#Dear prudence

[80sheaven]

Siouxsie Sioux "Dear Prudence" lyrics poster

[maculategiraffe]

I had to look up release dates because my first horrified thought was that these people named their baby thanos but that doesn't math out right. someone who isn't deeply out of touch with popular culture help me figure out whether these grandparents are right to be concerned

[glidingsilvery]

Belle Épine (Dear Prudence) 2010

[dillweed1236]

Siouxsie and the Banshees’s Dear Prudence cover by The Beatles (feat. Robert Smith on guitar).

[ubiq80]

Siouxsie & The Banshees featuring Robert Smith 1983

[thatbadadvice]

Help! Death is inconvenient!

Dear Prudence, Slate, 6 December 2022:

Q. Bothersome Burials: Is it appropriate to hold a funeral on a Saturday? I have recently noticed that funerals are more frequently being held on Saturdays instead of weekdays and I think it is bad etiquette. On most Saturdays, we already have plans for weddings, baby showers, birthday parties, ski trips, softball tournaments, etc. and I am perturbed when we are expected to change those plans to attend funerals. It seems to me that when you lose someone very close to you that you should be taking time off of work anyway rather than waiting until your scheduled day off to have a funeral and grieve. When you lose an acquaintance, or perhaps do not know the deceased but still want to support your friends and family, you should be able to limit it to a few hours during the week and not give up your weekend plans. Also, it seems inconsiderate to make the funeral home and cemetery staff work on a Saturday. I believe that Saturdays should be off-limits, am I mistaken about this?

Dear Bothersome Burials,

Funerals should absolutely never be held on Saturdays, for all of the excellent reasons you describe. It is inconsiderate in the extreme to interrupt people's ski trips even for legitimate reasons (whatever they may be — nothing immediately springs to mind, but the Bad Advisor is sure someone somewhere will be able to drudge up an example). To derail a romp on the slopes for something as inconsequential as a community gathering to grieve the departure of a beloved friend or family member from the plane of existence as we know it frankly defies comprehension. For the snuffing out of one's mortal lamplight to cause scheduling conflicts around more minor commitments such as weddings and baby showers is naturally a lesser infraction — attendees can always simply RSVP to the next one, or the one after that — but nevertheless impolite. Of course, few will share your deep concern for the wellbeing of those death professionals who work on Saturdays despite undoubtedly being, as you are, shocked by and entirely unprepared to accommodate the customs and traditions surrounding the inevitable fate, old as life itself, that awaits all of us. But your selflessness is noted here nonetheless.

If you are mistaken about anything, it is in failing to interrogate the cause of these breaches of etiquette. There was a time when people treated each other with just a little more consideration — when we left our doors unlocked, our unvaccinated children played together barefoot in the streets until dawn, and we dropped dead when and only when it was convenient for people's busy weekend schedules. My mother would have rather died than shuffle off the mortal coil just before Little Maydelayne's big softball tournament! Sadly, people these days think only of themselves, their own needs, and their own petty concerns — to say nothing of their unwillingness to sacrifice a day of fun and fulfilling work to attend the final celebration of life for some douchebag who had the gall to kick the bucket without checking their second cousin's day-off calendar first. Grief is already experienced for only those fleeting moments we spend attending funeral services; it is unseemly to defer our limited 40- to 90-minute mourning periods until such a time as we can gather together in meaningful community.

Alas, that's the world we live in today! We can lay much of the blame on the obvious culprits — video games, reefer, and heavy metal music — but we would be doing ourselves a disservice if we did not admit that we are responsible for making time for what matters. The next time a cherished friend, loved one, or colleague sets off on that long, mysterious journey to the undiscovered country, we must prioritize the apres-ski reservations at the lodge bar.

[sowhatifiliveinfukuoka]

Siouxsie & The Banshees

Dear Prudence (1983)

[myimaginaryradio]

Dear Prudence - The Beatles

[magical-mysterygirl]

JOHN. WHAT THE FLIP

[theoriginallittledarling]

Here’s a real musiciany post for all of you

Today I’ve been trying to learn the baseline in Dear Prudence, the real distinct part that stands out in the second verse. The entire baseline is on the D string

I first noticed that Paul slides out of each not before playing the next higher note each time, so I started trying to play it by playing the note, sliding down the neck, and playing the next 2 notes.

My brother told me that I needed to slide into the note rather than sliding out of it, so I started learning it that way; slide into the note, play the next note, then play the string open before sliding into the next note

After listening to it again I realized that he’s actually doing both, sliding up the string into the note, playing a half step next, then sliding out of the half step, then sliding back into the same half step, then playing another half step and so on

It’s such a good bassline and I’m really not a good enough bassist to be trying to play it

[bitter69uk]

“Once up a time, they might’ve burned Siouxsie Sioux at the stake or thrown her in a lake to see if she’d float with rocks tied to her ankles. Today, she’s signed to a recording contract with the hope that she’ll be the most famous witch since mother-in-law Agnes Moorehead made Elizabeth Montgomery’s husband Dick York so miserable in Bewitched … but you won’t find the catchy minimalism of Siouxsie and the Banshees on US radio, so Hyaena tries to adapt the band’s basic doom und gloom to the dictates of modern pop and rock, turning its existential angst into heavy metal / new wave rituals …”

/ From Roy Trakin’s review of Hyaena by Siouxsie and the Banshees in the November 1984 issue of Creem magazine /

Released forty years ago today (8 June 1984): Hyaena, the sixth studio album by essential British punk band Siouxsie and the Banshees. Coincidentally, THIS was the first Banshees album I ever bought, and it absolutely entranced me! Hyaena’s biggest hit was the Banshees’ Gothic reinterpretation of “Dear Prudence” by the Beatles. High priestess of punk Siouxsie’s deadpan delivery suggests she doesn’t give a damn if that brat Prudence comes out to play or not. (The song hit number three on the UK singles chart, blocked from going further by “Karma Chameleon” by Culture Club!). The rest of the album finds the band at its most experimental, exploring bad-trip psychedelia (think Grace Slick in hell and “Paint it Black”-era Rolling Stones):  “Dazzle” (“Skating bullets on angel dust / In the dead sea of fluid mercury / Baby piano cries / Under your heavy index and thumb / Pull some strings / Let them sing!”), “Swimming Horses”, “We Hunger” (“As the rust creeps / Corrosion seeps a rotting seed / Eat me, oh, feed me / With your belching foul breath …”). Scary fun times! I had this poster on my bedroom wall for years! (First in my teenage bedroom, then in my university accommodation).

[archivist-crow]

Siouxsie and the Banshees - Hyæna

Forty years ago today, on June 8, 1984, Siouxsie and the Banshees released their sixth studio album, Hyæna. With a Banshees lineup that included The Cure’s Robert Smith on guitar, Hyæna was the band’s first with Geffen Records and featured the singles “Swimming Horses” and “Dazzle”.

[ubiq80]

Siouxsie and the Banshees. 1983