Asides

NewsRevue Tonight, Multiple Lyric Revisions 1996 & 1997

My main post on this long-running lyric can be found if you click here.

There were several revisions, the last three of which follow.

This one is from 9 January 1996 and is actually numbered “4”:

NEWS REVUE TONIGHT – REVISION NUMBER GOODNESS KNOWS WHAT
(To the Tune of “Comedy Tonight”)

VERSE 1

THATCHER: Someone familiar,
PAISLEY: Someone peculiar,
ALL: Weirdoes from everywhere at News Revue tonight;
BLOKES: Major’s deflecting,
GIRLS: Emma’s defecting,
ALL: No party whipping here at News Review tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 1

GIRLS: Nothing that brings share options down,
BLOKES: Bring on Ken Clarke in place of the clowns
GIRLS: Old exploitations,
BLOKES: New corporations,
ALL: Something to make the boss contrite;

CLIMAX 1

ALL: Barbican tomorrow,
News Revue tonight.

VERSE 2

GIRLS: Alan Clark’s diaries,
BLOKES: The Scott enquiry,
ALL: Sleaze factor everywhere at News Revue tonight;
BLOKES: Serbs’ revolution,
GIRLS: Scots’ devolution,
ALL: Side splitting everywhere at News Revue tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 2

GIRLS: Nothing with French nuclear tests,
BLOKES: Show us exploding silicon breasts;
GIRLS: News that reflects life,
BLOKES: Diana’s sex life,
ALL: Satire that puts the world to right;

CLIMAX 2

ALL: Maida Vale tomorrow,
News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue..Tonight!!

Next up, revision 5 dated 16 November 1996 – I get the impression I did this in response to a request:

NEWS REVUE TONIGHT – XMAS 1996 REMIX (YOU ASKED FOR IT)
(To the Tune of “Comedy Tonight”)

VERSE 1

MAJOR: Someone familiar,
PAISLEY: Someone peculiar,
ALL: Weirdoes from everywhere at News Revue tonight;
LABOUR: New Labour morals,
TORY: Old Tory quarrels,
ALL: No party whipping here at News Review tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 1

GIRLS: Nothing that brings share options down,
BLOKES: Bring on Ken Clarke in place of the clowns
GIRLS: Old exploitations,
BLOKES: New corporations,
ALL: Something to make the boss contrite;

CLIMAX 1

ALL: Barbican tomorrow,
News Revue tonight.

VERSE 2

GIRLS: More cash for questions,
BLOKES: And lewd suggestions,
ALL: Sleaze factor everywhere at News Revue tonight;
BLOKES: Benazir Bhutto,
GIRLS: Tutsis and Hutus,
ALL: Side splitting everywhere at News Revue tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 2

GIRLS: Something to treat your Christmas guests,
BLOKES: Madonna and child with big pointy breasts;
GIRLS: News that reflects life,
BLOKES: Bill Clinton’s sex life,
ALL: Satire that puts the world to right;

CLIMAX 2

ALL: Broadway tomorrow,
News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue..Tonight!!

Finally, the sixth and final revision, a version for Edinburgh 1997:

NEWS REVUE TONIGHT – EDINBURGH 1997 VERSION
(To the Tune of “Comedy Tonight”)

VERSE 1

BLAIR: Someone familiar,
PAISLEY: Someone peculiar,
ALL: Weirdoes from everywhere at News Revue tonight;
LABOUR: New Labour morals,
TORY: Old Tory quarrels,
ALL: No party whipping here at News Review tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 1

GIRLS: Nothing that brings share options down,
BLOKES: Take off Ken Clarke bring in Gordon Brown.
GIRLS: Old exploitations,
BLOKES: New corporations,
ALL: Something to make the boss contrite;

CLIMAX 1

ALL: Edinburgh tomorrow,
News Revue tonight.

VERSE 2

GIRLS: War in Tirana,
BLOKES: Canaan Banana,
ALL: Globe trotting everywhere at News Revue tonight;
BLOKES: Congo’s solution,
GIRLS: Scot’s devolution,
ALL: Side splitting everywhere at News Revue tonight.

MIDDLE EIGHT 2

GIRLS: MP’s we chase, much like fox hunts,
BLOKES: Jack Straw and Gordon Brown are……;
GIRLS: …….at lunch;
GIRLS: News that reflects life,
BLOKES: Camilla’s sex life,
ALL: Satire that puts the world to right;

CLIMAX 2

ALL: Royal Mile tomorrow,
News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue, News Revue..Tonight!!

