Working Undercover For The Man
From This Might Be A Wiki
| song name | Working Undercover for the Man |
| artist | They Might Be Giants |
| releases | Working Undercover For The Man (EP), Mink Car (except European releases) |
| year | 2000 |
| first played | September 8, 1998 (98 known performances) |
| run time | 2:19 |
| sung by | John Flansburgh |
Trivia/Info
- John Flansburgh, from bandoppler.com:
It's more a meditation on the "Mod Squad" than anything else. The idea of the narc just seems...Like, those episodes of Dragnet where they have the young, undercover dress in a hippie suit. The whole thing about being in a band, you can almost think of everything as a costume. There's something artificial about it, but you've taken everything from street life, and then incorporated them into a stage show. There's nothing normal about being on stage. There's nothing true about being on stage. I guess the idea of rock music...people in the rock culture are so hung up on this notion of "authenticity" that it's painful. And I just thought that the idea of the guy in the band, you know, he's just a narc, was kind of exciting. It just revealed a larger potential lie. Like, maybe the guy in Soundgarden isn't really on the verge of total emotional collapse. Maybe he just thinks his hair looks really good today.
- Flansburgh in a 1998 interview with Pop Culture Corn:
I've always been infatuated with the expression "the man," because it's so vague and mysterious. It just has a certain X-Files appeal to it. It's such a paranoid idea. It's sorta like an update on the "Mod Squad" concept, the idea that there's a band going around the country infiltrating youth culture.
- A number of late '90s press releases featured the fun fact "When touring, John and John travel in Ford Crown Victorias, which look like unmarked police cars."
- Prior to the release of the studio version, this song was performed live with a different arrangement that was more of a nod to 1960s pop.
- Flansburgh wrote the horn charts for this song.[1]
Song Themes
Eyes, Hair, Intelligence, Espionage, Lies And Deception, Music, Nonsense Words, Occupations, Plans, Transportation
Videos
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