Just in case anyone was beginning to think they could spot a pattern in the lyrics going on this site, I’ll prove it’s all random with I, Trog, an obscurity hidden away towards the end of Some Call It Godcore. Another song about misfits. Thanks to Jon F, gNick and Martin
s.g.d.,a Shropshire lad
owdo mon,
I think that it is “mad sideys” as in sideburns.
s.g.d.,a Shropshire lad.
3 December 2008
Chris The Siteowner
I like that – in fact it’s what I thought myself. But all three people who sent in the lyrics for this one went independently for “my tidies” so I accepted the majority verdict, good citizen that I am, even though I didn’t really get it. So the debate opens!
3 December 2008
Carstairs
It is definitely mad sideys.
Take it from me I’m a trog
3 December 2008
Neil G
I’m in the Mad Sidies camp. There is a grammatical clue in the second verse where the subject of the sentence is the second person (i.e. you). “When you’re a trog and you’ve got… ” surely would be followed by ‘your tidies’ if it were tidies. Quite apart from that, I don’t know what tidies are, sidies makes sense and it sounds like sidies to me. And that’s all I want to say about that.
4 December 2008
Chris The Siteowner
OK, I suppose all we need to agree on is the spelling.
4 December 2008
grim
Mad sidies for me as well, or sideys if you prefer; although I admit I heard it as “my tidies” for a number of baffled years before finally working it out.
4 December 2008
Steve Malkmoose
Given that the a lone sideburn would be a “sidey”- as opposed to a “sidie” (which just doesnt look right!); the plural must be “sideys” rather than “sidies” unless of course I’m a rank buffoon.
12 December 2008
Chris The Siteowner
Yes, it’s more akin to “monkey/monkeys” than “tidy/tidies”, I guess. And indeed, a lone sideburn wouldn’t look right.
12 December 2008
Dave F.
The lyric book has it as sideys. Capitalized for some reason.
4 May 2009
Ben
Sounds like “and in my dreams….I’ve taken you to Falkirk!” which I think is an even better lyric *blows on fingers*
25 February 2010
Charles Exford
A post in another thread prompts me to confess that, after about two decades or something, I’ve only just realised that OMNI is a magazine.
I had previously thought either his Sven Hassel Omni(bus) was stacked there, or that Omni-Stacking was some kind of self-assembly under-bed shelving system favoured by Trogs that I’d never heard of. Or possibly both.
Not that I’d ever thought about it that much really.
9 January 2012
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
I’d always fancied that it might be a gun, but due to my ignorance of all things military had never really been motivated to check. (Omni? – Uzi? Stacked? – err, as in packing an Uzi – stacking an Omni perhaps. Tenfold? – ummm, he had 10 of them?) Ok, in the cold light of day that doesn’t make much sense does it?
Nevermind. It’s always nice to learn something new. Apparently Omni was a stablemate of Penthouse and was originally going to be called Nova. Super.
9 January 2012
John Burscough
There were 200 issues in all, which stacked tenfold under a (presumably) single bed wouldn’t have left much room for Penthouses.
10 January 2012
ACIDIC REGULATOR
Possible alternative source for the title: I, Robot by Isaac Asimov.
Dept. of the Bleedin’ Obvious. “I was born with a plastic spoon in my mouth”, Substitute, The Who.
Dept. of the Obscure (patron St Jude). Does the next line refer to Spring-heeled Jack (who was sighted in Liverpool), or can someone come up with a better explanation?
8 August 2012
Exxo
1. Alternative to what? ‘I, Robot’ is the most obvious likely inspiration I can think of (again, I find your use of “source” far too linear).
2. Obviously.
3. No – it’s just the way trogs always walked, all bouncy-bouncy (like they’re bounding up invisible stairs in the some dungeon full of orcs).
I guess awkward 13-23 year olds still walk a bit like that, but I haven’t really looked lately.
8 August 2012
ACIDIC REGULATOR
1. Gez’s site says I, Claudius – but I agree with you. (I’m not trying to be linear with “source”; but words like base, inspiration, origin, precedent feel no better, in one way or another. I just throw my hands up and write whatever first comes to mind, for elegant variation. I imagine that NB simply found this title appear in his conscious mind, liked it, and used it; irrelevant whether that was before or after the lyric.)
2. Too true.
3. Calling on your local knowledge, can you provide your definition or description of trog? From what you say, I suspect it’s subtly – or perhaps very – different to mine. The Troggs were cool.
8 August 2012
Chigley Skin
I’d agree that some exposition on “trogs” from a Merseyside perspective would be helpful with this song. Pretty much everywhere else I’ve heard the word used, it’s short for “troglodyte”, and is generally derogatory – I’m guessing there’s a bit more to it than that in this context, though?
8 August 2012
Dave Wiggins
My recollection of 60s and 70s Merseyside was that Trogs were the antithesis to Skinheads. Essentially, and simplistically, a Trog would wear loon trousers, a sheepskin coat, and have long hair. They would listen to Argent, and smell of patchouli oil.
9 August 2012
ACIDIC REGULATOR
A compelling (if appalling) picture, @Dave, and explains the lyric. To me, a trog was an uncouth knuckle-dragger (think Crabbe and Goyle). The Troggs were one of many 60s groups to adopt a name and style designed to annoy adults.
9 August 2012
Exxo
Fascinating how this abbreviation of ‘troglodyte’ has shifted and acquired regional variations since whenever and wherever it first emerged as a disparaging term. I suspect it might have been used even to apply to Teddy Boys and Rockers by the Mods, or even by their own dads in the 50s, but I don’t know, I’m no expert like I am on say the term ‘Wools’ (a term which I’ve had to relate to in one way and another for over 40 years now, but Trogs were only on my radar for a few years in the seventies).
Yes Dave, I expect a Venn diagram would be necessary to illustrate how Trogs overlapped with ‘Smellies’ – the smell in question being patchouli. But Trogs wouldn’t have necessarily gone out en masse to gigs the way the Smellies did. Smellies liked metal & prog; Trogs just listened to the latter in their lonely box rooms. Unkempt hair, not short, but often not _too_ long by the standards of the day.
But a Trog’s favourite pastimes were usually wargames, fantasy games, painting military models in every shade of Humbrol, etc. It’s all in the song, really. Trogs were generally fairly literate. A working knowledge of the likes of Asimov would be acquired by age 13 or14, before moving on later via Michael Moorcock to the likes of Sven Hassell*. Yes, ‘I, Claudius’ was iconic in the seventies too, but ‘I, Robot’ is far more Trog.
Camping and hiking trips were boring, fairly local & unadventurous, as suggested by Point of Ayr. A typical Trog was probably in the scouts till he was about 15.
By the way, for a facial image that conjures up the ‘mad sideys’ perfectly, you could google the poster for the film ‘Trog’ (1970, starring Joan Crawford of all people – I’ve seen it sometimes featuring on ‘worst film’ lists). OK, that fella is yer actual troglodyte, rather than a Trog, but it’s still a perfect mental image.
* when’s old Sven finally going to finally fall victim to the curse BTW? I’ve had him in the HMHB pool for a whole decade now)
10 August 2012