Doe Maar (the band name can be loosely translated as 'go ahead' or 'do as you say') recorded five studio albums, with the latter four hitting number one in the Dutch album charts.
Having emerged from a hippie community in the south of The Netherlands in the late 1970s, Doe Maar's self-titled 1979 début album was not much of a success. Founding member and original bass player Piet Dekker left the group. Ernst Jansz (vocals, keyboards), Jan Hendriks (guitar) and Carel Copier (drums) were briefly joined by stand-in bass player Joost Belinfante (of hippie/folk outfit CCC Inc.) before Henny Vrienten was recruited as the permanent new bass player in 1980.
The second album, Skunk, was released in the summer of 1981, preceded by the lead single Sinds 1 Dag Of 2, which didn't enter the charts until radio DJ Frits Spits had pretty much singlehandedly changed the song title into the more catchy 32 Jaar ('32 Years'). Single and album were reasonably succesful, but not more than that. At the end of the year drummer Carel Copier was replaced by René van Collem, who was 20 years of age at the time, more than a decade younger than the rest of the band.
March 1982 saw the release of the album Doris Day en andere stukken and the lead single, Doris Day, which - almost overnight - sparked off 'Doe Maar-mania', a craze unequaled for a Dutch band in their home country, including hysterical and fainting teenage girls during live performances and a brief domination of teen fashion in The Netherlands, with the fluorescent 'phosphor green' and 'lollipop pink' trade mark colours of the Skunk album and a huge market of Doe Maar memorabilia: pins, badges, sweatbands and what not.
Doe Maar were now referred to as 'the Dutch Beatles': very different music, but similar (if not worse) madness.
The Doris Day album had only just disappeared from the top of the Dutch album charts when the two-year old Skunk album hit number. The stand-alone single De Bom ('The Bomb') topped the singles charts in November 1982. Typically, the band's young fans hardly seemed to understand what an apocalyptic song it was: "Work on your future... before the bomb drops."
The band members were shocked and not seldomly frightened or depressed by their sudden popularity. They were in their mid-thirties; the hordes of teenage girls that suddenly invaded their private lives were everything but their peers. Doe Maar wrote particularly gloomy songs about topics that you would expect to appeal to 'thirty-somethings' rather than teenagers. Jansz and Vrienten, in particular, received tons of love letters from teenage girls, but also death threats from Dutch Neo-Nazis. They needed bodyguards. Meanwhile, the Dutch music press dismissed Doe Maar as a teenybopper phenomenon: the band was first sneered at and later mostly ignored by Holland's music critics.
In May 1982 the band fired its youthful drummer, René van Collem. His successor, Jan Pijnenburg, was involved in car accident shortly after he was hired. Somewhat bizarrely, the band then hired René van Collem as a stand-in for another six months of live concerts. The definitive Doe Maar line-up was now complete: Ernst Jansz (vocals, keyboards), Henny Vrienten (vocals, bass), Jan Hendriks (guitar) and Jan Pijnenburg (drums). Years later, René van Collem would express his bitterness over the fact that Pijnenburg can be seen on almost all of the band's famous group pictures and is generally regarded as the Doe Maar drummer (especially after the 1999-2000 and 2008 reunions), in spite of the fact that the drum parts on the studio albums are almost exclusively Van Collem's work. He also played the lion's share of the band's live shows.
The particularly dark 4us ('Virus') album was released in March 1983 and immediately rocketed to number one, just like its lead single Pa ('Dad'), a rather bitter song about generation gaps. 'Doe Maar-mania' was now at its peak and (during live shows) frequently out of control. The band decided to stop doing interviews, announced complete radio silence and attempted to focus on their next album, but had to conclude that there was no more inspiration. Doe Maar had burned out.
The announcement that Doe Maar was going to call it quits caused grief beyond belief amongst a generation of Dutch teenage girls. The Dutch Kindertelefoon ('Kids Phone') had to deal with countless brokenhearted young girls who phoned in, not seldomly to announce their imminent suicides.
The band did two emotional 'farewell' shows in Den Bosch's Maaspoort hall on 14 April 1984. Since then, Henny Vrienten and Ernst Jansz have pursued successful solo careers, mostly in the context of music composition for television and cinema. The band members remained friends and continued to play together on private occasions.
After more than fifteen years of absence - in which their work was rehabilitated by a new generation of music critics - Doe Maar decided to re-unite for one final album: Klaar (which means as much as 'finished' or 'done') was released in 2000. A string of sixteen reunion concerts at Rotterdam's Ahoy sports palace was announced. 175,000 tickets were sold in an eyewink, in many cases to the teenage girls of the early eighties, now thirty-somethings.
