Top Cat: the Mystery SOLVED!

 

(And now, for a summer rerun in the middle of April. I'm STILL getting comments on this post from 2017, which delights me no end!)

In my rediscovery of the magnificent Choo Choo, who was perhaps my favorite cartoon character of all time,  I've been thinking about some of the mysteries of the Top Cat theme song lyrics. This is, as far as I am aware, the correct version.

Top Cat, the most effectual
Top Cat, who's intellectual
Close friends get to call him T. C.
Providing it's with dignity

Top Cat
The indisputable leader of the gang
He's the boss, he's a VIP
He's a championship
He's the most tip top
Top Cat

Yes he's the chief, he's the king
But above everything
He's the most tip top
Top Cat

TOP CAT!

By God! I never knew the line was "he's a VIP" until just now, after listening to it seventy-seven times. But now that I hear it, that's all it could be. Most lyric sites say "he's a pip", but it's definitely NOT "pip". For a long time, it sounded to me more like "bip". Finally I find a site that says VIP, and I think: no way, nevermore! But yes, it works, if you pronounce it like one word, "vip" (and I'm not sure which way you spell it, upper- or lower-case). This means "very important person", though "VIC" would be more accurate. 

Not only that: one of the "misheard" lyrics below just clued me in on something. I think the second and third lines are usually heard as "whose intellectual/close friends get to call him T. C", but that doesn't make any sense. NONE of his friends are intellectual, not even my darling pink-coated, fluffy-tailed, Brooklyn-accented Choo Choo. But TC is smart as a whip. 

So it makes more sense to say:

Top Cat, the most effectual -
Top Cat, who's intellectual -
(A slight pause, which you can actually hear in the song, then the next thought):
Close friends get to call him T. C.
Providing it's with dignity.

It even makes better grammatical sense, at least to me. I added the dashes just for dash.

Now, can you believe I found whole web pages devoted to "mondegreens" (misheard lyrics) for the Top Cat theme? The "providing it's with dignity" line was especially problematic for people, reminding me of the Flintstones: "let's ride with the family down the street/through the courtesy of flphghghvfllgheep." It's worse than the "you know it's up to you, I think it's only fair" in the Beatles' She Loves You (quick - what's the next line?)

So a lot of the best mondegreens come from that line, often leading to shocking references to "whipping". This is a children's show, for God's sake (though you'd never know it by the crookedness and delinquency of T. C.'s gang of reprobates).

Original lyrics:

Close friends get to call him T. C. 

Providing it's with dignity

Misheard lyrics:

Close friends get to Quality Street
Nobody ain't gets whipping for tea

Close friends get to call him T.C.
Come right in, it's whipping for tea.

Close friends get to call him T.C.
Come on in he's whipping the 't'.

Close friends get to call him T.C.
Providing there's whipped cream for tea.

Close friends get to quality, see?
Provided it's with the kitty.
l
Close friends get to call him T.C.
Pro-fighting is whipped in the tea. 

So. When this show first came on, I was seven years old. It surprised me to find that out, because I think I "got" quite a bit of the humor in it. I noticed that most of the background music had been recycled from The Flintstones. I absolutely loved Choo Choo. He was, and is, adorable. For some reason I remember T. C. brushing his teeth before going to bed in the garbage can, and missing one side. That really bothered me, because I had been nagged and nagged about the proper way to brush my teeth.

As for the "with dignity" line, mine was the worst of all:

Close friends get to call him T. C. 
Most cats are just dripping to see
Top Cat (etc.) 

What that means, I don't even want to speculate on.

For my money, this is the best cover version of the Top Cat theme, which is ubiquitous on YouTube. I'm thinking of doing a version myself. This guy's ukelele chords are incredibly sophisticated. He looks a little bit like the kid from Deliverance, but that just adds to the mystique.



