What I’m looking for is a remedy for an ailment or affliction. The affliction can be as simple as being lovesick, but the remedy has to be something tangible, that you ingest or apply topically, like a tonic or an ointment. Also, it needs to be more specific than just “a pill” or “a handful of pills.”
So, for instance, “Good Lovin'” would not qualify because the doctor simply suggests that the cure lies in a lifestyle change that includes more “good lovin.” Nor would the rock and roll doctor in the Little Feat song, because he doesn’t really offer advice; the narrator merely ticks off the doctor’s rather impressive credentials.
Home remedies are encouraged, and the likelihood of the “cure” actually curing anything does not matter.
I’ll lead off with “Strychnine,” which, according to The Sonics, is good for what’s ailing you.
Smashing the mirror cures young Tommy of that blind/deaf/dumb thing.
Assuming that “Poison Ivy” is a metaphor for a woman who will leave you with a bad itch, “It’s gonna take an ocean of calamine lotion” to get over her.
Actually, after re-reading the rules, I guess “Poison Ivy” doesn’t need to be metaphorical – it could simply be about a case of poison ivy. I am Last Man Standing!
Medac by the Who. That was a mighty big pimple Keith had!
It’s a moot point now but smashing a mirror would not count as it is neither an ointment nor an ingestible substance, like, for instance, putting a lime in a coconut and drinking it all up in order to cure a belly ache.
The Kinks say “Have a Cuppa Tea” for a wealth of ailments: http://www.kindakinks.net/discography/showsong.php?song=137
I don’t know what’s in Love Potion Number 9 but it looks like Indian ink and tastes like turpentine and it cured the singer of his romantic lethargy.
D.M.S.O. mixed with LSD.
D.M.S.O. by Dead Kennedys
Got my mojo working, but it just won’t work on you
Got my mojo working, but it just won’t work on you
I wanna love you so bad till I don’t know what to do
In Los Paraguayos, Rod Stewart advises using alcohol to fight the common cold.
I believe the Who care more about this than anyone else – so I say Odorono, and hope you all learn from her lesson, lesion, or liason.
Are you not groovy? Are you afraid to cut your hair short or put on tight pants? Is the real world bringing you down? Your cure can be found in the “Yellow Pills” from 20/20.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLH3Vw5e9os (audio)
I’m not sure what was in the syringe given to Pink in Comfortably Numb but it cured his “Aaaaaaah ahaaah” but left him a little sick.
“Aspirin” – Green on Red
I think he changes it to “Heroin” in the last verse. Fast-track gateway drug, apparently.
Mark E Smith requests some “powered” vitamin C because he’s feeling unenergetic. He also asks the pharmacist to stock him up for the wintertime so I assume that’s for Seasonal Affective Disorder.
In Dr. John’s Gris Gris Gumbo Ya Ya he says he has got “medicine to cure all your ills … remedies of every description.” But there are also specific remedies, some of which even I can’t make out from the thickets of his patois. But I think I can translate this part:
If you got love trouble, got a bad woman you can’t control,
I got just the thing for you
Something called control-in-the-hearts-of-get-together drops.
If you work too hard and you need a little rest
Try my easy-life rub
Or put some of my boss-fix jam in your breakfast.
Btw I was trying to find a youtube of the song, unsuccessfully, but I did come across this interesting clip of Dr. John playing with Lou Reed on Dutch TV and singing Perfect Day as it was meant to be sung:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAoSGxvOm3g
“Mother needs something to calm her down. And though she’s not really ill, there’s the little yellow pill. So she’s running for the shelter of a mother’s little helper…”
“Doctor, ain’t there nothing I can take”
I said, Doctor, to relieve this belly ache?”
I said, Doctor, ain’t there nothin’ I can take”
I said, Doctor, to relieve this belly ache?”
You put the lime in the coconut, you drink them both together,
put the lime in the cocount, then you’ll feel better.
Put the lime in the coconut, and drink them both up,
Put the lime in the coconut, and call me in the morning.”
This actually works.
Fugazi’s 1988 “Give Me the Cure” is sort of an illustration. The narrator bemoans that he “never thought too hard about dying before” and repeatedly requests, “Give me the shot, give me the pill, give me the cure.” Although the illness is not mentioned, McKaye later said that he was talking about AIDS, which had minimal medical intervention at the time.
This is tougher than I thought it would be! I figured Lowell George’s “Rock ‘n Roll Doctor” would have prescribed something specific, but although he’s got “two degrees in be-bop, a PhD in swing,” he doesn’t dish out anything but swinging beats and good advice.
In Kiss’ “Calling Dr. Love,” one of the greatest rock songs of all time, Dr. Love has the cure you’re thinking of, and while we don’t get the entire recipe, the first step is a kiss.
Much would have been averted, including a lot of teenage angst, if the narrator in Suicidal Tendencies’ “Institutionalized” just would have gotten his Pepsi.