The Boy Bands Have Won
Encyclopedia
The Boy Bands Have Won is the common title of a Chumbawamba
album released in 2008. Its full title contains 865 characters, and holds the record for the longest album title, as of August 2009. The band normally uses the shorter version when referring to the album on their website.
, social networking websites, surviving a firing squad, evolution and the pains of the workplace. Also, on "Sing About Love" a heartfelt plea for a time when they wouldn't feel the need to "sing about the thing [they] always sing about".
The album was recorded by the five-piece line-up of Jude Abbott, Lou Watts, Boff Whalley
, Neil Ferguson and Phil 'Ron' Moody that comprises the Chumbawamba of recent times but features guest appearances by several other artists.
The full title of the album is:
except where indicated.
Also Appearing
Chumbawamba
Chumbawamba is a British musical group who have, over a career spanning nearly three decades, played punk rock, pop-influenced music, world music, and folk music...
album released in 2008. Its full title contains 865 characters, and holds the record for the longest album title, as of August 2009. The band normally uses the shorter version when referring to the album on their website.
Background
The album continues their move into politically and socially aware folk music. Themes addressed on this album include suicide bombers, Philip LarkinPhilip Larkin
Philip Arthur Larkin, CH, CBE, FRSL is widely regarded as one of the great English poets of the latter half of the twentieth century...
, social networking websites, surviving a firing squad, evolution and the pains of the workplace. Also, on "Sing About Love" a heartfelt plea for a time when they wouldn't feel the need to "sing about the thing [they] always sing about".
The album was recorded by the five-piece line-up of Jude Abbott, Lou Watts, Boff Whalley
Boff Whalley
Allan Mark "Boff" Whalley is the lead guitarist for the band Chumbawamba.-Early life and education:Whalley was born Allan Mark Whalley in 1961 in Burnley, Lancashire...
, Neil Ferguson and Phil 'Ron' Moody that comprises the Chumbawamba of recent times but features guest appearances by several other artists.
The full title of the album is:
The Boy Bands Have Won, and All the Copyists and the Tribute Bands and the TV Talent Show Producers Have Won, If We Allow Our Culture to Be Shaped by Mimicry, Whether from Lack of Ideas or From Exaggerated Respect. You Should Never Try to Freeze Culture. What You Can Do Is Recycle That Culture. Take Your Older Brother's Hand-Me-Down Jacket and Re-Style It, Re-Fashion It to the Point Where It Becomes Your Own. But Don't Just Regurgitate Creative History, or Hold Art and Music and Literature as Fixed, Untouchable and Kept Under Glass. The People Who Try to 'Guard' Any Particular Form of Music Are, Like the Copyists and Manufactured Bands, Doing It the Worst Disservice, Because the Only Thing That You Can Do to Music That Will Damage It Is Not Change It, Not Make It Your Own. Because Then It Dies, Then It's Over, Then It's Done, and the Boy Bands Have Won.
Track listing
All tracks written, arranged and produced by ChumbawambaChumbawamba
Chumbawamba is a British musical group who have, over a career spanning nearly three decades, played punk rock, pop-influenced music, world music, and folk music...
except where indicated.
