Uploading this part of my lyric archive some 25 years after the event, April 2019, makes me realise that accusations of Presidential corruption in the USA are more commonplace than we tend to remember. Trump might be more awful and cartoon-villain-like than his predecessors, but many have had scandals hanging over their heads for much of their presidency.
I don’t recall this lyric being used much, if at all. Some good lines though. I had to look up Bernard Nussbaum – White House Counsel under Clinton…
…and I still couldn’t spell “Hillary” in 1994.
_ THE GRAFT IN LITTLE ROCK CITY _
(To the Tune of "The Boy From New York City")
INTRO – THE PRESS
De dum de, dum-dum, dum-dum, dum-dum, dum-de-dum, De-dum-dum, dum-dum, dum-dum, dum-de-dum; Oh-wah, oh-wah, cool cool Hilly, tell us how you worked with Governor Billy, Oh-wah, oh-wah, Hilary Clinton, tell us all the things that you know went on.
VERSE 1 – HILARY CLINTON
We lived before, in Arkansas {yeh, yeh}, Which is the poorest US state you ever saw {yeh, yeh}; Bill’s a dope, who comes from Hope, But with me pulling all his strings maybe he can cope {uh, uh}. Oh-eee, you’ve gotta all believe, he don’t inhale {oh no} and don’t tell tales {oh no}.
MIDDLE EIGHT 1 – HILARY CLINTON
Bill thought that Whitewater was bonny, but still refused to sign; He sold his colleagues up the Swanee, like Michael Hesteltine.
VERSE 2 – HILARY CLINTON
Oh-wah, oh-wah, we’ve no pity, tell us about the graft in Little Rock City; Oh-wah, oh-wah, come on Hilary, the papers say that you both were ancillary. I had a shock, in Little Rock {yeh, yeh}, When all those stories broke on where Bill stuck his cock {yeh, yeh}; If its true, he’s in deep doo-doo, A la recherche de Paula Jones and Sally Perdue {who they?}. Oh-eee, a press conspiracy, on how Bill grafts {yeh, yeh} and how he shafts {yeh yeh}.
MIDDLE EIGHT 2 – HILARY CLINTON
Now we’re in trouble for Whitewater, but if Bill’s got some sense; He’ll take a tip from Shirley Porter, and shred all evidence; that’s smart.
OUTRO – PRESS AND HILARY OVERLAPPING LINES
{HILARY:Well alright, so he’s thick, PRESS:Oh-wah, oh-wah, don’t be shitty, blow the gaff on graft in Little Rock City;} {HILARY:But he’ll blame it all on Bernard Nussbaum so the flack don’t stick…. PRESS:Oh-wah, oh-wah, come on Hilary, the papers say the Clintons were ancillary} (Repeat, dancing off)
By the time I wrote this piece, I had probably overdone the subject of Tory “back to basics” hypocrisy over moral issues, especially homosexuality, for NewsRevue.
A pity, really, as I think this lyric might, purely in lyrical terms, be the best of the lot.
_ SIXTEEN BUGGER YOUR EIGHTEEN _
(To the Tune of “Sixteen Going On Seventeen”)
INTRO
MP:You wait, little chap, till you’re twenty one; until then you masturbate on, Your life, little chap, is an empty one, for MP’s to legislate on. GAY(S):We wait on….
VERSE 1
MP:You are sixteen going on seventeen, God help you if you’re gay; Fellows you meet, would give you a sweet and make you go the wrong way. You are seventeen going on eighteen, too young to be so lax, You’ll have to wait unless you are straight to indulge in sexual acts.
Totally unprepared are you to face a world of men, Gaiety undeclared, for you are too young to consent.
You need someone older and wiser telling you what to do; I’m a minister don’t think I’m sinister I’ll defile your youth.
VERSE 2
GAY(S):Under eighteen we’re in the gay scene, we don’t think we’re naive; Your back to basics makes us young gays sick, practice what you believe. You are sixty going on seventy, you are all out of touch, Old public schools where you learnt the rules did not sway you old sods much.