China, Hong Kong & Bali Trip – Song Thoughts, 9 December 1993

If I thought that a long holiday would bring a rush of creativity to my comedy lyric writing career at NewsRevue, clearly I was mistaken. Best part of four weeks and this is all he wrote, folks:

China Trip – Clean Business Cuisine Book Thoughts, 30 November 1993

While in China, I did a great deal of thinking about the planned book which became Clean Business Cuisine. Here are the notes I made while on that trip. I shall not try to translate them.

Hong Kong Briefing 26 November Ahead Of Transfer From Guangzhou To Hong Kong 29 November 1993

Three blithering pages of notes on how to go about transferring from our tour ending in Guangzhou to the unguided part of our holiday, starting in Hong Kong.

Perhaps some need reminding/informing that Hong Kong was still a British protectorate in 1993 – the “one country, two systems” transfer to Chinese rule thing was still at the planning stage.

To be fair, only the first page-and-a-half was really about the tortuous transfer – the rest was about what we might do in Hong Kong once we got there.

I won’t decipher my hieroglyphics in this piece but might extract some elements of them in my reports of our transfer to and then our time in Hong Kong.

1993 China Tour “Awards”, 28 November 1993

I’m not sure why I generated lists of pseudo awards for our China tour. Perhaps it was at the suggestion of the Kuoni guides for some last night of the tour fun.

Perhaps it was my own idea and/or something I did purely for my and Janie’s own amusement.

I have peppered / am peppering the main pieces about this trip with transcriptions and explanations of the individual awards, so I shall not transcribe them again here.

 

 

China Tour, Pre Briefing Notes, 14 November 1993

While we were fog bound at Heathrow on 14 November…

An Anticlimactic Start To My & Janie’s First Big Travel Adventure Together, 14 to 16 November 1993

…our Kuoni guides, Chris Lucas and Sally Ward, briefed us ahead of our trip.

I’m not going to try and translate this page

As Time Goes By or They Flew From Tuscany, NewsRevue Sketch and Medley, 10 October 1992

This was the version of this sketch/medley that was actually used. It is much better than the original version – click here for that – but the original version is interesting because I wrote it before Black Wednesday.

Pearls before swine, my economic predictions, pearls before swine.

Anyway, this post crisis version is funnier. There is an in-between version written a week or so  before – click here – I’m guessing that the director suggested improvements, e.g. switching Gini Bottomley out and Lady Thatcher in, which did make for a funnier sketch.

The early evening show at the Canal Cafe at that time was called “As Time Goes By” – some sort of musical retrospective of 1940s material, which made this sketch/medley especially fitting.

AS TIME GOES BY – NEW IMPROVED VERSION

or THEY FLEW FROM TUSCANY (A Sketch and Medley of Sterling 1940’s Songs)

 

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

 

John Major (Johnny)

Gillian Shepherd (Jilly)

Lady Thatcher (Maggie)

Norman Lamont (Fartface)

 

THE SKETCH

 

(VOICEOVER:And now, for those of you who missed the early evening show – here is an exert from “As Time Goes By”)

 

(The pianist tinkles away at the Second Movement of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto – a la Brief Encounter.  The music is adagio sostenuto, the voices are staccato.  Paula Tappenden knows all about it.  We start with just Johnny and Jilly on stage.)

 

JILLY:Johnny.

 

JOHNNY:Jilly.

 

JILLY:Oh Johnny.  What’s happened to the economy?

 

JOHNNY:Gerry’s giving us a bally barney, Jilly.  The pound’s doing terribly.

 

JILLY:What about Yankee Doodle Dandy?

 

JOHNNY:Gerry’s giving Yankee Doodle Dandy a bally barney too, Jilly.  The dollar’s doing awfully.

 

JILLY:Oh Johnny.

 

JOHNNY:Oh Jilly.  What are you doing for the old effort?

 

JILLY:I’m in employment.

 

JOHNNY:Gosh, that is unusual these days.

 

JILLY:In the ministry.  Oh Johnny,  this darned economy’s simply ruining all our lives.  I’m sorry.  I’m acting like a bally fool.

 

(Enter Maggie)

 

MAGGIE:Johnny, the economy’s going horribly.

 

JOHNNY:Terribly.

 

MAGGIE:Awfully.  And what about the Treaty?

 

JOHHNY:(offers her a sweety)  Have a choccy, Maggie.

 

MAGGIE:I mean the Maastricht Treaty.  (Maggie pokes her finger at Johnny’s lapel as she says) Johnny, I’ve warned you before, it is a ruinous straitjacket.

 

JOHNNY:(Brushing his lapel)  I thought it was rather trendy.  I got it on special offer in Marks and Spencer’s.

 

MAGGIE:Oh this is hopeless.  Where’s Normy?

 

JOHNNY:Out there in the treasury battling it out with Gerry.

 

MAGGIE:Oh God, I hope he isn’t going to do something silly.

