What's the frequency, Kenneth?

minstrel · #1 (**permalink**) 11-24-2003, 01:45 AM

This may be old news to most of you but I just came across it tonight - I frankly never understood the song so I compromised by just groovin' along to it driving in my car:

Quote:

What's the story behind R.E.M.'s song "What's the Frequency, Kenneth"?

CBS News anchor Dan Rather, renowned for his unusual expressions and sayings, has led a colorful life. However, one bizarre event really takes the cake.
One night in October 1986, Rather was walking down a Manhattan street when he was punched from behind and thrown to the ground. His assailant kicked and beat him while repeating, "Kenneth, what is the frequency?"

No one could explain the event, and the rumors flew fast and wide. Some speculated the assailant was a KGB agent, while others claimed the attack was the work of a jealous husband. Rather himself couldn't shed any light on the subject. His explanation at the time? "I got mugged. Who understands these things? I didn't and I don't now. I didn't make a lot of it at the time and I don't now. I wish I knew who did it and why, but I have no idea."

Apparently the strange event moved R.E.M. singer Michael Stipe, who said of the incident: "It remains the premier unsolved American surrealist act of the 20th century. It's a misunderstanding that was scarily random, media hyped and just plain bizarre."

The attack inspired the 1994 R.E.M. hit "What's the Frequency, Kenneth." Being a good sport, Dan Rather even accompanied the band when they performed the song on a Late Show with David Letterman appearance.

In 1997, based on a tip from a psychiatrist, Rather's attacker was identified as William Tager. According to the psychiatrist, Tager, who was currently serving time for killing an NBC stagehand (some time after the assault on Rather), blamed news media for beaming signals into his head, and thought if he could just find out the correct frequency, he could block those signals that were constantly assailing him. Hence the enigmatic inquiry.

Source: http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20010619.html

matauri · #2 (**permalink**) 11-24-2003, 02:12 AM

I wonder if he wore a cool tin foil hat too? I hear its meant to block out little green men reading your brainwaves. :-)

Now, as funny as this seems, it actually is quite a psychosis with some people. I knew a guy, very very intelligent, dux of Uni etc, anyway...one day he just snapped. No reason, they just found him blubbering under his bed about aliens invading his brain. Often after that he would go screaming thru the streets of eastern suburbia Perth on his bicycle. He used to always stop and talk to me if I was out front of my house.

The amazing things that used to go thru his mind. It was very difficult to think that this was just a man who's brain snapped. Things he talked about were with such clarity. He was never deemed a danger to society, and he lived alone, so he definately wasn't a fully fledged fruit cake. He would talk about how we have been scanned for many years by aliens, and how they didn't jsut take intelligent people to analize, that they also took normal & stupid people too. He had a room in his house which was covered in tinfoil. This is where he would drag you for 'private' conversations. I never used to laugh at him, because he genuinely believed it all to be true. And I guess I found it hard to beleive that someone so intelligent would just one day turn into a raving loon, which he wasn't. He KNEW what he was talking about.

So..the ravings of a nutter or an actuality? I have never truly been convinced that there wasn't at least some element of fact in what he said.

So maybe...that indicates I could be psychologically unbalanced too ?? ;-)

<< lays down on Minstrel's couch >>>

Cindy

pete61uk · #3 (**permalink**) 11-24-2003, 02:51 AM

A friend and I met this guy while out for a few beers one night. A bit bedraggled, he sidled over to our position at the bar and helped us to prop it up.

In the somewhat melancholy conversation that ensued he informed us that he was a theoretical physicist; that he’d reached the pinnacle of his profession and that, as the only employer worthy of his talents, he’d applied to NASA for a job.

Well, that’s what he told us! I suspect he told them they needed him. They declined, which explained both his appearance and demeanour.

Now, did this clever man let it go to become a captain of industry, or win a position doing research at some prestigious academicians’ utopia? Not for a second. As far as I’m aware he’s still collecting state benefits, propping up bars, and telling his story to anyone too drunk (and too polite) to escape.

Perhaps the aliens got to him. You decide.

rocky1 · #4 (**permalink**) 11-24-2003, 03:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matauri

I wonder if he wore a cool tin foil hat too? I hear its meant to block out little green men reading your brainwaves. :-)

Now, as funny as this seems, it actually is quite a psychosis with some people. I knew a guy, very very intelligent, dux of Uni etc, anyway...one day he just snapped. No reason, they just found him blubbering under his bed about aliens invading his brain. Often after that he would go screaming thru the streets of eastern suburbia Perth on his bicycle. He used to always stop and talk to me if I was out front of my house.

The amazing things that used to go thru his mind. It was very difficult to think that this was just a man who's brain snapped. Things he talked about were with such clarity. He was never deemed a danger to society, and he lived alone, so he definately wasn't a fully fledged fruit cake. He would talk about how we have been scanned for many years by aliens, and how they didn't jsut take intelligent people to analize, that they also took normal & stupid people too. He had a room in his house which was covered in tinfoil. This is where he would drag you for 'private' conversations. I never used to laugh at him, because he genuinely believed it all to be true. And I guess I found it hard to beleive that someone so intelligent would just one day turn into a raving loon, which he wasn't. He KNEW what he was talking about.

So..the ravings of a nutter or an actuality? I have never truly been convinced that there wasn't at least some element of fact in what he said.

So maybe...that indicates I could be psychologically unbalanced too ?? ;-)

<< lays down on Minstrel's couch >>>

Cindy

This sheds a whole new light on that "Making Mental" situation does it not Minstrel?

Greyhawk · #5 (**permalink**) 11-24-2003, 08:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matauri

I wonder if he wore a cool tin foil hat too? I hear its meant to block out little green men reading your brainwaves. :-)

I wonder if that will work with Blondes

Quote:

Now, as funny as this seems, it actually is quite a psychosis with some people.

Maybe in Oz, well western OZ (I have family in near Perth but we try not to mention them)

Quote:

It was very difficult to think that this was just a man who's brain snapped. Things he talked about were with such clarity. He was never deemed a danger to society, and he lived alone, so he definately wasn't a fully fledged fruit cake. He would talk about how we have been scanned for many years by aliens, and how they didn't jsut take intelligent people to analize, that they also took normal & stupid people too. He had a room in his house which was covered in tinfoil. This is where he would drag you for 'private' conversations. I never used to laugh at him, because he genuinely believed it all to be true. And I guess I found it hard to beleive that someone so intelligent would just one day turn into a raving loon, which he wasn't. He KNEW what he was talking about.

So..the ravings of a nutter or an actuality? I have never truly been convinced that there wasn't at least some element of fact in what he said.

So maybe...that indicates I could be psychologically unbalanced too ?? ;-)

<< lays down on Minstrel's couch >>>

Cindy

He wasn't Blonde by any chance was he?

I have notice that there are a lot of people out there that think they are being bombarded by men from Mars or have been kidnapped and had experiments done to them, hell there was a show on here last week where people were saying that aliens were forcing them to breed with each other and with the aliens themselves.

hmmm I wonder where all my tinfoil has gone?

Greyhawk

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