| # | Song Name | Length | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "When an Old Man Dies" | 0:54 | |
| 2 | "Add Me" | 3:27 | Featuring the Charlie Cake Marching Band |
| 3 | "Words Can Save Us" | 1:52 | |
| 4 | "Hull or Hell" | 3:31 | With vocals by Oysterband Oysterband Oysterband is a British electric folk or folk rock band formed in Canterbury in or around 1976.-Early history:... |
| 5 | "El Fusilado" | 2:32 | With vocals by Ray Hearne, Barry Coope & Jim Boyes Coope Boyes and Simpson Coope, Boyes and Simpson are an English vocal folk trio, formed around 1990. Their sound is rich and often has unusual vocal harmonies.The group comprises singers Barry Coope, Jim Boyes and Lester Simpson, and almost all of their music is sung entirely a capella, although they have occasionally... |
| 6 | "Unpindownable" | 1:22 | A song about Evolution Evolution Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth... , particularly that of the Peppered Moth Peppered moth The peppered moth is a temperate species of night-flying moth. Peppered moth evolution is often used by educators as an example of natural selection.- Distribution :... . |
| 7 | "I Wish That They'd Sack Me" | 4:10 | Music traditional, arranged by and lyrics by Chumbawamba |
| 8 | "Word Bomber" | 2:13 | Lead vocals by Roy Bailey Roy Bailey Roy Bailey may refer to:*Roy Bailey , Canadian Progressive Conservative politician from Saskatchewan*Roy Bailey , British socialist folk singer... ; Refers to the 7/7 suicide bombings in London, 3 of the 4 attackers who came from Chumbawamba's hometown, Leeds Leeds Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial... . |
| 9 | "All Fur Coat & No Knickers" | 2:12 | Refers to 'Lord Bono Bono Paul David Hewson , most commonly known by his stage name Bono , is an Irish singer, musician, and humanitarian best known for being the main vocalist of the Dublin-based rock band U2. Bono was born and raised in Dublin, Ireland, and attended Mount Temple Comprehensive School where he met his... ' and The Edge The Edge David Howell Evans , more widely known by his stage name The Edge , is a musician best known as the guitarist, backing vocalist, and keyboardist of the Irish rock band U2. A member of the group since its inception, he has recorded 12 studio albums with the band and has released one solo record... ; The 'Theatre of Dreams Old Trafford Old Trafford commonly refers to two sporting arenas:* Old Trafford, home of Manchester United F.C.* Old Trafford Cricket Ground, home of Lancashire County Cricket ClubOld Trafford can also refer to:... ' is Old Trafford, Manchester United's football stadium |
| 10 | "Fine Line" | 0:39 | |
| 11 | "Lord Bateman's Motorbike" | 3:34 | The characters, Lord Bateman and John Barleycorn, are metaphors for the British upper class Upper class In social science, the "upper class" is the group of people at the top of a social hierarchy. Members of an upper class may have great power over the allocation of resources and governmental policy in their area.- Historical meaning :... and working class Working class Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes... , respectively, Barleycorn John Barleycorn "John Barleycorn" is an English folksong. The character of John Barleycorn in the song is a personification of the important cereal crop barley and of the alcoholic beverages made from it, beer and whisky... being a common character in folk music; Hull KR Hull Kingston Rovers Hull Kingston Rovers or Hull KR is an English professional rugby league football club based in Hull, England. The club formed in 1882 and currently competes in Super League, having won promotion from National League One in 2006... is a rugby league team from Hull Kingston upon Hull Kingston upon Hull , usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It stands on the River Hull at its junction with the Humber estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea. Hull has a resident population of... , UK; The A65 A65 road The A65 is a major road in England. It runs north west from Leeds in Yorkshire via Kirkstall, Horsforth, Yeadon, Guiseley, Ilkley and Skipton, passes west of Settle, then continues through Ingleton and Kirkby Lonsdale before terminating at Kendal in Cumbria.... is a major road from West Yorkshire West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972.... to Cumbria Cumbria Cumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in... and Quarry Hill Quarry Hill, Leeds Quarry Hill is an area of central Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It is surrounded by the Leeds Inner Ring Road to the east and north. The Leeds - York / Hull railway runs just south of the district into the city centre... is an area in Leeds. |
