Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2014 June 21

= June 21 =

Life goes on, bra
The refrain to The Beatles' Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da goes Ob-la-di, ob-la-da, life goes on, bra. What does "bra" mean here? I doubt it means a brassiere. I've always imagined it's the Swedish language word bra "good, well", but that can't be right, as The Beatles weren't a Swedish band. Does it have some other meaning or is it just a nonsense word? J I P &#124; Talk 13:41, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Here in the US, it can mean "bro", as in (figurative) "brother", but I'm not sure if that slang would have been present in the Beatles' time. StuRat (talk) 14:11, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * The article states 'The tag line "ob-la-di, ob-la-da, life goes on, bra" was an expression used by Nigerian conga player Jimmy Scott-Emuakpor, an acquaintance of McCartney.' if that helps anyone. Nanonic (talk) 14:22, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Expressions like that probably mean about the same thing as "do do do down do be do down down, comma comma, down do be do down down, etc." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:42, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * See "Non-lexical vocables in music".—Wavelength (talk) 15:51, 21 June 2014 (UTC)
 * You may also ask what Ob-La-Di and Ob-La-Da mean, too. Mingmingla (talk) 18:09, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Here is McCartney's own explanation.  Stu and Nanonic basically combined to give the correct answer.   -- Jayron  32  19:57, 21 June 2014 (UTC)
 * All well and good, except it doesn't explain the last lines, "If you want some fun / Take Ob-La-Di-Bla-Da" followed by a "Thank you!" and giggling on the fade-out. I always took that to mean they were passing the pipe around, hence ob-la-di etc. being some sort of drug euphemism. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 22:07, 21 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Obviously they were discussing the theme music for an advertising campaign for a new product: Life Goes On bras. :-P Clarityfiend (talk) 23:37, 21 June 2014 (UTC)
 * But how would they compare to Tijuana Bras? - ¡Ouch! (hurt me / more pain) 06:33, 25 June 2014 (UTC)