Totally unprepared were you to equalise the age, Tory MPs are scared, for you, must now face gay outrage.
We’ll try something harsher and wilder to get our message through, We want sixteen bugger your eighteen, we’ll out all of you.
Here are Richard Haydn and Eleanor Parker singing Sixteen Going On Seventeen in the Sound Of Music movie:
In 1997 I updated this lyric for some House Of Lord’s reason:
SIXTEEN BUGGER YOUR EIGHTEEN – 1997 REMIX (To the Tune of “Sixteen Going On Seventeen”)
INTRO LORD(S): You wait, little chap, till you’re aged eighteen; until then you masturbate on, Your life, little chap, is an empty one, for we Lords to legislate on. GAY(S): We wait on…. VERSE 1 LORD(S): You are sixteen going on seventeen, God help you if you’re gay; Fellows you meet, would give you a sweet and make you go the wrong way. You are seventeen going on eighteen, too young to be so lax, You’ll have to wait unless you are straight to indulge in sexual acts. Totally unprepared are you to face a world of men, Gaiety undeclared, for you are too young to consent. You need someone older and wiser telling you what to do; I’m an ageing peer, no-one calls me a queer, I’ll define your youth. VERSE 2 GAY(S): Under eighteen we’re in the gay scene, we don’t think we’re naive; Not up for blokes and too young for smokes, this can’t be what you believe. You are sixty going on seventy, you are all out of touch, Old public schools where you learnt the rules did not sway you old sods much. Totally unprepared are you to recognise young men, New Labour want the change cos they have Chris Smith and Red Ken. We’ll try something harsher and wilder to get our message through, We want sixteen bugger your eighteen, we’ll out all of you.
I don’t recall seeing this one performed, but it might have been used. The perennial problem of the car industry in the UK; this news item was one of many chapters in that tale.
_ KARAOKE HONDA _
(To the Tune of “Without You”)
HONDA EXECUTIVE:Excuse me. Is this the Rover plant Karaoke bar? BARMAN (PIANIST):Certainly squire. That’ll be 50p for the video Karaoke machine.
(The Honda executive pays. The pianist strikes up the tune. The Honda executive takes up the microphone. Two members of the cast then meander around the stage throughout the song, looking into each other’s eyes and shining torches along pieces of cardboard, inscribed with large Japanese-like characters).
VERSE 1 – HONDA EXECUTIVE
Well I can’t believe it’s over, our relationship with Rover, But I guess it’s just the way the Tories go; We motorised your dismal lines when they ran slow, they ran slow. We were both rolling in clover, on the back of your Land Rover, But your German deal sucks more than you could know, And now we’re pulling out our engines, your autos might cease to go.
CHORUS 1 – HONDA EXECUTIVE
We lost face to frigging BMW, Aerospace are a bunch of old tarts, We won’t live in trade with BMW, we won’t give those kraut bastards our parts.
VERSE 2 – BMW EXECUTIVE
(One of the meanderers takes the microphone from the Honda executive. The Honda executive becomes a meanderer, staring longingly into the eyes of the other meanderer. The pieces of cardboard, reversed/transposed, now show German-like characters. The BMW executive has a “Stage-German” accent)
We just can’t believe you’re fonder of your car trade owned by Honda, Than the thought that UK firms are German owned, For all those years your British cars were not your own, they’d been cloned.
CHORUS 2 – BMW EXECUTIVE
We can deal without a civic Honda, it’s a steal without Honda accord, It’s a pup this industry you squandered, this makes up for the second world war, haw haw.
Below is Harry Nilsson singing Without You with lyrics on’t screen.
I’m just trying to imagine now, more than 25 years later, what I might have done with this lyric had we known back then that Edwina Currie was having an affair with the Prime Minister, John “back to basics” Major, at the time.
This lyric merely makes fun of Mrs Currie’s attempt at writing a bonkbuster novel.
_ CRUDE MOO _
(To the Tune of “Blue Moon”)
You’ll have to work out most of the backing do-do’s and wop-wop’s yourselves. It’s more than my jobs worth to even attempt it.