| 12 | "A Fine Career" | 0:47 | Lead vocals by Robb Johnson Robb Johnson Robb Jenner Johnson is a British musician and songwriter, who has been called "one of the last genuinely political songwriters", and is known for his mix of political satire and wit... |
| 13 | "To a Little Radio" | 1:08 | Based on a poem written by Bertolt Brecht Bertolt Brecht Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the... while in exile from the Nazi regime in 1933 as he listened daily for news of the war; Music by Hanns Eisler Hanns Eisler Hanns Eisler was an Austrian composer.-Family background:Eisler was born in Leipzig where his Jewish father, Rudolf Eisler, was a professor of philosophy... for his "Holywood Songbook" song cycle, which put famous poems to music, under the title "An Meinen Kleinen Radioapparat" or "To My Little Radio" , a clip of which can be heard here; English translation by Eric Bentley Eric Bentley Eric Bentley is a critic, playwright, singer, editor and translator. He became an American citizen in 1948, and currently lives in New York City... |
| 14 | "(Words Flew) Right Around the World" | 2:15 | Featuring the Charlie Cake Marching Band; The song was written 'especially for a performance at the annual Brecht Festival in Bertolt Brecht's birthplace, Augsburg Augsburg Augsburg is a city in the south-west of Bavaria, Germany. It is a university town and home of the Regierungsbezirk Schwaben and the Bezirk Schwaben. Augsburg is an urban district and home to the institutions of the Landkreis Augsburg. It is, as of 2008, the third-largest city in Bavaria with a... '; 'The line "Bert told Brecht. Brecht told Bert" was taken from a poem by Leeds poet Ronald Arthur Dewhirst' |
| 15 | "Sing About Love" | 1:39 | |
| 16 | "Bury Me Deep" | 1:37 | |
| 17 | "You Watched Me Dance" | 0:58 | |
| 18 | "Compliments of Your Waitress" | 2:43 | |
| 19 | "RIP RP" | 1:26 | About the decreasing influence of 'standard' RP Received Pronunciation Received Pronunciation , also called the Queen's English, Oxford English or BBC English, is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms... pronunciation of British English British English British English, or English , is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere... . The phonetician Jack Windsor Lewis noted the irony that the song was sung in an RP accent. |
| 20 | "Charlie" | 2:12 | Music traditional, arranged by and lyrics by Chumbawamba; About Charles Darwin Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory... |
| 21 | "The Ogre" | 0:53 | Inspired by the poem "August 1968" by W. H. Auden W. H. Auden Wystan Hugh Auden , who published as W. H. Auden, was an Anglo-American poet,The first definition of "Anglo-American" in the OED is: "Of, belonging to, or involving both England and America." See also the definition "English in origin or birth, American by settlement or citizenship" in See also... , which can be found here |
| 22 | "Refugee" | 2:42 | A 'modern-day version' of Frank Higgins' song "The Testimony Of Patience Kershaw" (see http://www.mysongbook.de/msb/songs/t/testamen.html for original lyrics) concerning mining conditions during the British Industrial Revolution , from which it borrows the lyrics "It's kind of you to ask me sir / To tell you how I spend my day" |
| 23 | "Same Old Same Old" | 0:59 | |
| 24 | "Waiting for the Bus" | 2:44 | About Gary Tyler Gary Tyler Gary Tyler has been a prisoner in Louisiana since 1975, when he was convicted at age 17 of the 1974 shooting death of a 13-year-old white boy. Tyler was originally sentenced to death because of the charge and was the youngest prisoner on death row. The Fifth Circuit US Court of Appeals ruled the... , in prison for over 34 years despite his "fundamentally unfair" conviction for murder. (See FreeGaryTyler.com http://www.freegarytyler.com) |
| 25 | "What We Want" | 0:47 |
Samples from previous albums
"...the band have ... mixed in samples of themselves from the past..."| Song | Sample from |
|---|---|
| "When an Old Man Dies" | "Rubens Has Been Shot!" from Slap! Slap! Slap! is a 1990 album by anarchist punk band Chumbawamba. It was a radical redefinition of the band's sound and attitude. The songs now inspired dancing more than moshing, and the lyrics were celebratory as opposed to victimist.-Track listing:... |
