As Gord, Nick and Dave scrap it out, hard-pressed political researchers are self-evidently running short of sync ideas for soundtracking soundbites. Hence this quick list to accompany politico dithering.
1. Bucks Fizz – Making Your Mind Up
Awful, of course, but it had to be in there. You really don’t need the lyrics quoted.
2. Radiohead – Where I End and You Begin
X’ll mark the place / Like the parting of the waves / Like a house falling in the sea
Thom the soothsayer – our sixth form focus group provided the following explanation … “X being the vote, the house falling into the sea a metaphor for Parliament disappearing beneath the murky wash of the Thames … “
3. Paul Weller – Hung Up
And now I’m all hung up again / Just like a soldier from the past / Who won’t be told it’s over yet
Er… song for Gordy?
4. That Petrol Emotion – Big Decision
Economies gets weaker / Reactionaries stronger / As they get satisfaction on their knees
Very nearly up there with Thom for prescience, with the final quoted line particularly delectable in the circumstances (as one wag has noted, the economy may have been in freefall, but there’s been a run on kneepads down SW1 way)
5. Lethal Bizzle – Babylon’s Burning Down The Ghetto
Labour party’s full of shit / Cameron’s a fucking arse / Keep on talking shit, I’ll put your face through the frigging glass
Yes, Biz, we’ve all felt broadly similar
6. Ella Fitzgerald – Undecided
First you say you do / And then you don’t / And then you say you will / And then you won’t
Possibly likely to get more airplay accompanying parliamentary shadow boxing and horse-trading than Biz’s effort.
7. Sham 69 – Questions And Answers
Questions and answers / Honesty, lies / Yes, no you can’t, but you can if you know why
And where was Sir Jimmy Pursey’s name on my ballot paper?
8. Teddy Thompson – Change of Heart
Well, I guess you must have had a change of heart / You don’t treat me like you did at the start
Country music is all about betrayal after all . . .
9. New Order – Confusion
He’s calling these changes that last to the end / Ask me no questions, I’ll tell you no lies / The past is your present, the future is mine.
It wouldn’t be too much of a twist to address this to the vexed PR issue . . .
10. Jay-Z – Politics As Usual
When it comes to this cheese / Y’all like Three Blind Mice
Probably the only relevant line in the whole song, but exquisitely so.
11. Husker Du – No Promise Have I Made
Tell me a story / Tell me just another lie / Well, I can tell you / Set Your Expectations High
The pitch . . .
12. The Tubes – No, Not Again
Once you are burned, you are twice shy / That’s a lesson that I’m still trying to learn / And it’s one I forget as you walk by / I’m tempted to ask you to return
Dave reels in the medium-term memory loss contingent
13. The Replacements – You Lose
Yea, You Lose / Yea, You Lose
Because it’s all playground stuff at the end of the day. Also, a gratuitous dedication to Nick Griffin and the former BNP councillors for the borough of Dagenham.
14. Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine – A World Without Dave
And the world carries on without Davey / It’s not a worse or better place / Uglier and safer maybe / But that’s a question of personal taste.
You know, just in case the mooted Lib-Con alliance falls and Broon manages to assemble his skittles.
15. The Rascals – People Watching
They’re all making a deal out of nothing / Decisions to be made, it seems so easy . . . And they’re reading into things without my say-so / And he’s sniffing his way to the top
In a nutshell.
