Are there any "Australianisms" in lyrics that we can explain to you non-Australians?

Little Creatures brewery is named from a lyric in the Talking Heads - Little Creatures album .

 

The EP French Press is fantastic , might give it a spin later .

 

So good!

 

Bloody flat earthers are now claiming that Australia doesn't exist - and that people like myself living in Australia are merely actors. Where are these people basing their claims?!

 

Jandals = Japanese Sandals

 

I haven't seen any around, or maybe I'm not taking notice!

 

Whereas the Wattle is a native of Australia, as celebrated in many songs, including Rick & Thel's "Under The Old Wattle Tree".
It was also mentioned in the Monty Python "Bruces" sketch: "This is the Wattle, the embalm of our land / You can stick it in a bottle / Or hold it in your hand".

 

Yeah, nah, yeah, no worries, if any true blue Aussie champs can't get ahold of any of these bloody rippers then old mate ought to get his sheila to bring out old cobber's boomerang and knock you over the head with it.

 

lotta nice trees down there cobbers!

 

Try the western suburbs from Subi to Cottesloe and south to Freo . Wanneroo has them everywhere , also scattered through most northern suburbs . I'm 3 hours south
of Perth and my small town has them everywhere .

edit - Flame trees are very rare in Perth in my experience , always wanted to see a few but very hard to find , North Perth has a street with a few in .

 

Bottle isn't Scottish, it's Cockney.

 

Flame trees are celebrated in the wonderful Cold Chisel song of the same name:


And in the lyrics, "happy hour" in the hotel is an hour of half-priced drinks, used to lure customers into the premises.

 

...and 'Hotel ' really means 'Pub'.

 

As far as AFL goes it's because of the short shorts, too embarrassing! Seriously you'd think sometime over the last 50 yrs someone would of suggested getting with the modern age and wear a decent pair of shorts for these players, they look silly.

As someone said before a lot of the words mentioned don't get used anymore. BTW, crikey isn't an Aussie thing. The only person i've ever heard in this country to use that word was Steve Irwin. However i do hear it being said sometimes in the mother-country.

Unfortunately so many Aussie kids prefer to use American words these days because that's what they hear in films and on tv. When i was young most tv programmes were Aussie or Pommie, but gradually American culture took over our culture in so many ways. I'm sure this has happened in other countries too.
The other day i actually heard someone say they were really pissed, meaning she was angry, said just like Americans say it, with no 'off' after that word. I couldn't believe it and it annoyed me to be honest seeing and hearing an Aussie teenager copying an Americanism simply because of tv and movies.
I realize language changes and words and phrases are borrowed from other cultures but i think it annoyed me because the speaker was so young. I know it's only a little thing and maybe it's not important to some, however i think stuff like that is important, it's part of a societies culture imo.
BTW i'm not anti-American so i don't want anyone to get that idea about me.[actually i always stick up for America if anyone criticizes the country.]

Also there aren't lots of people called Bruce down here! Actually there is a great Monty Python sketch about Aussie Bruces. I did originally post it here from youtube however while i was listening to it i realized there were a couple of terms used that these days are rightly un-pc. So the sketch is off it's time period but it's really funny and worth looking at.

 

VB will give you a hang over from hell.

Vegemite = Food of the Gods.

 

Victa is a leading brand of lawn mower, 2-stroke is the type of engine in it.

Rolf Harris' song from the early 60's, a bit hit. Some translations:

• wallabies - an Australian marsupial, very similar to kangaroos
• cockatoo - an Australian parrot, quite loud and destructive, sometimes kept as pets. Often abbreviated to "cocky". A supervisor was sometimes called a "boss cocky" (eg. in a shearing shed).
  
• koala - a cute but not cuddly Australian native mammal, found in one species of eucalyptus trees.
  
• "He lives somewhere out on the track..." - track is an unmade road, often in the bush.
• platypus duck - platypus is an Australian native animal, with a "duck bill" for a mouth. Lives in rivers. Very shy so unlikely to be found to be "running amok".
• didgeridoo - indigenous musical instrument, a hollow tree branch. Amazing when heard played live. Many people try playing them by using a vacuum cleaner wand. Women are not allowed to play them unless the indigenous elder gives permission.
• "keep playin' 'til I shoot through, Blue" - "shoot through" = to leave. "Blue" = a nickname for a red-haired man.
  
• An early version of the song (now hard to find, for good reason) refers to "Abos", an offensive slang term for Aboriginal Australians.

 

Here is an unoffensive Monty Python sketch about some Australians hunting the very dangerous, mosquito.

 

Wattle is used in the team song of Australia's national sport cricket .

Under the Southern Cross I stand ,
A spring of wattle in my hand ,
A native of my native land ,
Australia you f*****g beauty .

 

So many examples like the "Pissed" which in Aussie terms should mean drunk not angry like the American use.
Saw a TV ad for 'SUV' which blatantly mentioned 'the *hood*' instead of 'Bonnet'.

Coming from an English background myself and being 50+ these all stand out to me.

 

The original version starts...

Two arms, two hands,
Two swollen glands
Beneath the Southern Cross I stand
A can of Fosters in my hand
The emblem of our native land
Australia ... you bloody beauty.

 

Fair suck of the sauce bottle, china

 

Let's break out on some Chad Morgan tunes to boot! lotta great lingo in his stuff.
Pretty offensive to some by today's standards, but very funny Aussie humour.

 

I've got to admit, up here in the chilly Northern Hemisphere, I found it difficult to empathize with Robert Forster when he sang about "draining the pool for you" in the Go-Betweens song of the same name.

 

I haven't seen this explained yet, Zombie is a strain of marijuana.

 

China = China plate = mate = cockney rhyming slang