10 comments:

InviteeOctober 4, 2020 at 5:03 AM

I’m not convinced. Despite having tracked down and heard many supposedly original airings where it does seem to be “with dignity”, I still suspect it’s ACTUALLY “with invitee”. INVITEE is a little used word for INVITATION. The line therefore means that close friends can “call on T.C.” (visit T.C.” so long as they have an invitation. Even the man who wrote the lyrics, when later asked, said he didn’t know and no originally written lyrics survive! Nothing will shake my belief.ReplyDelete
Replies

Bunnycat.October 8, 2020 at 8:37 AM

Invitee is not a synonym of invitation. An invitee is a person who receives an invitation. The person who issues the invitation is the invited.Delete



Margaret GunningOctober 12, 2020 at 4:12 PM

Hey guys, thanks for the comments. I love it when someone reads my stuff a couple of years later. The Top Cat issue remains contentious. I was actually working on an updated version of this post when your comments came in! There is a Hanna-Barbera Wiki site with a LOT of cartoon lyrics on it, and here is what they said:

Top Cat!
The most effectual Top Cat!
Who's intellectual close friends get to call him T.C.
Providing it's with dignity.
Top Cat!
The indisputable leader of the gang.
He's the boss, he's a pip, he's the championship.
He's the most tip top,
Top Cat.
Yes he's a chief, he's a king,
But above everything,
He's the most tip top,
Top Cat.
Top Cat!

I still have a little trouble with the "the"/"a" bit, but it's not as important as the "whipping the tea" line, which I think has led to some creative alternatives that I like better than the original. And I'm sticking with my "providing it's with dignity." There is still a little bit of debate about whether it's TOP CAT who is intellectual, or if his CLOSE FRIENDS are intellectual. It has been argued his close friends are dumb as posts, which is true - but might this be a little irony sprinkled in?Delete


Reply


KolbeAugust 31, 2022 at 7:57 AM

"He's a Pip" does make sense. I've never heard anyone referred to as a V.I.P. without articulating each letter. Not that they couldn't have taken license and said "vip", figuring people might get it, but it's more sensible to assume the word "pip", which was known and used and easily understood especially by the adults watching at that time, though the word is all but obsolete now. It meant an "highly admirable, attractive person". It was such a common label it became something of a trend to use it in a negative way, rolling the eyes when referring to someone as "a pip". You'll see that in old movies from time to time.
As regards the comment that the guy on video covering the song looks a little "Deliverence" to you, what an insult. Have you gone back to look at the Deliverance kid since the 70's? No resemblance, save that he's a human being plucking strings.ReplyDelete
Replies

Margaret GunningAugust 31, 2022 at 10:18 AM

I liked the kid from Deliverance! Though he mimed the banjo playing,he added something unforgettable to the film. In reality, he wasn't a mentally challenged person, rather a local kid who wanted to do it and passed the audition, and throughout his life (I actually researched this) he was still treated like a celebrity. I would say the guy who rapes Ned Beatty was thoroughly detestable.
At any rate, I appreciate your comments. "Pip" just reminds me of something upper-class Brits say: "Cheerio, pip-pip" (though no Englishman EVER said that). An orange or lemon seed could also be called a "pip". But it does sound better than "vip". It always surprises me when something I posted five years ago gets some response. For one brief shining moment, there was a Top Cat YouTube channel, which of course disappeared due to copyright issues. Watching them again, I was impressed with how stylish the visuals were - a bit like Disney in 101 Dalmations (though totally different subject - stylized but not pretentious). BRING BACK T. C. (and Choo-Choo, of course). At very least, start showing them on YouTube again.Delete



AnonymousNovember 22, 2022 at 10:20 AM

Now that I know what 'pip' means, it DOES make a lot more sense. I can't promise to stop using 'vip' though.Delete


Reply


KolbeAugust 31, 2022 at 7:59 AM

PS. Not being overly critical with my comment. Enjoyed stumbling across this today. I loved T.C. and the gang back in the day.

I found a big mistake!

We all love Rocky and Bullwinkle, right? No? Okay. That was just a rhetorical question. I have no idea if you like them or not, or even know who they are. But I found something interesting on a YouTube video featuring the running gag which appeared on the show every week: "Hey, Rocky! Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!" In every case, Bullwinkle the magician pulls the head of a wild animal out of the hat and responds with some quip like, "No doubt about it. I'd better get another hat." (A different wild animal each time.) Then Rocky says, "And now for something we hope you'll really like!" This gif is the full non-audio version of the segment, about ten seconds long.

j

But if you keep watching it, it becomes apparent that at about the six-second mark, something very strange happens. Hint: keep your eye on the lower left-hand corner.

One of the main characters. . . disappears. Rocky vanishes. He just isn't there any more.

Slowing this down, it looks even more bizarre. What were the animators thinking? 

