The year was 1970 in Oklahoma City. The date was today, Febrauary 27th. The band was Jefferson Airplane. The use of profanity broke a local ordinance. They were fined $1000 for this violation. The ordinance was drawn up due to Jim Morrison of The Doors allegedly exposing himself at a concert in Miami the year before.
Imagine an artist being fined today for use of profanity at a life show?
When I was growing up, it was a really big deal when there was a song with a curse word. I think about Pink Floyd, The Who and The Rolling Stones. In fact, the Van Morrison song, “Brown Eyed Girl” was banned from some radio stations due to this line, “making love in the green grass.” Just the mention of sex in a song was still taboo in 1967.
Early in my career as a DJ working in radio, we received a list of banned songs on a regular basis. One of the college radio stations I was Music Director and then Program Director would have team meetings to determine which songs we deemed OK for airplay from this list. Some of the choices we made were considered controversial. Some of our DJs had their FCC license revoked due to these decisions. Seems funny to reflect back on those years.
A little piece of trivia I find humorous whenever I see somebody watching the CSI TV show. The theme song in the show by The Who, “Who Are you”, album version contains an F-bomb which is very funny considering how much it gets played on CBS during prime-time with the profanity removed. They use the single version of the song released for radio airplay in 1978.
To bring us back to today, hard to imagine Kanye or Jay-Z making music without profanity. What would the music industry be like today if all profanity was banned from radio and most record labels would not allow profanity on recordings?
What the popularity of Rap be what it was has been in the last fifteen years without profanity? Would the genre even exist?