Thursday, 18 October 2012

“Whistling is killing music,” 1981


The success of the title song from Monty Python Live At Brian’s (1979) tempted millions to experiment with whistling, almost destroying the British music industry. Takings at concert venues and sales of LP records plummeted as ordinary people found they could make their own entertainment, a phenomenon Jonathan King described as “morally repugnant”.


Acting on instruction from the Lord Privy Minstrel, the NOI mounted this memorable campaign, which ran alongside a macabre television advertisement showing a young Dexter Fletcher whistling himself to death in a public toilet. The music industry was eventually revivified by the cassingle.

2 comments:

  1. Can you share that song, want to heare,
    I heard some of his Romantic songs

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  2. You continually out-do yourself with your curation of this timeless collection of common-sense and right-thinking. A pity we can not return to the simpler times depicted in these warnings--a time when a simple piece of paper, printed on one side and properly place, could keep a nation orderly and safe. Nowadays it's virtually impossible to even alphabetise one's sock drawer without pausing for several drinks.

    Speaking of which, would you please make T-shirts with this design on them? I would trade you money for one.

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