ALABAMA SONG

[Roylimon]

millions think Jim Morrison wrote it, better than thinking Marilyn wrote it...

[FredC1968]

Six people think Marilyn Manson wrote this.

[BlueronClyburn]

Brecht and Weil wrote this in German originally. Brecht wrote plays of social conscience... Both got out of Germany in the nick of time before the Third Reich caught up with them.

[BPavsner]

OK, if you want to get TECHNICAL, the Doors covered this song. Pretty ballsy, IMHO.

[HuiBuhInYaFaiZ]

i was searching a long time for this version.

we listened a lot of times to the CD...

[faridjabba]

wat year?

[fuggedupwebrep]

THUMBS UP if you're DYING to find that NEXT WHISKEY BAR

wwwiwassofuckedupcom

[shamannofthedead]

i gota flee the country this is my last drink! how much did they pay you to fuck that polar bear

[opyanne]

Awsome. I didn't know David Johnasen did any live theatre. Wish I coulda seen it.

[andremiguelaa]

7 people didn't find the next whiskey bar

[mrwhatsnexttothemoon]

dog shit



[PamCourson74]

Q musica de Mierda!

[tarantulatook]

Marilyn Manson does a great cover of this song that's also very freaky. It's a cover of this, not the Doors' version.

[jgorsnapple]

VERFREMDET! Geil scheiss.

[TheMam50]

Magnifique ! Pour moi, c'est la meilleure interprétation tant sur le plan orchestration que vocal !

[opyanne]

@TheMam50 d'accord



[MarcCinematecoPortes]

Just perfection!

[kebby28]

this is intense! omg! my life will never be the same!

[highmcdopehead]

this is mingin

[dieguns80]

I´m going to have nightmares about this thing....I thought Doors version was already freak...But this is too much..

[fiofodiveia]

@dieguns80 Maybe as a non-native speaker of English I don't grasp the spirit of the song, but honestly I never felt the lyrics to be freaky, scary or whatsoever. I've always seen it as something cynical. The typical cynicism of street drunken asking for more booze.

[MrDukemeister]

@fiofodiveia I wonder if the lyrics are eerier in the original German?

[DaithiBOC]

@MrDukemeister

Actually the original lyrics were in English for the songspeil Mahogonny

[roxydog2004]

They should use this video as a forced rehab for D U I offender's, scare em straight

[karrot101]

it doesn't get better than this, i love it

[genecos]

I've been writing to the Canadian production company of this TV special for years.........BEGGING them to release it on DVD. It was called "September Songs"

[ampinah]

It is a 1930 German Opera called Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, (Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny) composed by Kurt Weill to a German libretto by Bertolt Brecht. It was first performed in Leipzig on 9 March 1930.

Wikipedia Alabama song

[spugintrntl]

I can't get this bloody song out of my head! Somebody lend me a drill!

[harrytwinotter]

Oh fantastic! I love it. Just the oompah song needed to help celebrate Oktoberfest.

[gmork13]

With the make up and the music it's a little scary

[MonsieurVerite]

This version is very good, but it doesn't compare to Dalida's version.

[kevlney]

I remember watching this on PBS back in 94 or 95. I used to have the whole program on video but got rid of it long ago. Now that I found this I'll have to see if I can find the other songs I like so well.

[karrot101]

I love the Bowie version best but this Video is soooooooooooooooooo good, nope changed my mind i like this the best lol it's cowing lush

[blacklikemichaelj]

I have a question the one the doors made wasn't the original cause I alway thought that the doors made the song so like if they didn't who did because I think the doors did make the song but I hear other people sing it with like same lyrics and it isn't a cover by the doors so is the original alabma song the lyrics that the doors sing or did the door make it up TELL ME

[justJunya]

@blacklikemichaelj the one the doors made wasn't the original though folks believe that the doors made the song but like they didn't but who did was other people like two old-school dudes in Germany like I mean REALLY old-school like back in 1927 with like the lyrics by Bertolt Brecht and music by Kurt Weill and like it wasn't a cover or anything like they made it up all on their own cuz dey was cool like dat but they didn't sing it cuz they wrote it for the hos in their play but you knew that.

[curtismichael14]

AMAZING

[Sarc37]

Haha, It's Buster Poindexter!

[benbisley]

Weird - gruesome - excellent -

The woman reminds me of my mother-in-law.

[gugina2]

this is absolutely excellent! funny, witty, creepy and very much Kurt Weill. the opera version is dull compared to this. thank you for posting!!!

[matykpo1992]

the driver of the truck is driving me crazy. he's so creepy...

[Luckyrawk]

David Johansen former singer from New Yourk Dolls.

