Mandalay - Mandalay in Popular Culture

Mandalay in Popular Culture

The Eagles' "Long Road Out of Eden," the title track to their 2007-released cd, includes a lyric "...on the road to Mandalay."

• John Masters wrote a book about his wartime experiences in Burma called The Road Past Mandalay. (Masters is the author of many books on India and Asia, Bhowani Junction being one of them.)
• Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem called "Mandalay", which is the origin of the phrase "on the road to Mandalay".
• In 1907, Kipling's poem was set to music by Oley Speaks as "On the Road to Mandalay". Speaks' version was widely recorded. Among the best known renditions is the one by Frank Sinatra on Come Fly With Me.
• Kurt Weill's musical Happy End includes "The Mandalay Song". Mandalay is also mentioned in the bordello scene in his opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.
• 46 Bliss perform a song "The Road to Mandalay" on their Pistachio Home release.
• Manderley (a variant spelling of "Mandalay") is the name of the house in the novel Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.
• In a comedy sketch, Peter Cook, as a bicyclist, seeks directions to Mandalay from Dudley Moore, who is painting road lines on what he says is the Karakoram highway.
• George Orwell was stationed at Mandalay for a time while working for the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, and his first novel, Burmese Days, was based on his experiences in Burma. He also wrote a number of short non-fiction essays and short stories about Burma, such as "Shooting an Elephant" and "A Hanging".
• The children's song "Nellie the Elephant" features the line "they met one night by a silver light on the road to Mandalay."
  
• Mandalay is referenced in the song "Not Guilty" written by George Harrison for The Beatles, but it was not released as a Beatles song until The Beatles Anthology was released in 1995. A solo version of the song was released by Harrison in 1979. He sings: 'Not Guilty, for leading you astray, on the roads of Mandalay', using it as an allusion for the Beatles' trip in India in 1968.
• Mandalay Bay is the name of a casino in Las Vegas.
• Mandalay is a music group responsible for the song "Beautiful".
• Saya Myoma Nyein composed many songs for Mandalay especially for the Thingyan Water Festival.
• The Ian Dury and the Blockheads song "Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick", features the line "On the Road to Mandalay".
• The Electric Light Orchestra had an unreleased track on their 1983 Secret Messages album called "Mandalay". It was later released on the 3rd CD of their boxed set Afterglow.
• Colin Hay, the lead singer and main writer from the group Men at Work has put out a number of solo albums since the breakup of Men at Work. His album Topanga, released in 1996, has a track called "Road to Mandalay".
• Mandalay is referenced in the song "Mountains of Burma" by Midnight Oil on the album Blue Sky Mining. It was written by Rob Hirst.
• Blackmore's Night has a song called "Way to Mandalay" on Ghost of a Rose.
• Manderlay is a film by Lars von Trier.
• Robbie Williams had a song called "The Road To Mandalay" on Sing When You're Winning.
• Manfat Voodoo has a song called "The Bus Times to Mandalay" on their album "Erasmus Darwin and the Chicken Ladder"
• The title song of the Eagles' 2007 release Long Road Out Of Eden includes the line "Been down the road to Damascus, the road to Mandalay."
• In Lady Chatterley, a 1993 Ken Russell film, Lady Chatterley and her sister plan a trip to Mandalay to visit their father.
• Echo & the Bunnymen reference 'Traveling dark on the road to Mandalay' in the song "Bombers Bay", from their 1987 eponymous album, Echo & the Bunnymen.
• A line in the theme song of the movie Five Weeks in a Balloon says "I wouldn't trade places with the king of Mandalay."
• Russian band Scarlet Dazzle has a song called "Mandalay" on their debut self-titled album released in 2008.
• Elton John and Leon Russell's 2010 album The Union includes a song called "Mandalay Again".