowie was right and his version of "China Girl" is dud

This thread isn't as good as I remembered it, but the central question is still fascinating and still bugs me.

And Peter Bjorn and John's "Young Folks" as well.

Maybe that's why this song reminds me of Sanz/Fallon's "I don't care what your momma says. Christmas time is nee-ear!"

Wikipedia doesn't know either (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_Riff) though it does know the Zach Galifianakis joke, and knows all about the "snake charmer" song (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Streets_of_Cairo%2C_or_the_Poor_Little_Country_Maid).

Helpfully though, Wikipedia points to The Musical Cliché Figure Signifying The Far East: Whence, Wherefore, Whither? The guy has something like 100 clips and citations so far. The oldest he cites is from 1847.

Bowie was right and his version of "China Girl" is dud

Bah, I say. The Iggy version is more immediate, but Bowie turns in a great vocal performance on his rendition of it, and the production isn't half bad, either. For the record, I like the Iggy version more, but to call Bowie's version a "dud" is going too far, I say. To far!

Well... I was SURE that that riff was included in the Hoagy Carmichael bit, "Hong Kong Blues", in To Have and Have Not, but it isn't. It has the gong, and pentatonic blues galore, however.

After years of looking for the soundtrack for this, it's nice to scam an MP3 for the rare occasion that I might want to hear it.

Bowie's China Girl! HAHAAHAH that takes me back

I like the bit in the video where Bowie makes his eyes slanty to be cute.

If I'm humming correctly, the old Tin Pan Alley tune "Chinatown, My Chinatown" and R.E.M.s "7 Chinese Brothers" also step up and down the pentatonic scale.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzPBk1p37Zw

I would like to know the answer to this.

The whole Zach Galifinakis sidetrack upthread = worth a read.

http://chinoiserie.atspace.com/index.html

This page (linked upthread) has a pretty good history of the "oriental riff". Apparently it can be traced as far back as the 19th century, but the origin remains unknown.

(x-post)

i just linked to that

but thanks for linking it again for those who missed it.

Yes, that's why I said x-post.

Didn't mean to offend you.

here's the link again http://chinoiserie.atspace.com/index.html

xpost

wow @ the midi gong at the end of the sample

The Debussy piece is Pagodes, not Et La Lune...

It uses pentatonics heavily but does not employ the stereotypical riff this thread's talking about.

Despite the title, it was directly inspired by Debussy's hearing of a Gamelan ensemble at the Paris Worlds' Fair ("such counterpoint makes Palestrina sound like child's play"). AFAIK it was the first western music to be gamelan-influenced.

I listened to "Turning Japanese" again bcz of this thread and damn if "I want a doctor/to take your picture/so I can look at you from inside as well" isn't the most revolting pop lyric ever.

http://midnightcafe.files.wordpress.com/2007/04/dead-ringers.jpg

Wow I never noticed those verses. That's vile!

he just wants to look at her x-rays. surely you've heard a lot more vile than that!

Hahaha that didn't occur to me. If it's that, then creepy but not abominable.

The radio station just played "Kung Fu Fighting" back-to-back with "Turning Japanese"...

Chopsticks At Dawn on BBC Radio 4

Chinese decorative arts are revered in the West. From Willow pattern dinner plates to the Brighton Pavilion, their designs are regarded as beautiful and sophisticated. But for the past two centuries European composers and musicians have had no qualms about mercilessly parodying what they thought of as 'Chinese tunes'.

As a girl growing up in Hackney, the opening orientalised-flute strains of the 1970s pop record Kung Fu Fighting by Carl Douglas were enough to send future comedian Anna Chen running for cover.

The same cliches haunt Turning Japanese by The Vapours, Hong Kong Garden by Siouxsie And The Banshees and David Bowie's China Girl. They have all followed a pattern set by Claude Debussy, Malcolm Arnold, Albert Ketelbey and Lancashire Linnet George Formby, who were equally guilty of taking Chinese musical motifs and mangling them - or simply making them up!

How did this mocking abuse of a handful of venerable Far Eastern notes begin?

Musicologist Dr Jonathan Walker accompanies Anna on a historical mission, picking out examples on the piano and explaining why and how our western ears hear certain note configurations as "oriental" - from Chopsticks to Chopin.

They explore the pentatonic scale that chartacterises so much Chinese music, delve into the story of the Opium Wars which triggered a deep British disrespect of Chinese musical culture and unveil the earliest dubious examples of Chinoiserie in Western Music.

And we hear from a new generation of British born Chinese musicians who are putting right the discordant wrongs of the past 200 years.

Chinese decorative arts are revered in the West. From Willow pattern dinner plates to the Brighton Pavilion, their designs are regarded as beautiful and sophisticated.

wtf the willow pattern is by an englishman and brighton pavilion is largely based on indian design.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJGRgzRrqFU

the riff is at the start & again at the end

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3X95uWv8A

the backing band at 0'33". transposed but it's the same figure, basically.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtYfHW5wu8Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtYfHW5wu8Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpcz9peCYgg

http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/08/28/338622840/how-the-kung-fu-fighting-melody-came-to-represent-asia

I love Zach Galifianakis now! I get the joke now too!

Lately I've been thinking about the stereotypical weepy violin tune which is used all over the place. It appears to be from "Hearts and Flowers" by Theodore-Moses Taboni.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-i18PGvP1s

This tune just popped into my head. What do you call these sorts of themes that have become so synonymous with a certain vibe or emotion that they have become the stock sound? Often people don't know the name of the tune. I searched ILX and there's not one mention of the title of this one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wjP0MeFPrQ

i was going to start a thread about this but it's been done. i was inspired by hearing that Thompson Twins song "LIES" (i think) that has some line where they mention Japan and then you hear this stereotypical shit.

Heard this in a poker room not long ago and was like ugh but also like: where did this come from?

The most 2005 post here:
Besides, he wasn't being racist, he was being a comical over-exaggeration of racist, which is funny!

Lol that thompson twins song also has a mention of cleopatra -- backed by the arabian riff.

2005, when comedy was legal

see also

Instrumental Pieces that Everyone Knows but that Hardly Anyone Knows the Name/Composer Of

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvGzmf8E4Dc

this thread title has always bugged me because that particular little tune doesn't even appear in China Girl.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udHeBbv0RcI Buck Owens Made In Japan