JOHNNY BODE & LILLEMOR DAHLQUIST/ BORDELLMAMMAS VISOR RLP 101 (-68) MONO SWEDEN

"Genitalia Rock" or "Genital Rock" emerged as a branch of Swedish punk rock in the late seventies. Lyrics builds on frequent use of "four letter words" and pejoratives, picturing more or less preverted sexual situations and/or descriptions of bodily waste, most of the time performed to very simple melodies with rock backing. However its true origin was way before punk rock and the puerile ickiness attributing the genre today. This is the album where it all started. The story about originator Johnny Bode (1912-83) has to be divided into two separate - one public and one private - so diverging it's hard to believe they're describing the same person. Bode was one of the forces behind the Swedish schlager industry from the late twenties up to the war as artist, songwriter and translator of foreign lyrics, recording hundreds of songs, many of them big sellers. In the early sixties he wrote three operettas for the Vienna Opera which all became hits and was spread internationally. He made a final comeback 1968 with a serie of four "erotic" LP:s, this being the first. So in a way it's a success story about an artist who managed to renew himself and stay creative for over forty years. But it's also the tale about a deeply disturbed man who through life struggled with inner demons and from time to time failed to function socially. Already in the thirties a known mythomaniac with serious criminal reputation, prosecuted for a large number of felonies including theft, fraud and sexual abuse. After years of getting in and out of courts and jails the authorities had enough, sterilized him and locked him up in a mental institution. He escaped during the war and joined the nazis in Norway, entertaining the high officers by writing and singing pro-Hitler songs. That worked for a while, but eventually he fell back in his old ways - drank too much, stole stuff and tried to con prominent members of Quisling's war administration. After getting caught and spending a few weeks at Grini concentration camp he was thrown out and declared persona non grata. The alleged nazi sympathies got him banned from a large part of the European entertainment industry post-war. After a short trial as spy for the DDR communist regime he continued writing and recording under various synonyms - the earlier mentioned Vienna operettas as "Juan Delgada" and for other works as "Richard Ritzi", "Florence Valentin", "Rob Robertson", "Kiddie Niles" or the "Johnny Delgada" used for this release. By 1967, at age 55, he participated in the student life around Lund University, writing for and entertaining at gatherings. Some of the songs were ingeniously erotic, reputation spread and eventually led to an offer from porn editor Rondex to record an LP. They hired professional musicians as for a regular schlager session - the lyrics were added afterwards - and he also persuaded a blossoming revue singer and primadonna - Lillemor Dahlquist - to do the female part with a promise that she would remain anonymous (a trust he broke soon after). The result was something totally new and unparallelled back then. Melodies are catchy schlagers in various styles, well performed and produced while the lyrics are sexually offensive, male chauvinist and sometimes racist, all presented with a kind of old fashioned libertine humor. It's like he finally got his two personas together in one place - the creative skill reflected in the melodies and the uninhibited hustler expressed through the lyrics. Although initially sold by mail order only it became an unexpected hit in Sweden and also re-issued in a couple of other European countries with translated, slightly censored lyrics - Bode himself doing the German version. The English translation of album title would be "The Brothel Madam's songs". Since this isn't an age restricted page I'm trying to smooth over following song title translations - "C*nt Cracking Polka", "W*nk Me Off With White Gloves On, "Virginity Waltz", "It's So Wonderful Always Being H*rny", "Peeper's Song"...and so on. First release as shown here in mono only with beautiful audio. Two last pics below were not part of this issue. Third is from a compilation of his earlier work (1929-42) and fourth of him and Lillemor Dahlquist (with the white gloves on) at time for recordings. (SCÄ*)(FÄV*) (ÄXÅH*) (CCÖ*) (NÖH*)