| "All Fur Coat & No Knickers" | "Social Dogma" from WYSIWYG WYSIWYG (album) WYSIWYG is a 2000 album by anarcho-punk band Chumbawamba. Released after the massive success of their previous effort, Tubthumper, it commented on various aspects of the pop culture the band had inadvertently become a part of... |
| "Fine Line" | "Rappoport's Testament: I Never Gave Up" from Slap! Slap! Slap! is a 1990 album by anarchist punk band Chumbawamba. It was a radical redefinition of the band's sound and attitude. The songs now inspired dancing more than moshing, and the lyrics were celebratory as opposed to victimist.-Track listing:... |
| "Lord Bateman's Motorbike" | "Happiness is Just a Chant Away" from Shhh Shhh Shhh is a 1992 album by anarchist punk band Chumbawamba. It was originally recorded and written as "Jesus H. Christ," an album that relied heavily on samples. A number of the musicians whose material had been sampled objected, and the album was largely re-worked to defend artistic intent and... |
| "You Watched Me Dance" | "I'm Coming Out and "Dumbing Down (Piano Version)" from WYSIWYG WYSIWYG (album) WYSIWYG is a 2000 album by anarcho-punk band Chumbawamba. Released after the massive success of their previous effort, Tubthumper, it commented on various aspects of the pop culture the band had inadvertently become a part of... |
| "Charlie" | "Chase PC's Flee Attack By Own Dog" from Slap! Slap! Slap! is a 1990 album by anarchist punk band Chumbawamba. It was a radical redefinition of the band's sound and attitude. The songs now inspired dancing more than moshing, and the lyrics were celebratory as opposed to victimist.-Track listing:... |
| "The Ogre" | "Digger's Song Diggers' Song The "Diggers' Song" is a 17th century ballad, in terms of content a protest song concerned with land rights, inspired by the Diggers movement, composed by Gerrard Winstanley. The lyrics were published in 1894 by the Camden Society... " from English Rebel Songs English Rebel Songs 1381-1984 English Rebel Songs 1381–1984 is a 2003 studio album by anarchist punk band Chumbawamba. It was originally released in 1988 with a slightly different tracklist as English Rebel Songs 1381–1914... |
| "Refugee" | "Fade Away" from A Singsong and a Scrap A Singsong and a Scrap A Singsong and a Scrap is a Chumbawamba album released in 2005. It shows more folk influence than their previous album Un and features guest appearances from folk musicians such as Coope Boyes and Simpson, Andy Cutting and John Jones and Ian Telfer of Oysterband... |
Personnel
- Lou Watts - Vocals
- Boff WhalleyBoff WhalleyAllan Mark "Boff" Whalley is the lead guitarist for the band Chumbawamba.-Early life and education:Whalley was born Allan Mark Whalley in 1961 in Burnley, Lancashire...
- Vocals, Ukelele - Neil Ferguson - Vocals, Guitars
- Jude Abbott - Vocals, Brass
- Phil 'Ron' Moody - Vocals, Accordion
Also Appearing
- OysterbandOysterbandOysterband is a British electric folk or folk rock band formed in Canterbury in or around 1976.-Early history:...
, Roy BaileyRoy Bailey (folk singer)Roy Bailey MBE , is a British socialist folk singer. Roy began his singing career in a skiffle group in 1958.Colin Irwin from the music magazine Mojo said Bailey represents "the very soul of folk's working class ideals.....
, Robb JohnsonRobb JohnsonRobb Jenner Johnson is a British musician and songwriter, who has been called "one of the last genuinely political songwriters", and is known for his mix of political satire and wit...
, Ray Hearne, Barry Coope & Jim BoyesCoope Boyes and SimpsonCoope, Boyes and Simpson are an English vocal folk trio, formed around 1990. Their sound is rich and often has unusual vocal harmonies.The group comprises singers Barry Coope, Jim Boyes and Lester Simpson, and almost all of their music is sung entirely a capella, although they have occasionally...
- Vocals - Charlie Cake Marching Band - Brass
- David P. Crickmore - Banjo on 7, 22; Square-necked Dobro on 18, 22
- Jo FreyaJo FreyaJo Freya is an English saxophonist, clarinetist and singer.She was born Jo Fraser, but changed her name to Jo Freya as a condition of joining the actors' union Equity, which does not allow two of its members to share the same name...
- Sax on 2 - Harry HamerChumbawambaChumbawamba is a British musical group who have, over a career spanning nearly three decades, played punk rock, pop-influenced music, world music, and folk music...
- CajonCajónA cajón is a box-shaped percussion instrument originally from Peru, played by slapping the front face with the hands.-Origins and evolution:...
on 9, 11; Tablas on 16 - The Pudsey Players - Strings on 6, 11, 18