http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4ZyuULy9zs "Southern Trees bear a strange fruit. Blood on the leaves and blood on the root. Black bodies swingin' in the Southern breeze. Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees" In 1999, Time Magazine named it the best song of the 20th Century. It was originally a poem written by a white Jewish school teacher called Abel Meeropol who was a Communist Party member and came from the Bronx. He was disgusted at the lynchings of African Americans in the deep south of America and the poem was his way of expressing his extreme antipathy towards that crime. He set the poem to music and it became something of a protest song. There are conflicting reports on how Billie Holiday was introduced to the song, but she began to sing it in an integrated night club called Cafe Society in 1939. The whole place would come to a standstill when she sang the song. She would close her eyes whilst singing - almost as if she was in prayer. Eventually, after a lot of record companies rejected her, Billie was allowed to sing the song for Commodore Records in 1939 and then again in 1944. The critics loved it and the 1939 version sold over a million records. It remains a terribly sad piece on an horrific time in history where racists could openly get away with the crime of murder. The image of bodies strung up on a tree will surely haunt the listener for a long time. A great song but you wouldn't play it at a birthday party.
My first film watched was Carrie aged 2 on my dad's knee. Educated at The University of St Andrews and Trinity College Dublin. Fan of Arthouse, Exploitation, Horror, Euro Trash, Giallo, New French Extremism. Weaned at the bosom of a Russ Meyer starlet. The bleaker, artier or sleazier the better!