Karma Chameleon
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| "Karma Chameleon" | ||
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| Single by Culture Club | ||
| from the album Colour by Numbers | ||
| Released | 1984 | |
| Recorded | 1983 | |
| Genre | Pop | |
| Chart positions | ||
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"Karma Chameleon" is a song from British band Culture Club. The song spent three weeks at number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in 1984, becoming the group's biggest hit and only U.S. number-one. The song hit number one in sixteen countries worldwide. In their home country the single became Culture Club's second song to top the UK singles chart, staying there for six weeks. The single came from 1983's Colour by Numbers album.
[edit] Music Video
The Karma Chameleon music video is set in Mississippi in 1870, according to caption. It depicts people in colourful costume, including dancers in "red, gold and green", waiting on a riverbank. Boy George is dressed in even more colourful and flamboyant costume and is depicted singing the title song. A pickpocket is seen wandering through the crowd. A riverboat, The Chameleon, arrives and people board. A game of cards takes place, with Boy George still singing in the background. The pickpocket is discovered cheating and is thrown off the back of the boat. Throughout the video, black and white people are depicted singing and dancing together, a rather unlikely scenario at the time and place where the video is supposed to be set.
[edit] Title parodies
- A parody of the title was used as a Dragonball chapter title "Kame Kame Kame Kame Kame Chameleon" regarding the kamehameha attack.
- It is the song played in Scary Movie 4 on the iPod parody (Tripod), under the "Awesome 80s" playlist, before it converts to the alien war machine.
- Bomfunk MCs's 2000 hit "Freestyler" mentions the song
- Darkwing Duck also parodied the title with an episode titled "Calm a Chameleon".
- Jack Johnson's song "Mud Football" features the line "Karma, karma, karma chameleon".
- "Karma Chameleon" was also the title of the third episode of the TV Series Wonderfalls.
- "Karma Chameleon" was used as the title for episode 204 of Degrassi: The Next Generation.
- The game Kingdom of Loathing has a familiar called the Comma Chameleon.
- A character named Khameleon , in the Mortal Kombat video game series, is in reference to the song. If you fail one of the levels using a character named Nitara , you will receive the following message; "You must successfully learn the Kama. Khameleon would have mastered it with ease had her culture not been clubbed by Shao Kahn ages ago."...The phrase 'culture not being clubbed' referring to the Culture Club.
Many of those parodies were given names based on misheard lyrics of the song, as the word "Karma" is repeated quickly in the chorus.
| Preceded by "Red Red Wine" by UB40 |
UK number one single September 18, 1983 |
Succeeded by "Uptown Girl" by Billy Joel |
| Preceded by "Owner Of A Lonely Heart" by Yes |
Billboard Hot 100 number one single February 4, 1984- February 18, 1984 |
Succeeded by "Jump" by Van Halen |
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