Talk:Little Boxes

Song lyrics

I've removed the song lyric listed as it appear to be copyrighted. --Tsaetre 00:26, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

As have I, twice now. PKtm 01:16, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Removed copyrighted lyrics again. —MJBurrage • TALK • 14:52, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Why are there two external links for the lyrics? They're both the same lyrics, seems a bit redundant. I'd say get rid of the second one, as the first one also has some other information which might be of interest, while the second is just the lyrics and nothing else. --Lurlock 17:52, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Orchestral version

There are three composers by the name of Charlie Barnett listed at IMDb:

1. Does anybody know if the two present day film-and-television composers listed on IMDb—Charlie Barnett I and Charlie Barnett III—are related, or are they possibly the same person, with IMDb being in error?
2. Is one of them the composer of the orchestral version of “Little Boxes” that was used on Mrs. Botwin's Neighborhood (Weeds episode), or was it Charlie Barnet?

—MJBurrage • TALK • 09:39, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Similar tune

The "little boxes on the hillside" phrase is very similar to a bit of the tune "Pittsburgh Pennsylvania" by Bob Merrill, which was a hit in 1952. It's best known as "There's a pawn shop, on the corner, in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania". No accusation of theft to Malvina Reynolds here, but she might have unknowingly lifted the tune. The lyrins (and the rest of the tune) have nothing in common. http://ntl.matrix.com.br/pfilho/html/lyrics/p/pittsburgh_pennsylvania.txt I'm sorry but I can't find a good file of the tune online, if you scroll down this Amazon link you can hear a tiny bit: http://www.amazon.co.uk/My-Truly-Fair-Recordings-1950-1953/dp/B0001JSS1I.Saxophobia 00:27, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

One similar line does not seem notable to me. I just removed a claim on the page that the songs shared the same melody. I could find no source for such a claim, and the clip on Amazon sounds pretty different to me. —MJBurrage • TALK • 14:14, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

the reverse of the medal

Why there is no one single word about the negative meaning of the lyrics? In my opinion this is a [Marxist] song that criticizes the middle class values without a solid ethical base. I.e. envy is at the bottom of it. I suppose that Malvina Reynolds was happier when seeing the slums.--Mazarin07 (talk) 06:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Because that would be unnecessary editorializing. Presenting the song and it's intended meaning is within the realm of being informative. Adding additional content to criticize it -- unless that criticism itself was somehow considered particularly relevant -- would be inappropriate. Also, trust me, I live about two or three blocks away from the Westlake neighborhood of Daly City, CA (there's a big shopping center there where I often shop for groceries) and it's exactly what you'd think from the song: typical mid-century suburban development. Houses on tiny lots and conforming to about four or five different designs with very obvious repetition. Very dated suburban style architecture. I could tell just by looking at it that it had obviously been built shortly after the war. If anything it's a very dated representation of suburbia. It's not slums, but it definitely feels like lower-middle class housing. At the same time it's much more classically suburban than the just-barely-over-the-city-limits San Francisco residential area I live in only a few blocks away. 69.181.55.239 (talk) 10:25, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I think the entry's quote from Tom Lehrer, that 'Little Boxes' is 'the most sanctimonious song ever written' is the most appropriate and devastating criticism possible. AtomikWeasel (talk) 18:45, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Image

I have removed the image because the song has no connection with the location, and is therefore only synthetically associated with the song retrospectively by the inserter. The location of the image I inserted was referenced in the quote about the origins - we do not know the precise location, only the city, which inspired the song, according to the source who gives the origination: "My mother and father were driving South from San Francisco through Daly City". Not sure that image is of insufficient quality, but when there is not a more appropriate image, we use the one we can find. Having an image of the city linked to the song in the article is preferable to one in a different state that has no relationship to the song - which can not be justified. Mish (talk) 07:59, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

An editing conflict has developed over an image that I added to this article. It is being claimed that the photograph, which shows Levittown, PA, is not appropriate for this article, because that development is not directly connected to the song. The editor replaced the image with a fuzzy, indistinct image of Daly City. But the song "Little Boxes" isn't about Daly City, that was merely the inspiration for the song being written. The song is about "ticky-tacky" suburban housing developements, of which Levittown was a prime and prominent example. Thus, using the image is not remotely "synthesis" as the editor claims, it is simply an illustration of the song's subject matter.

Using Levitttown wasn't my first choice, I looked high and low for an image of the actually hillside houses which inspired the song, which can be seen when driving from San Francisco to SFO, but no images were available. I then looked at images of Daly City, including the one the editor used, and considered that they were just not strongly evocative of the theme of the song, or, like the one the editor picked, just technically and visually unsuitable. I finally settled on the Levittown photo because it aptly illustrates the subject matter of the song and is a distinct and visible image which nicely complements the article.

I would ask the other editor to stop removing this perfectly good and completely allowable image from the article. "Little Boxes" hasn't survived and remained popular because people like a good song about Daly City, California, it has continued to be popular because it makes a point about a social trend and a certain kind of enviornment. The image I choice illustrates that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 08:21, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Little Boxes in sermon

An editor has been removing the mention in the article of a sermon which quotes "Ticky Tacky". I've researched this on Google, and while I've been unable to find the text of the sermon, or a reliable source to add as a cite, there is sufficient mention of the sermon on various unconnected weblogs to indicate that:

1. The sermon exists (an audio tape of it is for sale on the person's website)
2. The sermon's title does contain "Ticky tacky"
3. The use of the phrase is not simply a "mention" of the phrase, the sermon uses the song "Little Boxes" as its basis

Given this, the proper thing is not to delete the reference from the article, which this editor has been doing, but to tag it with a "fact" tag, as I have done, and continue to look for a reliable source to support it. The existence of the sermon cannot be questioned, and the evidence for its general contents is sufficiently convincing, that deletion is not appropriate. I would ask that the editor cease to do so, and perhaps join in to look for a citation to support the entry. I, too, will continue to look. Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:37, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

• The proper thing to do with trivia is not to lard articles with it. It is not in any conceivable way anything beyond the realm of trivia that a preacher, even a very famous preacher, quoted the lyrics in a sermon. He quoted the song. So what. He used a word from the song in the sermon's title. So what. It tells us nothing about the song. It increases our encyclopedic knowledge of the song by exactly zero. That there exist no reliable sources that discuss the song in the context of the sermon and vice versa should be a big ol' clue to the triviality of it. The same goes for being "brought up" in a novel and "referenced" in a non-notable song. If we listed off every single time that the subject of an article was merely mentioned somewhere regardless of established importance or context then we end up with articles filled with hundreds of lines of trivia. The performance of the song in other media is exactly the sort of thing that should be and is included, not every time every random character in a TV show says "ticky-tack". Are You The Cow Of Pain? (talk) 20:48, 3 July 2010 (UTC)