Then witness Bullwinkle making his usual smart remark to an empty stage! There's a great big wall of nothing where Rocky should be. He's looking down and talking to nobody.

This is followed by Rocky's cheery announcement, "And now here's something we hope you'll really like!" It's likely this little bit of animation was reused in all these segments to save money.

But notice that it bears little or no resemblance to the original set. The colours are more saturated, the curtains look strange - sort of gathered into folds - and there's a big black "something" above Rocky's head. There was some sort of emblem or crest on the curtains behind Bullwinkle's head that appeared to have a B on it. This, whatever it is, looks nothing like that. It looks like they got some three-year-old to draw their backgrounds for them with a black crayon. This was some sort of cut-rate animation sweat shop. We didn't see just how amateurish and ugly all this was, because we all loved Rocky and Bullwinkle so much.

Well, I did.

Oopsy. I was wrong! This is the Rocky announcement at the end of one of the other magician bits, and it's totally different. The curtains are green, blocky, no gathers, and have some sort of thing on them like an upside-down hot water bottle (if you know what THAT is). But pay attention to Rocky, and you'll see they have repeated the animation from the first one verbatim, except for little details like the tail. In the first one, it looks like an animated slug with no features on it at all. But the second one - pay attention to his feet, how they lurch back and forth in a way that is horribly cheap and unnatural. In fact, I can almost see the bottom line of the curtains showing through his little feet. 

Disney it ain't. Not even Rankin-Bass. And yet, these guys were wildly popular in their day, in the style of early '60s animation. We were much less critical as kids.

Fred and Wilma had sex!

They did. They really did, or they wouldn't have gotten Pebbles.

You know. Pebbles. She happened round about the third season, The Flintstones was beginning to sag a bit in the ratings, so the show's writers decided to add a new wrinkle. They took a truly bold step for a cartoon series.

They made Wilma pregnant.

Imagine it. A PREGNANT cartoon character! Wilma went around for a number of episodes with a big jutting fertility-goddess belly covered by a demure white maternity blouse. What does it all mean? If we're going to imagine this is any kind of normal scenario, we'll have to think of it in the same way we do in real life.

If anyone dares go there, we have to come to the conclusion that Fred and Wilma were - you know. THEY WERE HAVING SEX! Try to picture it. No, don't go there! But try. They are merely cartoon characters, after all, and not real. But they had a "real" baby, didn't they?

Picture it.

How good a lover would Fred Flintstone be? How long would he last? How adept would Wilma be at pleasing her man and keeping him satisfied so he wouldn't go after some cheap floozie in the gravel pit? I cannot imagine. I cannot imagine Fred Flintstone having sex, and deciding one day to just throw the rubber away and wing it. Or was Pebbles really just Daddy's little accident?

Another bizarre issue: the Rubbles, becoming envious upon seeing the adorable new Flintstone baby, began to sigh over the fact that they couldn't have babies of their own.

INFERTILITY! The writers had broken yet another major taboo.

Cartoon characters struggling with infertility: it seems unthinkable, especially in the early '60s. Betty had blown her ovaries somehow-or-other, or else Barney must have had a low sperm count. Picture him in the fertility clinic with a plastic beaker and a Playboy.

Well. IF the writers were going to introduce such ideas into a cartoon series, aren't we within our rights to just sort of sit here and think about how it all went down?

So there was no IVF then, no surrogacy, and a cartoon character masturbating in a clinic is just too weird to contemplate. So the Rubbles wish upon a star, and. . . voila! Bamm Bamm appears on their doorstep, his biological parents abandoning him because he is such a little freak.

It's good for Barney, because it means he never has to have sex again. And Betty no longer has to keep track of her cycles on a calendar to see when she's ovulating. (Hey, they ARE talking about having babies here!) She doesn't have to think about breastfeeding either. The advantages of a baby on your doorstep!

So Pebbles turned out to be the Flintstones' only child, at least for the duration of the show. Does that mean Fred and Wilma no longer had sex? Did they use birth control after that? Was Wilma orgasmic? Did Fred suffer from premature ejaculation?

These are the things that perplex my soul.

BLOGGER'S SOURCE OF ASTONISHMENT. This is an exact transcription of that sappy "Let the Sunshine In" song that Pebbles and Bamm Bamm sing in one of the episodes. I was - gobsmacked. It's religious! I mean, REALLY religious, in a creepy kind of fundamentalist way that was unusual even back then.