INTRO
Cu, cu-cu-cu, cu-cu, cu-cu, cu; ree, re-re-re, re-re, re-re, re, Edwina Currie; Blue book, blue book, blue book, do-do-do-do-do, Moo, crude moo, crude moo, do-do-do-do-do, Moo, crude moo, crude moo, do-do-do-do-do, Cu, cu-cu-cu, cu-cu, cu-cu, cu; ree, re-re-re, re-re, re-re, re, Edwina Currie; VERSE 1
Blue book, Edwina Currie’s new tome, Of the intrigues in the house, when two MP’s are alone. Crude moo, A Parliamentary Affair’s for, Those members whom we despair for, They don’t know what members’ there for.
MIDDLE EIGHT
The gay community, says that you’re permissive, Tho’ you seemed priggish, when obsessed with eggs; With incredulity, we read your new missive, On strawberry cream, smeared in between the legs.
VERSE 2
Oh-oh-oh crude moo, Edwina Currie’s a cow, She told the old to keep warm, Her book now illustrates how.
I have a quick update to the Russian Shock song to incorporate the major news story of the week.
At the end of the dancing interlude:
JOHN MAJOR APPEARS WEARING A SILLY RUSSIAN HAT
MAJOR:Hello, Russians.
RUSSIANS:(to John Major)Where did you get that hat? (to each other)Where did we get this twat? Oy!
THEN GO INTO CHORUS
No doubt you have suitable headgear somewhere in the News Revue stock. However, should you lack a suitable titfer, I have one that you could have gladly. If you do need the hat, please leave a message on my answering machine today and I shall bring the hat in for you tomorrow evening. Look forward to seeing you then.
Yours sincerely
Ian Harris
PS Please may I have some of those tapes back on Thursday, if you have finished with them. My stocks are very low now that I am sending stuff to Steve as well as you!
I enclose your starter pack of lyrics and tape for my offerings. The pack consists of new songs, songs currently in the show and one or two rewrites of older ones etc. If you want me to work on an old chestnut of mine that you might have uncovered in the archive, just let me know.
Please do call me and let me know if you are short of any subjects or styles and I shall try to oblige. Also, if any of these need a bit of rewrite then I shall be happy to change them on request.
I’m pretty sure I was unfamiliar with Amanda de Cadenet as a celebrity; I must have read a bio of her and turned the bio into lyrics, basically.
I don’t think the idea worked; I’m pretty sure this wasn’t performed or if it was it was short-lived in the show.
_ AMANDA de CADENET _
(To the Tune of “Lady Marmalade”)
INTRO
Hey she’s a Sloane bimbo groan bimbo moan bimbo, Hey she’s the next icon sex icon flex icon.
VERSE 1
Amanda de Cadenet was in her teens, presenting the Word on our screens; While dad was at Le Mans, she had Duran Duran. Flicky tricky pouting panter, posing for Hello in LA; Breast feeding her sprog Atlanta, women hate de Cadenet. Es-que tu a pretentious fat, spoilt brat? Es-que tu a pretentious twat?
VERSE 2
She spread out in Playboy and showed all her bits, except for some reason her tits; She’s so anti-porn, but still gets paid for the horn…. That she gives to crazy wankers, why on earth do men masturbate; With their bags and amyl-nitrate, imagining de Cadenet. Es-que tu a dumb hypocrite you tit, Es-que tu a bit of a shit?
VERSE 3
Oh oh oh Slurp slurp gurgle so wet and smooth, Christ knows what these lyrics mean, She seems so hard to resist for auto-eroticists: why? why? why? She’s a pretty flitty toddy, She has naught of worth to say, Politically correct as Noddy, Men can keep de Cadenet.
Below is Labelle singing Lady Marmalade with the lyrics on the screen:
I had no recollection that the Mad Frogs And Englishman lyric was somewhat a request by Maggie and Paul. Nor that my father passed on sage advice about it through me! But I do recall my father absolutely loving that lyric.