[InPetrospektive]

magnificent

[bloodvein3]

this is just creepy. the doors did it way better. i actually like the doors version of it.

[mojitek]

@bloodvein3

yes,The Doors is N°1,buth this song is orig. theatre version ..

[mojitek]

Very very very good interpretations and actors . Bravo !

[ColdSpringHarbor1971]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[maurock92]

É uma belíssima interpretação. Vale a pena conferir também a versão do David Bowie

[DarkprinceCs]

this is giving me the creeps,

I prefer the doors haha :P

[leonelmendrix]

Espectacular!!

Também eu tenho este video em vhs...

Lembro-me que deu na rtp2 por duas vezes*

Na altura era imperdivel...

Adorei ver por lá a por ex a PJ Harvey, Nick Cave, Lou Reed, e a curiosa forma de cantar de Mary Margaret O' Hara, apaixonei-me*

[mivoiosi]

too cool

[erickmac88]

awesome

[chinashopjada]

AH Buster Poindexter (aka David Johansen) how good it is to see you!

[271amy]

This is incredible! Where does this clip come from? Is it part of a movie? I would like to find others with the same actors.

[skullyj2002]

It's from a TV special and CD called "September Songs: the music of Kurt Weill".

[pickpocketpeter]

funny drunk guy

[haloCE6]

dang stop typing long..

[katjohannsen]

I saw this on CBC Canada about Kurt Weill (they barely mentioned Brecht) ... he fled the Nazis, the smart man. So did Bertold Brecht, but for different reasons. I love this version best .... the "entartete Kunst" (degenerate art) it all - note sarcasm.

[felamerkin]

I like every version, and will probably like every subsequent.

If I find one I don't like, I probably will just not listen to it, and leave it at that.

[lustewart77]

respetemos a la gran voz de los new york dolls. esta es una gran puesta teatral. por otra parte la version de los doors es genial. pero la de bowie es suprema!!!!!

[orangemisfits]

is there any way i can get this song on my ipod? i dont like havin 2 come to youtube everytime i wanna hear it

its a great song and a great video. ive always loved the doors' version but this is much better

[justJunya]

@orangemisfits Google for converters that download YouTube videos to your disk in MPEG4 format. You can send the MPEG4 video to your Ipod.

[johnmannno]

Nobody seems to "get" Weill's music. You can't hear the counterpoint, the unusual harmonies are all washed out. The percussion is too loud, and alters the original intention of the irregular rhythms to the point where all the subtleties are lost. Marliyn Manson's version did the same, as did Mr Morrison's. Weill wrote CLASSICAL music, NOT rock, and NOT jazz. Listen to Lotte Lenya's and no one else's.

[archbaker]

I don't know Weill that well, but I'm almost certain Brecht would have loved this version.

Also, I listened to Lenya's version, and I loved it, so thank you for the recommendation. It sounded more like jazz than symphony to me, but I'm no music expert.

[justJunya]

@johnmannno

Lenya's first cover is silly "pop novelty". It uses a trio of Rudy-Vallee-clones and dance band. Yet Weill said it was "authentic". The absurdity of your claim is best countered with a quote from Weill:

"That my music to Die Dreigroschenoper [The ThreePenny Opera] has been industrialized does not argue against our standpoint but for it."

Same goes here. Weill agreed with his publisher: "The main object is, after all, that the numbers should be played and sold as much as possible".

[johnmannno]

@justJunya Well! If Weill himself said that his intention was cold, hard cash, then who am I to disagree?

Then would Kurt have loved McDonalds? Would he have invested in Berkshire Hathaway?

He woulda been a millionaire!!

[justJunya]

@johnmannno Weill never said his intention was cash. These days there is a tendency to talk about "Weill's music" and ignore, or downplay, Brecht's role (Marxism is soooo last century...). But notice Weill says "OUR standpoint". It was a collaboration. And Brecht's standpoint was explicit: to strip theater of its "high art" pretensions, and use it as a forum for social and political ideas. So it should be no surprise that Weill welcomed the many "low art" adaptations of his music.

[johnmannno]

@justJunya I'm enjoying this exchange, and thank you for your thoughtful comments. I guess, as someone who is most sympathetic to Weill and Brecht's Marxism, I would point out that most of the versions of Weill I've heard are commercially motivated. I'm not sure that pop music, and its capitalist leanings, is something that Weill and Brecht would have countenanced. Mass markets were quite new in their time.