Open Up Your Heart and

Let the Sun Shine In

Mommy told me something

A little kid should know

It's all about the devil

And I've learned to hate him so

She said he causes trouble

When you let him in the room,

He will never ever leave you

If your heart is filled with gloom

So let the sun shine in

Face it with a grin

Smilers never lose

And frowners never win

So let the sun shine in

Face it with a grin

Open up your heart and let the sun shine in

When you are unhappy

The devil wears a grin

But oh, he starts to running

When the light comes pouring in

I know he'll be unhappy

'Cause I'll never wear a frown

Maybe if we keep on smiling

He'll get tired of hanging 'round.

If I forget to say my prayers

The devil jumps with glee

But he feels so awful awful

When he sees me on my knees

So if you're full of trouble

And you never seem to win

Just open up your heart and let the sun shine in

So let the sun shine in

Face it with a grin

Smilers never lose

And frowners never win

So let the sun shine in

Face it with a grin

Open up your heart

And let the sun shine in

(YouTube random comments): 50 years later, it's still timeless. And still true :) Thank God for Pebbles and BamBam.

If the Almighty and Powerful God didn't create Pebbles and Bam Bam on the 8th day where would we be now. Praise baby Jesus.

I had never realized how religious this song was. Creepy.

Me neither until tonight. I heard the written lyrics and it was wonderful for me too! And I'm 59!

i love it, and i am 62

WHY CANT PEOPLE JUST ENJOY LI'L CUTE THINGS,INSTEAD OF READING TOO MUCH INTO THEM/GAWD!!!!

AMEN!

You don't hear songs like this anymore, such wholesome lovely songs. Compared to today's garbage.

Top Cat: Forever Choo Choo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hercules vs. the Giant Bug Thingammy

Hercules cartoons are horrible. They were horrible then, and they're horrible now, but what gets me is how excited we got about them. People wax very sentimental on YouTube about watching these when they were ten, though in some cases that was only about five years ago. These things are shown over and over again because they are a particular kind of bad that sort of tries to be good, and people like that. Kids in particular like that.

This is The Worst Hercules cartoon ever - it has to be - and I don't remember the title. This thing, this insect has a pink, vaguely humanlike body and limbs, which makes it especially disgusting, but it surely must have been easier to draw. I think silent gifs are preferable to the original, because what was there to listen to in these things? A horrendous theme song about "softness in his eyes, iron in his thighs"; three or four stock pieces of music played over and over and over again (bucolic shot of Caledon; theme of dark urgency, signalling arrival of Daedalus; thunder-and-lightning "magic ring shot" when Herc finally remembers, again, that he has to put the stupid ring on to get his super-strength; and that's about it, really). The dialogue is equally stilted. The very early ones had one set of actors, then abruptly changed to another set, probably at lower cost, and in one instance they change voices mid-cartoon. It's funny in a mildewed kind of way. And whenever Pegasus arrives, Herc goes through the same old ritual of "taming" him while he heaves and bucks around, emitting the same high-pitched stock-sound-effect whinny over and over and OVER again.

There's a youth called Timon, kind of a clone of King Dorian only not royal, and I used to wonder about him. He's the kind of kid who gets the crap beaten out of him in the schoolyard. He was always going to Hercules' gladiator school or whatever it was, to try to learn how to Be A Man, or else trying to save his sick mother who lay there all the time in the sickly thatched cottage he lived in. Poor but noble. Hercules has a special fondness for him, and I wonder about that, just as I wonder about the fact that he has no nipples.

Helena may just be the worst. She is The Female plugged in "wherever", particularly when Herc needed to rescue someone, though there is also a Bad Female with a mean cat (what was her name? Wilhemena or Willemena or however they spelled it). The rest of them are males, and I am sorry to say that not all of them are human.

But we watched The Mighty Hercules every day, and considered it on a par with all the other stuff we watched, whether it was slickly-produced Disney or quirky, inspired Max Fleischer, or Rankin-Bass with their stiffly-moving stick-figures. The Canadian-produced Wizard of Oz series was weak and badly animated, but we watched it. We just did. That was what was "on".

What if Louis Wain painted. . . Choo Choo?