What does this lyric mean?

[Reggie Pepper]

How can anybody misunderstand the lyric Mouthful of Pie???

How on earth can their be any ambiguity about this lyric, if indeed you even thought for one second there was ambiguity that would be instantly dismissed by the next line, Head in a blouse,

So let's get this straight, its not a homosexual act, as the guy is obviously very hetrosexual with both Karen and Sharon!

Mouthful of Pie, I mean be realistic, the phrase is even used in the frozen asteland that is Scotland!

Are you people for real????

Reg

 

[Stuheff]

I believe they are American Reginald.

 

[Reggie Pepper]

American Pie?

As is pointed out if they were unsure the next line wold dispell any doubt.

 

[Twat]

I think its from a Roman saying Bread and Circuscuses meaning , If the popuious had enough to eat and entertained them they miss what is really going on around them.....eg crap TV soaps,BB and cheap food and Junk food ahd missing the bigger picture

 

[Trouble loves me]

Wow, smutty Moz![/QUOTE]

Isn't he always?

There's at least one gem of a double entendre on every solo album, and with The Smiths it was practically every song.

The naive child that I was trotting down the shops to buy an album called 'Your Arsenal' ... i wondered what my dad was laughing at.

 

[Trouble loves me]

how do you use this quote thing btw ... it obviously hasn't worked for me.
i am technologically incompetant (and i don't think i can spell either)

 

[mozmic_dancer]

how do you use this quote thing btw ... it obviously hasn't worked for me.
i am technologically incompetant (and i don't think i can spell either)

You will close, Trouble. Just hit the Quote button on the bottom-right side of whoever you want to quote.

You can edit the Quotee for brevity's sake, but you must keep the html tags in brackets intact.

 

[Dave]

The double entendre is there but I don't think it is necessary to convey Dave's character. He is an uncomplicated and good-natured guy who puts big stickers on his car.



Pie in the Sky doesn't mean head in the clouds, btw. There is a song "There'll be pie in the sky when you die". From http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-pie1.htm

This last song, dating from 1911, was aimed directly at the Salvation Army, a body anxious to save the Wobblies’ souls, while the Wobblies were more interested in filling their bellies. The Wobblies hated the Sally Army’s middle-class Christian view that one would get one’s reward in heaven for virtue or suffering on earth. The song was a parody of the Salvation Army hymn In the Sweet Bye and Bye:

Long-haired preachers come out every night,
Try to tell you what's wrong and what's right;
But when asked how 'bout something to eat
They will answer with voices so sweet:

CHORUS:
You will eat, bye and bye,
In that glorious land above the sky;
Work and pray, live on hay,
You'll get pie in the sky when you die.

and I'm quite happy to be an American, thanks. We definitely have our problems but at least we don't support a "royal" family.

 

[Requiescant]

Whilst 'pie' is certainly a euphamism for a vagina in Scotland and some parts of the north of England, I don't think that is Morrissey's intended use in the song. The opening lines are surely to give a character sketch of Dave.

'Head in the clouds': a bit of a dreamer, short attention span.
'Mouthfull of pie': talks with his mouthfull, a bit of an uncultured sort.
'Head in a blouse' and 'I love Karen, I love Sharon': he is a bit of a philanderer. A tad testosterone heavy.

Incidentally, The Stranglers also have a song called Dagenham Dave from their 1977 album 'No More Heroes' which is about a friend of the band who was killed in a racist attack. I doobt there is any connection between the songs but does anyone know of any?

 

[bored]

mouth full of pie..... referring to the female parts!!!! Han't anyone said this yet?

That would be mouth full of hair-pie (Revenge of the Nerds reference)

 

[spectral hand]

Re: How can anybody misunderstand the lyric Mouthful of Pie???

So let's get this straight, its not a homosexual act, as the guy is obviously very hetrosexual with both Karen and Sharon!

You're right, Dave (i.e. Jake?) is ostensibly heterosexual, hence the Karen and Sharon stickers on his car.

BUT ... what do you think this means?

"He'd love to touch, he's afraid that he might self-combust /
I could say more, but you get the general idea."

I think Dave is a closet case, terrified of his own homosexual/bisexual feelings, and overcompensating for it by being a real "ladies' man". What else could the above lines mean? "He'd love to touch" - well, he's obviously already touching women, with his "mouthful of pie" ... but what does he really want to touch?

