Tag: Canal Cafe Theatre

Here is a letter I wrote to director, Mark Bowden, just after the start of the first run of 1993.

He and his cast took a shine to my songs. Perhaps too much of a shine; the show was ram-packed with them.

Here’s a link to the submission I sent that crew on 4 January 1993 – click here.

The following letter was written the day after the opening night.  I’ll up the songs referred to therein as soon as I am able:

                                                                                                                               22 January 1993

 

Dear Mark

 

Congratulations on a grand opening night.  I enjoyed the show very much and get the feeling that the other writers felt the same.  Please pass on my felicitations to the team.

 

I promised you some comments (hopefully constructive ones) once I had sobered up so here they are.  These you may take or bin.

 

FEMIDOM

 

I think this song would go down better later in the show (once more people are more drunk).  Consider “Coal Digger” or “Prince Charlie” as the warm up number.  The metre baffled me.  For what it’s worth – here is the metre I intended and tested thoroughly (to rigorous BS5750 standards etc):

 

Loving you is so fantastic, inside a Femidom,

With your coat of thermoplastic, known as the Femidom;

This vaginal {this vaginal} polyvinyl {polyvinyl},

Is an artificial con,

Little darling let’s bonk and tonk, inside a Femidom {a Femidom}

We only bought the one, because the price is so steep,

By the time you got it on, I’d long since gone off to sleep; etc etc

 

WHITE HOUSE

 

Seemed a bit static – consider bringing the other rednecks on once they are mentioned – to create a bit more movement.  This is actually a very difficult song and you did it surprisingly well.

 

SLOBIDANS ARMY

 

Also a very difficult song – I thought the delivery was excellent.  I don’t really think the audience is supposed to laugh much until the last few lines – they should be half wanting to laugh and half thinking how awful it all is.  That balance came across very well I felt.  Consider substituting Sudan for Iran at the end as it has just hit the news this morning.

 

COAL DIGGER

 

Well done!  I’d like you to think about the metre on the following lines as the joke is lost unless it is right.

 

And the miners all – know they’ve been pissed on,

Cos the mining in-dustry’s gone.

 

MICHAEL JACKSON

 

Total triumph – very pleased with this one.  “There are people starving but I’m the last one laughing,” ended up negative somehow but otherwise I cannot imagine it being done better.

 

Hope all this helps – and its tough if it doesn’t help.

Well done once again to you all – look forward to seeing you soon.

The following list is titled “Bowden”. Based on subsequent correspondence and what is left of my memory, I think this went to a director named Mark Bowden, who took a particular shine to my songs.

Perhaps too much of a shine; I seem to recall that the first run of 1993 was ram-packed with my songs. Indeed, I wrote to Mark soon after the run started with some notes – here’s a link to that letter.

I shall upload the lyrics referred to in the list below and the letter as soon as I am able.

                  LIST OF SONGS SUBMITTED AND TAPE TRACK LISTING

                                              JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1993 RUN

 

Song Title	Original Title/ Artist on Tape	Aprox. No. of Performances
		7	4-6	1-3	New/Nil
Inside A Femidom	Under The Moon Of Love/Curtis Lee				Y
Slobidan’s Army	Oliver’s Army/Elvis Costello				Y
White House	Our House/Crosby Stills Nash & Young				Y
My Genitalia	My Generation/The Who				Y
I Gatt Round	I Get Around/Beach Boys				Y
Nude For Thought	Food For Thought/UB40				Y
Fair Weather Friend	You’ve Got A Friend/Carole King				Y
Midnight Plane to Jordan	Midnight Train to Georgia/Gladys Knight & Pips				Y
Coal Diggers	Goldfinger/Shirley Bassey		Y
Closed to You	Close to You/Carpenters		Y
Snatchbroker Snatchbroker	Matchmaker Matchmaker/Fiddler on the Roof Cast			Y
Trucker Strikes	Summer Loving/Grease Cast			Y
Designer*	Delilah/Tom Jones				Y*

* (so new I have had to tack it on to the end of the tape) 

4 January 1993

 

Seemingly my first scribbling of 1993, it is dated the same say as the listing I sent to new director Mark Bowden – see link to listing here.

