Ventilator blues

January 6, 2006 7:14 AM

In traditional blues songs you sometime hear the term "ventilator". I know it's a piece of modern medical equipment, but what the heck was Robert Johnson talking about in the 1930s?
posted by punkfloyd to media & arts (21 comments total)

Not necessarily medical. Could be the ventilator shaft or air circulation vent built into a cold water cabin or shack or any crappy slum apartment building as a paltry gesture towards keeping the air in a dwelling fresh. Certainly there must have been some of those back in the day either at a place of work, a juke joint or a slum building.
posted by spicynuts at 7:18 AM on January 6, 2006

Could it be a fan?
posted by dead_ at 7:18 AM on January 6, 2006

I'm almost completely certain he's referring to a gun.
posted by Prospero at 7:23 AM on January 6, 2006

Yeah, can we get some specific lyrics? Context would be extremely helpful.
posted by spicynuts at 7:25 AM on January 6, 2006

Rolling Stones - Ventilator Blues

"Don't matter where you are,
Ev'rybody's gonna need a ventilator.
When you're trapped and circled with no second chances,
Your code of living is your gun in hand."

So I'd agree with Prospero
posted by Leon at 7:26 AM on January 6, 2006

After googling for some Robert Johnson lyrics involving 'ventilator' I came up empty handed.

However, this Rolling Stones song, "Ventilator Blues" does seem to back up what Prospero said. Here's some lyrics:

don't matter where you are,
ev'rybody's gonna need a ventilator.
When you're trapped and circled with no second chances,
your code of living is your gun in hand.
posted by dead_ at 7:29 AM on January 6, 2006

Whoops, a bit late on that.
posted by dead_ at 7:29 AM on January 6, 2006

But then there is this:

Ain't nobody slowing down no way,
ev'rybody's stepping on their accelerator,
don't matter where you are,
ev'rybody's gonna need a ventilator.
posted by punkfloyd at 7:30 AM on January 6, 2006

On a side note, I had never really heard this term used to mean "gun" before, but it makes me wonder if the word "heater" that is so commonly used to mean "gun" in rap these days, derives from original blues usage of the word ventilator.
posted by dead_ at 7:32 AM on January 6, 2006

Can't find the link, but I believe the idea is that if I shoot you full of holes, you're been ventilated.
posted by desuetude at 7:33 AM on January 6, 2006

Ventilate: to shoot someone ("You're gonna be so ventilated that when you take your next swig of hooch you'll spout like a fountain!")

So yes, a gun.
posted by staggernation at 7:34 AM on January 6, 2006

Really, when you think about it, in blues and rock there are really only a few objects/people that need or get code words:

cocks, balls, assess, vaginas, guns, drugs, alcohol, cops, cars and girls/women. So, most likely it's a gun.
posted by spicynuts at 7:36 AM on January 6, 2006

You must not be watching enough old gangster movies. A ventilator is a lovely little device which allows air to flow through portions of the human body formerly occupied by blood.
posted by caddis at 7:53 AM on January 6, 2006

Ventilator as gun: 'cause it puts holes in you. I agree.

What did it say on the old bluesman's grave?

Didn't wake up this morning.
posted by Savannah at 7:53 AM on January 6, 2006

makes me wonder if the word "heater" that is so commonly used to mean "gun" ... derives from original blues usage of the word ventilator.

I'd mark the beginning of using "heater" for gun with the first broadcast of the original series Star Trek "A Piece of the Action" (ie the gangster planet) in January 1968.
posted by Rash at 9:25 AM on January 6, 2006

Nope. Used in the movie Lucky Jordan (1942) for one - saw it just last week
posted by A189Nut at 9:57 AM on January 6, 2006

dead_ writes "but it makes me wonder if the word 'heater' that is so commonly used to mean 'gun' in rap these days, derives from original blues usage of the word ventilator."

Heater == Gun dates from at least the pulp detective novels of the 30s.
posted by Mitheral at 10:18 AM on January 6, 2006

I'd mark the beginning of using "heater"

You doity rat: heater, rod, gat and ventilator all date back at least as far as Prohibition (I think).
posted by yerfatma at 12:52 PM on January 6, 2006

Rash makes me laugh.
posted by Good Brain at 1:45 PM on January 6, 2006

Ventilator == Gun, for the reasons caddis names.
Heater == Gun, because they get hot when you use them to ventilate things.
posted by Hildago at 4:06 PM on January 6, 2006

"A Piece of the Action" was an entirely derivative homage to detective movies. Fun, but nothing new about it. (They wanted to save on the production budget by using existing costumes and sets on the Desilu lot.)

Heater and ventilator may come from hardboiled fiction, and nowhere else. A lot of the authors of the pulps made it up, the way Zane Grey made up his stories of life on the frontier.
posted by dhartung at 12:55 PM on January 7, 2006