This was much harder to write than I thought it would be, but it has gone down very well with everyone who has heard it so far (and I can barely do Noel Coward).
My old man reckons that “Noel” should be introduced by a maid or butler bringing him a newspaper or some such business. Whether this would mean anything to the under 70’s I cannot judge, but I promised to pass on his advice to you.
I hope you have fun with the Noel song.
Some friends of mine who regularly visit the show came along last Thursday and called me yesterday to say that it was the best News Revue they had seen in ages. Well done!
One of the longest-running of the lyrics I wrote for NewsRevue, it is about the Bosnian war. There were several updated versions of this one, but take a look first of all at the version I believe to be the first of them, from February 1994.
It was my dad’s absolute favourite, this one. But then he was a Noel Coward fan. My other recollection of it was the great Paul Cawley having a love/hate thing with it. Love in that he liked delivering the material. Hate in that he reckoned it was one of the hardest lyrics he’d ever had to learn.
MAD FROGS AND ENGLISHMEN
(To the Tune of “Mad Dogs And Englishmen”)
VERSE 1
In Balkan climbs these are torrid times they say,
When former Yugoslavs conspire to lie in wait and open fire;
It’s one of those wars where guerrillas cause affray,
In which a wise peacekeeping force is not prepared to stay the course and goes away.
Ra-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-tat – machine gun fire – whizz splatt, whizz splatt;
We make Serbs irate yes their warlords hate our guts, because our aid workers are definitely nuts.
CHORUS 1
Mad Frogs and Englishmen take aid to the Bosnians, Americans don’t care to, Italians wouldn’t dare to;
The loss via the cross fire cannot be described as fun, but England has beserker aid workers;
In Sarajevo they are so brave, oh why don’t they have a go at,
Herzegovina? No, don’t bother, the place is entirely Croat;
In Mostar the costs are that convoys are overrun,
But Mad Frogs and Englishmen lug aid to the Bosnians.
VERSE 2
Most people deplore the extent of war they see,
So many Nations seem to fight although they know it can’t be right;
Humanitarian aid, the majority pay deftly,
But when it comes to volunteers most stay at home to drink their beers and watch TV.
Whizz splatt, whizz splatt – Scud missile attack – different war this time – nyyowww;
It seems such a shame when the UN claim the earth, that they give rise to so much ridicule and mirth,
Ha-ha-ha, oh dear.
CHORUS 2 & CHORUS 3
Mad Frogs and Englishmen drag aid to the Bosnians, the UN’s a defender quite likely to surrender;
A long war is ignored if Asian or African, as French and English cures stop in Europe;
The Middle East won’t in the least be borne such a harried snack,
In Central Asia there’s little aid for Nagorno Karabakh;
In Phnom Penh the strong men won’t help a Cambodian,
But Mad Frogs and Englishmen run aid to the Bosnians.
Mad Frogs and Englishmen shlep aid to the Bosnians, the Russians try to ban it the Yankees help them plan it,
General Rose we must suppose has spent too long in the sun, as most war zones just wish an aid mission;
In Guatemala the pantry parlours aren’t filled with flown in fare,
Iraqi Kurds think it absurd their lack of aid’s so unfair,
In Mogadishu the big issue is that the yanks have cut and run,
But Mad Frogs and Englishmen take aid through the Serb lines, dodge past the Croats,
Give a little, get a little, mercy mercy mercy mercy aid to the Bosnians.
Thank you very much.
Just in case you are unfamiliar with Noel Coward’s patter song, Mad Dogs and Englishmen, here it is:
Below is one of the better updates for NewsRevue, when the war took a slightly different turn in the summer of 1995. Possibly even tighter than the first version.
MAD FROGS AND ENGLISHMEN – SUMMER 1995 REMIX (To the Tune of “Mad Dogs And Englishmen”)
VERSE 1
In Balkan climbs these are torrid times they say, When former Yugoslavs conspire to lie in wait and open fire; It’s one of those wars where guerrillas cause affray, In which a wise peacekeeping force is not prepared to stay the course and goes away. Ra-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-tat – machine gun fire – whizz splatt, whizz splatt; We make Serbs irate yes their warlords hate our guts, because our aid workers are definitely nuts.
