Kilroy Concept Information

[bugsymalone]

OK, a friend found this interesting little exchange from a Cornell University Q/A site. I guess these students were into the whole Mr. Roboto experience! (Probably to avoid hitting the books)

Anyway, what I found interesting was the research done on the word "modren" and its historical meaning.

Dennis used to get blasted for this "inane" use of the word "modren" and turns out he was just being very obscure, but accurate, in his references.


[url]
http://ezra.cornell.edu/posting.php?timestamp=964670400[/url]


Dear Unkie Ezra
In the song "Mr. Roboto" by the band STYX the robot at the end of the song reveals his identity as "kilroy." "I'm KILROY!!!" He declares, as if this has some intense significance to all of the people of our generation. On the contrary, we are baffled. Who is Kilroy? Why is he THE Mauldren man?
Help us out here...we're needin' to know!

THE MAULDREN MEN OF HIGH RISE 5

Dear Mauldren Men of High Rise 5,

Here's the scoop on Kilroy from Cornell alum and staff member Jeffrey Anbinder, who researched this on your behalf:

"The album 'Kilroy Was Here' is actually a rock opera of sorts, which takes place in the near future. The concept is that rock'n'roll music has been outlawed as a bad influence on our children -- replaced, if you can believe it, by sex and drugs, which are publicly considered much less harmful (although the evil 'Dr. Righteous' actually uses them as tools of mind-control).
"Kilroy is a rock musician who has been jailed for his crimes against society; to escape, he hides inside the shell of a 'Mr. Roboto,' one of thousands of Japanese mass-produced servant-robots who do our everyday menial tasks for us in this version of the future. The song 'Mr. Roboto' contains Kilroy's thanks to this robot for unwittingly helping him -- 'Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto' is Japanese for 'Thank you very much, Mr. Roboto.'
"The announcement 'I'm Kilroy!' is really just an affirmation of his own identity, as he sheds the outwardly robotic shell to regain his humanity outside of prison.
"And as it happens, Kilroy thinks of himself as a 'Modren' man, not a 'Mauldren' man. 'Modren' (often spelled with the R shown in mirror image) was originally a way to describe contemporary experimental jazz music in the 1950s, when the more generic term 'modern' was being used to describe mainstream pop such as Elvis. The jazz musicians simply needed a way to emphasize that their music was even *more* modern than modern. The word is mostly used now to describe anything that is supposedly ahead of its time. "


As Mr. Spock used to say to Captain Kirk -- fascinating.

Bugsy

[yogi]

Excellent Post!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[froy]

Excellent Post!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep it sure is

[sadie65]

Well that's the thing about Kilroy. You either like it or you hate it. Doesn't appear to be a whole lot of middle ground for that one. Me, I like it, so I think the explanation above is a good one...though I'm not sure about the experimental jazz connection. Not really sure Dennis had that in his thought process when he wrote it...but, hey, I could be wrong.

Sadie

[Ash]

WOW talk about anal-analysis.

They clearly missed the point. Replacing rock and roll with Sex and Drugs? I don't get that from the album - not sure about anyone else. And if that HAD been the theme of the album, nobody would have given 2 shits about the backward message in snowblind! This would have made it more controversial and likely would have sold about 50 billion more copies.

Also... "modren" man? NO idea what he's talking about. Could it be that was DDY's chicago dialect coming through? I mean we all know people from the norteast and north-central talk super funny

Like I tell people.... quit arguing the nuance of the meaning so much... it always ends up meaning far more to you than it does to the person who wrote it... I dealt with that all the time when I ran Tony Carey's fan club.... you should hear the kinds of things I've gotten in my email regarding the meanings behind "Pink World".

[sadie65]

Also... "modren" man? NO idea what he's talking about. Could it be that was DDY's chicago dialect coming through? I mean we all know people from the norteast and north-central talk super funny

Hey now, I resemble that...being from the north side of Chicago. Now Dennis...he has that southside dialect..."modren" is nothing they'd say "over by dere". Trust me.

Y'all in the south sure about that accent thing

Sadie

[SuiteMadameBlue]

Ash says:

I mean we all know people from the norteast and north-central talk super funny

Ahem!!! If you listen to the nightly news on national tv, all the newscasters have the same accent as me!!! (LOL) The Midwest accent!!! They don't have accents from the South, East or West, it's all from the Midwest.

Ya know, eh......

[ek88]

Gotta love accents. I was born in Maryland, then we subsequently moved to Massachusetts, North Carolina, and New Jersey, before finally settling in Nebraska. Everytime we moved I got teased about my accent and then seemed to pick up the local accent just in time to move again!

[SuiteMadameBlue]

Yep, I love accents!! I hosted friends here in the Milwaukee area for one of Dennis shows in 2003. We had people from Chicago, Texas, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Kentucky and Arkansas. It was a great time trying to understand what everyone was talking about - LOL They all thought that I had the "accent" not them.

[Zan]

Yep, I love accents!! I hosted friends here in the Milwaukee area for one of Dennis shows in 2003. We had people from Chicago, Texas, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Kentucky and Arkansas. It was a great time trying to understand what everyone was talking about - LOL They all thought that I had the "accent" not them.

Something we agree on! I'm from an area that recruits lots of people from different places...Some of my favorites are the North Carolina drawl, the British, Irish (my BF is from Dublin too, which is so so very nice. lol), and the Northeastern attitude accents. I think the little accent Tommy Shaw has is cute, especially when he says "I tell you what..." hehe...

Don't mind me - just having fun out loud.

[yogi]

Forgot about this 'Assembly Line'

[FormerDJMike]

Wow another old thread. But check the lyrics, it says modren not modern. And I believe the r is backwards will check it when I get home.