Mark liked it and used it, although it is hardly a laugh out loud song. I think he used it as a tone down.watershed song. It ran for a while I recall, despite my profound inability to spell Nagorno-Karabakh back then. I might be the only NewsRevue lyricist to have used that place name and attempted to rhyme with it more than once.

The tune is Oliver’s Army by Elvis Costello – click here or below to see YouTube/Vevo.

Original lyrics of Oliver’s Army can be found if you click here.

♬ SLOBIDAN’S ARMY ♬

(To the Tune of “Oliver’s Army”)

 

VERSE 1

Don’t stop those peace talks,

They may last all night;

The Serbs are cruel war hawks,

Who try to get their own way through might.

Call in the United Nations,

Have you got a peaceful army? – cos

 

CHORUS 1

Slobidan’s Army’s from Serbia,

Slobidan’s Army has gone too far,

And I would rather be anywhere else than Bosnia.

 

MIDDLE BIT

Radovan Karadzic,

Hates Izetbegovic;

He may flatten Kosovo,

After he’s laid out Sarajevo,

With the Serbs from the mountains and Montenegro.

 

VERSE 2

The blood is flowin’,

Every time those Serbs advance;

In spite of David Owen,

And his old has been side kick named Cyrus Vance.

If you think the Slavs are out of luck,

You should see Nagorno-Karaback.

 

CHORUS 2

Slobidan’s army has gone too far,

Slobidan’s death toll is costlier,

And I would rather be anywhere else than Bosnia.

(Except Somalia, Cuba or Iran,

Or in Cambodia, Chad or Kurdistan.)

copyright © Ian Harris 1993

This is not the most profound song I ever wrote. The electronic file is dated just before Christmas 1992. The song premiered in the first run of 1993, about one month later.

The femidom was, in the UK in 1992, a much-vaunted innovation in contraception. An article from 2005 – click here for link – suggests that its success was short-lived.

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Female_condom.jpg

Anyway, this one proved very popular in early 1993 (the song I mean, not the contraceptive device), despite the rather crude, sophomoric style of the lyrics. Mark Bowden’s team used it as their opening number, despite my protests that it should perhaps be used later in the show – see letter – click here for link.

The original tune is Under The Moon of Love, originally by Curtis Lee but made famous in the UK by Showaddywaddy – see YouTube of them singing it by clicking here or below.

And a link to the original lyrics – click here.

As part of my research for the lyrics that follow, Janie and I did procure and attempt to use such a contraption on one occasion. How we laughed. The things we put ourselves through for my NewsRevue art.

♬ INSIDE A FEMIDOM ♬

(To the Tune of “Under the Moon of Love”)

VERSE 1

Lets go for a little shag, and use a Femidom,

Just me and you and a plastic bag, lets use a Femidom;

I wanna lover {wanna lover} with a cover {with a cover},

Like a great big Wellington,

Little darling, let’s poke and stoke, inside a Femidom {a Femidom}

VERSE 2

Loving you is so fantastic, inside a Femidom,

With your coat of thermoplastic, known as the Femidom;

This vaginal {this vaginal} polyvinyl {polyvinyl},

Is an artificial con,

Little darling let’s bonk and tonk, inside a Femidom {a Femidom}

MIDDLE BIT 1

We only bought the one, because the price is so steep,

By the time you got it on, I’d long since gone off to sleep;

{I think I would rather use my hand}

VERSE 3

Bring the groceries from the shops, inside a Femidom,

A pork salami and sirloin chops, inside a Femidom;

It’s the fashion {it’s the fashion} to kill passion {to kill passion},

With a jumbo freezer bag,

Little darling, let’s hump and rump, inside a Femidom {a Femidom}

MIDDLE BIT 2

At enormous cost, a polyurethane thrill,

I hope that we’ve not lost, our coil and our cap and the pill;

{Why not use a method I can stand?}

VERSE 4

We’ll avoid a misconception, without a Femidom,

Let’s use other contraception, but not the Femidom,

Then we’ll feel {then we’ll feel} something real {something real},

And we won’t feel put upon,

Little darling let’s play and lay, without a Femidom {no Femidom}.

copyright © Ian Harris 1992