Semi-Charmed Life: or When Radio/Video Edits are Dumb and Screw the Message

Sometimes, Youtube decides I am in a nostalgic mood. Usually, Youtube is correct. Big Data (the computer concept, not the artist - he makes good stuff) is scary guys.

Youtube decided I should listen to Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life." So, I did because I am a piece of elder Millennial trash that would do anything to capture the feeling of the prelapsarian age before 9/11 (note to self- future topic: 9/11, impact on pop-culture never mind everyone with a Medium has written that piece). As the cheery pop hook filled the bedroom I've spent most of my time in on my abbreviated summer break I heard the infamous "wighsash." For those of you not old enough to remember what I'm calling the "wighsah" (technical term, I asked people) was all the rage in the late 90's for censoring radio edits - take your bad word and reverse it! If you're lucky and it's like the word "shit" you end up with "ish" and create an entirely new pop-cultural shorthand that means exactly the same thing but gets past the FCC's naughty word detector despite the fact that the definitions and general offensive connotations are the same!

So, dear reader, why am I writing about a song that's twenty years old and how does it relate to censorship? You're wondering, "Why are you so mad they censored a word? Are you mad it was the radio edit?" No, and you should feel bad for thinking that. Let's start drilling down shall we? Here is a selection of lines that are not altered in any way in the radio edit of Semi-Charmed Life:

"She comes 'round and she goes down on me"

"And I speak to you like the chorus to the verse / chop another line like a coda with a curse"

"The sky was gold, it was rose / I was taking sips of it through my nose"

"It won't stop / I won't come down, I keep stock / with a tick-tock rhythm and a bump for the drop

And then I bumped up / I took the hit that I was given / Then I bumped again / Then I bumped again"

"How do I get back there to the place where I fell asleep inside you?"

"The days you were wearing that velvet dress / you're the priestess I must confess 

those little red panties they pass the test / slide up around the belly face-down on the mattress"

So dayum! This song is rife with explicit references to drug use and is rather sexually explicit even in the radio edit. Hell, that last one gives me the fucking vapors! After typing it I had to go lay on a fainting couch and fan myself lest I get too excited. So what IS censored in this sexually explicit song that frankly discusses drug use?

"Doing crystal meth will lift you up until you break"

"Now you hold me / and we're broken / Still it's all I want to do

Feel myself with a head made of the ground / I'm scared but I'm not coming down

And I won't run for my life / She's got her jaws just locked now in smile

But nothing is alright / All right"

This censorship deeply harms the message of the song. It's pretty common knowledge that Semi-Charmed life is a song about the dangers of crystal meth addiction hidden under a pop veneer. The pop hook helps create the sense of disconnection that the drug itself creates; it makes you feel great even though your life is falling apart around you. With this form of art there's always the chance of it being misinterpreted. Clearly, somebody with power decided that saying the magic words "crystal meth" would create an impression in the listener the message of the song was "crystal meth is fucking awesome and everyone should do it." That person was a fucking idiot. They censored the only explicit mention of the drug in the only instance it appears in a line that is about as anti-crystal meth as it gets outside of those stupid "this is your brain on drugs" PSAs. They further compound this problem by removing an entire sequence of lines that, again, explicitly are anti-drug, describing in detail how the drug gets its teeth into you and takes over your thoughts; how it's possible to be afraid of what's happening to you but more afraid of quitting and coming down.

The radio edit clearly undermines the message of the song. I also know you've read this article before - but this was the best one.

::JESS'S TWO CENTS:: I fucking hate radio edits as well. Mostly because the things that are censored or removed aren't as bad as you'd think. For example, the word "whore" in Everlast's "What It's Like," which is simply describing the extreme level of hate a poor girl is receiving for getting an abortion. They also censor "sex" in "The Lazy Song" by Bruno Mars (fucking Bruno Mars, for chrissakes!) - "Tomorrow I'll wake up, do some p90x/Meet a really nice girl have some really nice sex." I don't see anything wrong with that, especially considering that in the first verse, he alludes to masturbating and nothing in that verse is censored. But the thing that bugs me the most, I think - and this really deserves a post all its own - is when they remove rap/reggae interludes from songs for no reason. I never heard this happen until I moved to San Antonio but the pop stations will only play the versions with the rap breaks removed. It was most noticeable to me when hearing Katy Perry's "Dark Horse" and No Doubt's "Underneath It All." Because....why? There is nothing bad in either of the breaks for those two songs so, in my head, there's really only one reason for it: racism. As I said, that topic needs a post of its own, because I could point out a dozen songs off the top of my head where they do that when it's unnecessary and, quite frankly, ruins the song. There's a reason these artists chose to collaborate, and removing essential parts changes the entire tone of the song. Okay, sure, "whigsash" a cuss word or two, or even remove them altogether ("you're so very special"....rolling my eyes so hard), but don't remove entire verses just because it incorporates a musical genre or artist that society isn't comfortable with.  ::END::