Banana Boat Song

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“Banana Boat Song”
Single by Harry Belafonte
Released 1957
Format vinyl record (7", 12")
Label RCA

The Banana Boat Song is a traditional Jamaican folk song,[1] the best-known version of which was sung by Harry Belafonte and is the most well-known calypso. It is a song from the point of view of dock workers working the night shift loading bananas onto ships. Daylight has come, the shift is over and they want their work to be counted up so that they can go home (this is the meaning of the lyric "Come, Mr. Tally Man, tally me banana/ Daylight come and we wanna go home.")

Belafonte's debut television performance of the song was on the TV series The Muppet Show.

Contents

[edit] Origins

The origins of the "Banana Boat Song" are often stated incorrectly. The song was originally a Jamaican folk song of unknown authorship; it was sung by Jamaican banana workers, with the familiar melody and the common refrain ("daylight come and we wanna go home"), but with many different sets of lyrics, some possibly improvised on the spot.

The first recorded version was done by Trinidadian singer Edric Conner and his band "The Carribeans" in 1952, on the album Songs From Jamaica; the song was called "Day De Light".[2] It was also recorded by Louise Bennett in 1954. In 1956, singer/songwriters Irving Burgie and William Attaway wrote a version of the lyrics that was recorded that same year by Harry Belafonte; this is the version that is by far the best known to listeners today. Also in 1956, folk singer Bob Gibson, who had travelled to Jamaica and heard the song, taught his version of it to the folk band The Tarriers. They recorded a version of that song that mixed in the chorus of another Jamaican folk song, "Hill and Gully Rider", and released it, spawning what became their biggest hit. This version was re-recorded by Shirley Bassey in 1957, and became a hit in the United Kingdom.[3]

The Tarriers, or some subset of the three members of the group (Erik Darling, Bob Carey and Alan Arkin) are sometimes credited as the writers of the song, perhaps because their version of the song, which mixed in another song, was an original creation.

[edit] Covers

[edit] Parodies and other uses

The cry "Day-O!" by itself has become a frequently-used bit at baseball parks in late innings when the home team needs a rally, as spectators want to "go home".

There have been a number of parodies of this iconic song over the years:

  • "Banana Boat (Day-o)" by Stan Freberg, produced in the 1950s, features ongoing disagreement between an enthusiastic lead singer and a bongo-playing beatnik who "doesn't dig loud noises" and had the catchphrase "You're too loud, man". When he hears the lyric about the "deadly black taranch-la", the beatnik protests, "I don't dig spiders, Man."
  • In 1972, the Dutch artist & comic André van Duin used the melody for a song "Bananenlied" (Banana Song) exploring the question of why bananas are bent.
  • German band Trio performed a parody where "Bommerlunder" (a German schnapps) substituted the words "daylight come" in the 1980s. In one rare coincidence, Trio and Harry Belafonte appeared in the same TV show with the latter watching Trio's act in disbelief.
  • The Flash animation "Osama Bin Laden Has Nowhere To Run, Nowhere To Hide", produced shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks, features a parody version of the song apparently performed by Colin Powell (with George W. Bush on bongos). The main refrain is "Come Mr. Taliban, turn over bin Laden! (Payback come then we drop the bomb)" [1]
  • Parodied as "Gay-O" in The Simpsons episode about gay marriage entitled There's Something About Marrying, season 16.
  • Musical comedy group Da Yoopers parodied the song as "It Was Eino" on their 1996 album We're Still Rockin'. Their version tells a story of deer hunting.
  • Country music artist Neal McCoy includes snippets of the Banana Boat Song in his "Hillbilly Rap", which can be found on his That's Life album.
  • The Firesign Theatre parodied the Banana Boat Song on their 1985 album "Eat Or Be Eaten" as an ad for "Rastafarian Motors" auto repair shop ("You should be smoking, not your car!").
  • There have been songs on various radio stations around the U.S. that in spring of 2007 have played a parody of this song which is saying about American Idol's Sanjaya, "America please send Sanjaya home".
  • The Totally Rad Show - Episode 21 - Beetlejuice Parody
  • It is parodied in the PC game Discworld II as a part of the Rite of Ask Ente.
  • The Banana Throat Song (also known as The Banana Song) by Judge Dread
  • Key West street performer Mustafa sang a stirring version of this song with Daniel Caton and David Lundeen contributing backup vocals

[edit] Cultural references

  • In the 1985 film Girls Just Want to Have Fun, the character of Lynne, played by Helen Hunt, breaks out into song during choir rehearsal to distract the teacher while Janie, played by Sarah Jessica Parker, escapes to meet up with her dance partner.
  • The song was used in the dinner scene in Tim Burton's Beetlejuice.
  • The song was used in a banana collecting scene of the documentary Life & Debt by Stephanie Black.
  • The fictional character Marve Fleksnes, in the Norwegian series "Fleksnes", played by Norwegian actor Rolv Wesenlund, uses the quote "Day-O" frequently. He yells it in the intro of the series as he hammers his fist into a TV with flickering signals to make them stable and clear, thus zooming into the TV, and a frame of the current episode shows.
  • In an episode the tv series "Fresh prince Of Bel-Air" Will, Carlton and Aunt Vi sang this song to get Aunt Vivian and Uncle Phil to stop arguing.
  • In BBC Radio 4 comedy series Giles Wemmbley-Hogg Goes Off, Giles travels to New Zealand to stop his ex-girlfriend Arabella marrying a Mr Fonty, as then she would be Arabella Fonty, and everyone she was introduced to would sing this song at her.
  • In more than one episode of Futurama, a character on the show named Hermes Conrad (a Jamaican accountant) has made references to the Banana Boat song.

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Day-O" / "The Banana Boat Song", Calypso: A World Music; An Exhibition of Photographs and Illustrations of the International History of Calypso, 1930-1970. Historical Museum of Southern Florida. Accessed on line May 25, 2008.
  2. ^ Mento Music. Edric Connor, Louise Bennett & Jamaican Folk Music
  3. ^ The Songs of Shirley Bassey. The Tarriers

[edit] External links