"Head in the clouds" ... in blissful denial of his true self, because it makes life so much easier - "with never the need to fight or to question a single thing". Do you realise how many homosexual men there are out there living like this, getting married and playing straight because they don't know what else to do, and because it makes life easier, for a while at least?

And have you noticed that weird moment at the end of the "Dagenham Dave" video where Dave is at that guy's car window, with the cigarette? Sorry, but as a gay man, I recognise that as a total cruising moment - the way they look at each other, the very act of approaching another man's car window in a deserted parking structure. I also know from experience that the men who shout loudest about how much they love women and what studs they are, are the ones most likely to have doubts about their own sexuality. Protesting too much, methinks!

I don't know, it all seems pretty clear to me. In many ways I think this was Morrissey's coming out song, and indeed album. Other songs on Southpaw Grammar just reinforce this for me.

 

[mjp]

Isn't i interesting that such an average Moz song (I consider it to rank alongside Roy's Keen as one of my least favourite Morrissey songs) is able to generate so much debate?

 

[Stuheff]

Incidentally, The Stranglers also have a song called Dagenham Dave from their 1977 album 'No More Heroes' which is about a friend of the band who was killed in a racist attack. I doobt there is any connection between the songs but does anyone know of any?[/QUOTE]

He didnt die in a racist attack. He was a manic depressive who killed himself.

Im mates with Hugh Cornwell.

 

[Requiescant]

He didnt die in a racist attack. He was a manic depressive who killed himself.

Im mates with Hugh Cornwell.

Ah! Someone's told me porkies then.
Thanks for pointing that out. Sorry about the mix-up.

 

[Stuheff]

Re: How can anybody misunderstand the lyric Mouthful of Pie???

You're right, Dave (i.e. Jake?) is ostensibly heterosexual, hence the Karen and Sharon stickers on his car.

BUT ... what do you think this means?

"He'd love to touch, he's afraid that he might self-combust /
I could say more, but you get the general idea."

I truly think that Morrissey means that he would like to touch anything that isnt birds basically. Books, Music (other than the pop crap he no doubt listens to), art, literature or men.

This song has the classic underlying Moz theme of someone who wants to do better than they are doing, by being different, but is truly afraid to try. So he goes around not thinking - Mouthful of Pie, head in the clouds.

Also, lets not forget that Everybody loves him - because he's no threat. He fits in, he is Mr Average. Dave is an average bloke

The Pie thing refering to a women's parts in my eyes really vulgarises Morrissey's song writing ability. It is a comment on this 'bloke' not caring what he's eating.

I first listend to the song when it came out, when I was surrounded by Dave's - I lived in Watford (very similar to Dagenham). And the song is brilliant in it's capturing in a few lines what these people are like. Unthinking robots.

If this song was released now for example it would probably be titled "Chavenham Dave, the Chav who wishes he could be poet laureate" or something equally as long.

Can we please stop thinking its about oral sex - It isn't.

 

[Danny]

I think this discussion is a good example of if people want to find a specific meaning in any song, they can. Most of it has nothing to do with the writer's intentions at all. Most words and phrases can have several different meanings some of which the writer probably wasn't aware of him/herself. It's up to you which ones you choose to hear. It's wise (and self aware) to be aware of that though and not think just because you hear something in the song then that's exactly what the writer meant.

 

[stressford poet]

"My wife made me do a search for "mouthful of pie" and the first thing to come up was from a gay site. I refuse to believe he would sing about something that nasty. She says shes right, but I know the truth."

Lmao!

oh heaven forbid ,morrissey should sing about anything "that nasty"
if you ever listened to most of morrissey/smiths you would realise that most of what he sings about is revolved around what you describe as "that nasty"

and how you manage to choose the one song where morrissey sings about the most heterosexual male one could ever picture, and try to turn it gay makes you look even more stupid!

conclusion-homophobic and stupid!

oh and get rid of the ronnie reagan picture-a gesture that is absolutely vile!

 

[sid james]

I think this discussion is a good example of if people want to find a specific meaning in any song, they can. Most of it has nothing to do with the writer's intentions at all. Most words and phrases can have several different meanings some of which the writer probably wasn't aware of him/herself.

Am I the only one with a dirty enough mind that I always have to stifle a chuckle at the line 'I'm packed' in 'Late Night, Maudlin Street' - particularly coming straight after the line about 'me without clothes'? In a song so melancholy I'm sure the double entendre is unintentional, but I still find it utterly hilarious.