Camper Van Beethoven – Eye Of Fatima (Pt. 1)

I want to thank obbverse’s brother for recommending this song to him and then him to me. Love the bass in this one and the guitar licks that complement the bass. I hear a little bit of Bakersfield in this one as well, with some twang. The song feels like the first part of a bigger story, which it is. The second part song follows as a kind of comedown, but this first part is where the hooks are. Also, it’s even kind of radio-friendly.

Back in the late eighties, I was working while going to college. A co-worker of mine kept playing this band, and it drove me up the wall. My first reaction was to ask…”what the hell is this and why are you playing it?” By the end of the week, I wanted a copy of it, so she taped it and gave it to me on cassette. The song was Take The Skinheads Bowling and it was heavily played on college radio in the late 80s. That’s how I started to know about this band. 

This song was a few years later than that one. This one was on their 1988 album called Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart. The first Camper Van Beethoven record for a major label, Virgin, no less, and it’s as if the band decided to storm the gates of MTV with fiddles and surrealism. With this band, you know you’re in for something strange, but also something oddly familiar.

With all that is going on, there is something subversively pop about this song. It grooves. It twangs. It rambles with purpose. And you can sing along to it even if you’re not quite sure what it’s about.

Just so we cover this sufficiently, here is Eye of Fatima (Part 2)

Eye of Fatima (Pt. 1)

He’s got the Eye of Fatima on the wall of his room
Two bottles of tequila, three cats and a broom
He’s got an 18-year-old angel and she’s all dressed in black
He’s got 15 bindles of cocaine tied up in a sack

And this here’s a government experiment and we’re driving like Hell
To give some cowboys some acid and to stay in motels
We’re going to eat up some wide open spaces like it was a cruise on the Nile
Take the hands off the clock, we’re going to be here a while

And I am the Eye of Fatima on the wall of the motel room
And cowboys on acid are like Egyptian cartoons
And no one ever conquered Wyoming from the left or from the right
But you can stay in motel rooms and stay up all night

…

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

32 thoughts on “Camper Van Beethoven – Eye Of Fatima (Pt. 1)”

  1. Pingback: Camper Van Beethoven – Eye Of Fatima (Pt. 1) – MobsterTiger

  2. Max, I love that song, especially Part 1! I only knew Camper Van Beethoven by name. I mean how can you forget that cool name! Note to myself: Next time when you come across a group with such a name name, check ’em out -their music might be cool as well!

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  4. Interesting stuff. I really only know ‘….Skinheads..’ and their cover of ‘Pictures of Matchstick Men’. Definitely quirky & hard to pin down. Part 2’s a pretty decent jam & you can hear on it how they evolved into Cracker in the ’90s

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      1. I’ll take the bold and controversial stance and say they probably were better or more listenable than the two Kings of American Quirk Rock, the B52s and Devo

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      2. I agree…more listenable yes…not that I don’t like the others but I think these guys were…dare I say it? More accessible.
        They would not like that remark lol.

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  6. Thanks, Max, Ob, and Ob’s brother for the introduction. The pudgy dude bowling in the bowling with skinheads is the cute skinny dude singing in Eye of … video, the nose is unmistakeable. Tight music. Particularly like Eye of part 1. Guitar hella good.

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  9. I remember this coming out during my senior year in high school and seeing the video on regular rotation on 120 Minutes. There was also this local Adult Alternative station in rural New Hampshire, WMDK, that used to play this and the album track “Turquoise Jewelry” all the time. Was always fun to hear these after school when I was doing my homework!

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    1. You are around 2 years younger than me. I graduated in 85…back in this time I was heavy into the Replacements and some other alternative bands.

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    1. No problem…it took a week or so but they grew on me…and I ended up liking them a lot. MUCH better than anything at that time in the top 40.

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  11. Thanks Max, I’ll let Davey boy know he’s happened upon a winner on this one. I is another that had all the earmarks of a hit. Hooks, chorus, great vocals, bass, guitars. There is not a thing not to like. Apart from the fact they take themselves waaaay too seriously…

    I jest. I mean, the name alone sounds like a Monty Python put-on band name!

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    1. I know…the name alone would get me to listen and did back in the day. Like many other bands….I knew the song they were famous for and didn’t go more into them. Greg Kihn is another example of that. These guys were a lot of fun.

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      1. Just a late FYI comment, brother David sent me another couple of toons to listen to- you’ll appreciate this- ‘Someone Take The Wheel’ and ‘One Wink At A Time,’ Replacements. I didn’t take to ‘The Wheel’🙄 but really like ‘One Wink.’

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      2. Well thank your brother again…I’ll take a listen to both of them. I’ve been wanting to post another Replacements post. He has great tastes!
        What surprised me about his last recommendation is how many knew of Camper Van Beethoven. Much more than I thought would have.

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      3. Yes, I know you’re a big Replacements fan- nice ‘different’ lyrics in ‘Wink’ and a jaunty hooky up-tempo tune.

        I think you have some wide-ranging followers out there, some are deep deep divers. As you said in one post recently you’re hearing has been expanded, if not psychedelicized!

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      4. Oh yea I like it! It doesn’t take much convincing me with them.
        I am very lucky to have the readers I have. To tell you the truth when I started to post more unknown things I thought I would lose readers…the opposite has happened. I’m happy that most of the older readers followed along and didn’t expect just hits.
        I love that lyric…. psychedelicized!

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