[justJunya]

@johnmannno No need to speculate on hypotheticals - let's look at the facts. Weill abandoned the concert hall for the stage. Like Stravinsky, his compositions used jazz - the pop music of their time. Hence, he was reviled as a sellout by Anton Webern. And his American music dropped the radical politics of his youth: he sold his soul to Broadway. In short, Weill's music blurs the distinction between "commercial" music and art. Weill wanted (and achieved) success in both. That was his genius.

[johnmannno]

@justJunya Hmmm....I see quite a difference between Jazz, and contemporary popular music. Folks such as the Doors are examples of a mass market mediated by corporations, no matter what the marketing may say. As for Mr Webern, I am inclined to agree with his assessment. Speaking strictly musically (and factually so), Alabama Song is filed with harmonic and rhythmic subtleties that are missing in this version and the Door's version (I've sung it and played it). Such a thing blurs his genius.

[justJunya]

@johnmannno In the 1920s jazz was popular music, mass marketed by corporations. That's why the 20s is also called "The Jazz Age".

Yes - these pop versions lack Weill's musical innovations that give the music "bite" to complement the cutting lyrics. But they do provide an entry level: the Doors version was my intro to Weill, and used to be a favorite, tho it sounds trite to me now. And theatrically, this is the best version I've seen for capturing the cynicism and Brecht's "alienation effect".

[teclnum1]

la de abajo es la pura verdad no ha habido una mejors version que la de los doors.

[doors40th]

holaaa .. aunque whiskey bar sea de kurt weill ... la mejor y numero una del mundo es la de the doors .... the doors populariso whiskey bar por todo el mundo ... whiskey bar en difinitiva es unacamente de the doors no hay duda ... nosotros los fanaticos lo sentimos asi¡¡¡¡¡

[harsawa]

Next to the Doors rendition, this is the best Modern Version! I love its style and sound. Plus for some reason I love him crunching his cigar :)

[potth]

love this version. if you like Kurt Weill check out the other song fron September Songs

[potth]

that is other songs such as Mack the Knife etc.

[petercrowley41]

Best version other than Lotte Lenya's (posted by vaimusic) on YouTube. I wish Dave Van Ronk's even better version had been filmed, but apparently it wasn't. Bowie deserves credit for trying, as does Marilyn Manson, but David Johansen takes the prize.

[AlphaAviator]

I love the interpretation of this song in this vid. Absolutely amazing!

But, of course, The Doors' version takes the gold medal!

[seerauberjohnny]

Ute Lemper did the best modern version in my opinion,although I think this one captures the right spirit!

[nikkononov]

Bert Brecht is greatest dramaturgist...

and it's his stage style absolutely, I think...

superbe! превосходно!

[niflymoth]

glod glod glod... gold gold. i am fond in mansons version but this is bettööör.

[rcassou]

Are u crazy????

How can you compare the greatest dramaturgist Bertold Brecht whit Tim Burton.

Are u drunk?

Non sense!!!

[ubob3]

Most Tim Burton's films music (Danny Elfman) is inspired from Kurt Weill.

[DaGaukla]

i think this has a little bit of tim burton...

[rcassou]

Are u crazy????

How can you compare the greatest dramaturgist Bertold Brecht whit Tim Burton.

Are u drunk?

Non sense!!!

[sogniperfetti]

Vi amo....che spettacolo

[DaGaukla]

awsome!!!

[Paaaaaaaaaaap]

David Johansen is the singer of the punk band New York Dolls... it's kindda funny you're sking, because I once read an atricle about him named : who cares about David Johansen???

There's a link : once heard, of course, but never bought or heard of... he's got a good voice, though.

[whipsmaid]

Whose David Johansen then?

I love the David Bowie liove version the best mind you

[smcallah]

David Johansen is Buster Poindexter.

[whipsmaid]

Love it !

Who are they?

[jotinha999]

David Johansen

[rubino83]

@whipsmaid David Johansen, Ellen Shipley, Ralph Schuckett and Bob Dorough

[nicknorthable]

@whipsmaid ....That's the multi talented Buster Poindexter Singing the lead...I believe he may have preformed on Broadway in this musical...*

[fibonaccihead]

This sounds like 20 times more evil than the Doors' version.

[chinchalare]

Agreed!

[JeniusRob]

@fibonaccihead  and somehow even creepier yes its creepier

[acdc192837465]

@JeniusRob haha yes it is VERY creepy

[valkyriekat47]

@fibonaccihead

it is a canadian tv special on the work of musician kurt weill. Much more suited to the era it was made in and the meaning too

[valkyriekat47]

@fibonaccihead

it is a canadian tv special on the work of musician kurt weill. Much more suited to the era it was made in and the meaning too

[ankrax]

@fibonaccihead yep this sounds wicked

[u2byooser]

beautiful staging, very gritty