CHORUS 1
Mad Frogs and Englishmen take aid to the Bosnians, Americans don’t care to, Italians wouldn’t dare to; The loss via the cross fire cannot be described as fun, but England has beserker aid workers; In Sarajevo they are so brave, oh why did poor Zepa yield?, Srebrenica’s like the blitz only thank God no Gracie Fields.; In Mostar the costs are that convoys are overrun, But Mad Frogs and Englishmen lug aid to the Bosnians.
VERSE 2
Most people deplore the extent of war they see, So many Nations seem to fight although they know it can’t be right; Humanitarian aid, the majority pay deftly, But when it comes to volunteers most stay at home to drink their beers and watch TV. Whizz splatt, whizz splatt – Scud missile attack – different war this time – nyyowww; It seems such a shame when the UN claim the earth, that they give rise to so much ridicule and mirth, Ha-ha-ha, oh dear.
CHORUS 2
Mad Frogs and Englishmen drag aid to the Bosnians, the UN’s a defender quite likely to surrender; UNPROFOR is ignored and has nowhere else to run, cos French and English cures stop in Europe; The Middle East won’t in the least be borne such a harried snack, In Central Asia there’s little aid for Nagorno Karabakh; In Phnom Penh the strong men won’t help a Cambodian, But Mad Frogs and Englishmen run aid to the Bosnians.
CHORUS 3
Mad Frogs and Englishmen shlep aid to the Bosnians, the Russians try to ban it, the Yankees help ’em plan it, Rupert Smith must be high on spliff as he sits upon Mount Igman but most war zones just wish an aid mission; In Guatemala the pantry parlours aren’t filled with flown in fare, Iraqi Kurds think it absurd their lack of aid’s so unfair, In Mogadishu the big issue was that the yanks just cut and run, But Mad Frogs and Englishmen take aid through the Serb lines, dodge past the Croats, give a little, get a little, mercy mercy mercy mercy aid to the Bosnians. Thank you very much.
I don’t think this lyric was used. I had loads in the show at that time, not least plenty of John Major material. Frankly, I think the others that were used were probably better. But a few decent ideas in this one.
The disaster song genre seemed appropriate at that time…
…retro-writing in the spring of 2019, that disaster genre would be good for our current times too.
_ JOHNNY LEADS HOPELESSLY _
(To the Tune of “Johnny Remember Me”)
VERSE 1 – JOHN MAJOR
{Ah, ah, ah-oh} When the press is prying and the smears are flowing, And the daily papers are full of innuendo; {oh-oh} I’m castigated by Norman, The Chancellor that I sacked a year ago. {oh-oh}
CHORUS 1 – NORMAN LAMONT
Johnny leads hopelessly.
VERSE 2 – JOHN MAJOR
Well it’s hard to believe, I know, But he’s still so tactless when he talks to the press; ‘Specially if they feed him, {oh-oh} And get him legless. {oh-oh}
CHORUS 2 – NORMAN LAMONT
(Now sounding quite drunk) (hic) – Johnny leads hopelessly. (Then coming to a little) But, now I can remember, Ginny Dougary, made a buggery -(hic); Ginny, misquoted me. {GINNY:oh-no, oh-no, that’s what he said to me}
VERSE 3 – JOHN MAJOR
Well I’m glad, I guess, I found myself, another Chancellor, To take the place of that juice head; But as long as I live I know, Norman will be loitering around in the House, Feeling like a leper, and buying booze at Threshers;
CHORUS 3
NORMAN (soaked):(hic) Johnny remembers me, JOHNNY:Yes, I’ll always remember; Your skulduggery, NORMAN (soused):(hic) Oh bugger me, Johnny dismembered me (hic). (Norman passes out and is dragged off by chorus {Johnny, dismembered him})