In 2007 a theatre musical about the band's music toured the Netherlands and won several important theater awards. The success of 'Doe Maar - The Musical' was followed by another reunion show, at De Kuip football stadium in Rotterdam. 50,000 tickets sold out within the hour, three more concerts were added... and also sold out in no-time. In an interview on 20 June 2008, Henny Vrienten said: "This is no longer a 'reunion'. Doe Maar is back, for real." Doe Maar still performs regularly in The Netherlands, mostly at festivals.
OK
Doe Maar Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Dat hield ik 7 weken, toen had ik het bekeken
Ik dacht eentje maar en nam er toen toch twee, hee, hee, hee
Het ging meteen weer better, ik rook weer als een ketter
Ik stopte dus met zuipen en kreeg acuut de stuipen
En zag ik iemand drinken begon de moed te zinken
Ik dacht eentje maar en nam er toen toch twee, hee, hee, hee
Ok, geef mij er dan maar twee
Want met die ene kom ik er niet mee
Al doet mijn lever zeer en zijn mijn longen zwart van teer
'tis OK, geef mij er dan maar twee
Ik stopte dus met vreten, nou dat heb ik geweten
Ik snakte naar kroketten en vette koteletten
Ik dacht eentje maar en nam er toen toch twee, hee, hee ,hee
Nou kan ik lekker proppen en moet mijn buik verstoppen
OK...(etc.)
In Doe Maar's song "Okee," the lyrics describe a person who has tried to quit various vices including smoking, drinking, and overeating, but ultimately gives in to temptation and goes back to their old habits. The verse about smoking mentions feeling broken after quitting and then feeling better when they start smoking again. Similarly, the verse about drinking describes feeling anxious after quitting and then feeling more relaxed after drinking again. The final verse about overeating talks about craving unhealthy foods after quitting and then indulging in them freely.
Overall, the song emphasizes the struggle of trying to overcome addictive behaviors, and how difficult it can be to break the cycle of addiction. The recurring refrain of "ok, geef mij er dan maar twee" ("okay, give me two then") suggests that the person is resigned to their habits and would rather indulge than try to resist.
One interesting feature of the song is the use of the Dutch word "ketter" in the second verse, which means "heretic" or "apostate." This can be interpreted as a play on words, as the person is essentially "breaking" their oath to quit smoking by starting again.
Line by Line Meaning
Ik stopte dus met roken en voelde me verbroken
I quit smoking and felt shattered
Dat hield ik 7 weken, toen had ik het bekeken
I kept it up for 7 weeks, then I had had enough
Ik dacht eentje maar en nam er toen toch twee, hee, hee, hee
I thought one, but took two anyways, ha ha ha
Het ging meteen weer better, ik rook weer als een ketter
It immediately got better, I started smoking like crazy again
Ik stopte dus met zuipen en kreeg acuut de stuipen
I stopped drinking and immediately suffered withdrawal symptoms
En zag ik iemand drinken begon de moed te zinken
And when I saw someone drink, my spirits sank
Nu zuip ik weer jenever en heb een rotte lever
Now I'm drinking again and have a rotten liver
Ok, geef mij er dan maar twee
OK, then give me two
Want met die ene kom ik er niet mee
Because with one, I won't make it
Al doet mijn lever zeer en zijn mijn longen zwart van teer
Even if my liver hurts and my lungs are black with tar
'tis OK, geef mij er dan maar twee
It's OK, then give me two
Ik stopte dus met vreten, nou dat heb ik geweten
I stopped eating, well I felt it
Ik snakte naar kroketten en vette koteletten
I craved croquettes and fatty pork chops
Nu kan ik lekker proppen en moet mijn buik verstoppen
Now I can eat to my heart's content and have to hide my belly
Contributed by Carter E. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
@jeroentromp7097
Herkenbaar nummer, D.Blok stond voor mijn ouderlijk huis live, ..live TV.. tijdens de aankondiging van het afscheidsconcert. ; ) Doe Maar, wauw zo goed/zeker live!!
@MissxLeslie
Ik houd hiervan! Heerlijke muziek is het, en zal het altijd blijven!
@jpht1964
Dankzij dit geweldige nummer heb ik maar besloten om weer te gaan zuipen, hahaha
@barrygol7146
heel goed van jou
@hotje2
Goede muziek man, nostalgie! :)
@FearTheOldB
Dit nummer is zo passend.
@sander26297
Super nummer!
@Egondv
Dit is zeker mijn favoriete lied van Doe Maar. Naast Pa. Oh en Watje... Oh en radeloos... oh wat lul ik ik kan niet kiezen :D
@bofwiner5228
i love this song! Vette kotteletten en het ging meteen weer better!
@davidosolo
Pure poëzie. R.I.P. Henny.