 

(Enter Normy)

 

JOHNNY:Here he comes now, and I rather think we’re all going to do something silly.

 

JILLY:You don’t mean……

 

NORMY:Yes, we’re all going to sing a medley.

 

FALLING IN ERM

(In the Style of Marlene Dietrich to the tune of “Falling in Love again”)

 

I often stop and wonder, why stripy shirted men,

Financial markets plunder, sell pounds and buy yen.

We offer them low taxes, but still those city sharks,

With mobile phones and faxes, dump pounds for Deutchmarks.

 

Falling in ERM,

Sterling’s down the drain,

Valueless again,

So don’t hold it.

 

Falling in ERM,

Sterling is the pits,

Norman’s got the shits,

And can’t help us.

 

DON’T FUCK UP THE ECONOMY

(To the tune of “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree”)

 

Don’t fuck up the economy with anyone else but me,

Anyone else but me, anyone else but me (no, no no);

Don’t fuck up the economy with anyone else but me,

We’re screwed financially.

 

We’ve devalued the currency with countries like Germany,

We’ll struggle internally, from now till eternity (no no no);

We’ve devalued the currency to purchasing parity,

With Spain and Italy.

 

WE’LL ERM

To the tune of “We’ll Meet Again”)

 

We’ll ERM don’t know why don’t know when,

But I know we’ll ERM our money pay.

Make Sterling true to the Mark and ECU,

Till the interest rate is ten percent a day.

 

Now we are not in at all,

But the pounds in free fall,

While the Deutchmark’s still strong;

And though Sterling’s now small,

Some of us still recall,

When we used to belong.

 

We’ll ERM don’t know why don’t know when,

It’ll cost us fourteen billion a day.

The above material was used quite a lot, not least the “Don’t Fuck Up The Economy” snippet which found its way into other medleys and even was sandwiched in a Ben Murphy medley in 1993 – I take no credit, nor demerits, for Ben’s other bits:

Here is a link to Marlene Dietrich singing “Falling In Love Again”…

…and below a link to the Andrews Sisters singing “Don’t Sit Under The Apple Tree”…

…and here’s Dame Vera Lynn singing “We’ll Meet Again”:

As Time Goes By or They Flew From Tuscany, NewsRevue Sketch and Medley, 2 October 1992

This version of the sketch/medley came between the prophetic pre Black Wednesday original version – click here…

…and the improved version that was eventually used.

This version for completists only – hence published as an aside.

AS TIME GOES BY or THEY FLEW FROM TUSCANY (A Sketch and Medley of Sterling 1940’s Songs)

 

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

 

John Major (Johnny)

Virginia Bottomley (Gini)

Gillian Shepherd (Jilly)

Norman Lamont (Fartface)

 

THE SKETCH

 

(VOICEOVER:And now, for those of you who missed the early evening show – here is an exert from “As Time Goes By”)

 

(The pianist tinkles away at the Second Movement of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto – a la Brief Encounter.  The music is adagio sostenuto, the voices are staccato.  Paula Tappenden knows all about it.  We start with just Johnny and Gini on stage.)

 

GINI:Johnny.

 

JOHNNY:Gini.

 

GINI:Oh Johnny.  What’s happened to the economy?

 

JOHNNY:Gerry’s giving us a bally barney, Gini.  The pound’s doing terribly.

 

GINI:What about Yankee Doodle Dandy?

 

JOHNNY:Gerry’s giving Yankee Doodle Dandy a bally barney too, Gini.  The dollar’s doing awfully.

 

GINI:Oh Johnny,  this darned economy’s simply ruining all our lives.  I’m sorry.  I’m acting like a bally fool.

 

(Enter Jilly)

 

JILLY:Hello Gini.

 

GINI:Hello Jilly.  Do you know my friend Johnny?

 

JILLY:Hello Johnny.

 

JOHNNY:Hello Jilly.  What do you do for the old effort?

 

JILLY:I’m in employment.

 

JOHNNY:Gosh, that is unusual these days.

 

JILLY:In the ministry.  Gosh, Johnny, economy’s going horribly.

 

JOHNNY:Terribly.

 

JILLY:Awfully.  Where’s Normy?

 

JOHNNY:Out there in the treasury battling it out with Gerry.

 

GINI:Oh God, I hope he isn’t going to do something silly.

 

(Enter Normy)

 

JOHNNY:Here he comes now, and I rather think we’re all going to do something silly.

 

JILLY:You don’t mean……

 

NORMY:Yes, we’re all going to sing a medley.

 

FALLING IN ERM

(In the Style of Marlene Dietrich to the tune of “Falling in Love again”)

 

I often stop and wonder, why stripy shirted men,

Financial markets plunder, sell pounds and buy yen.

We offer them low taxes, but still those city sharks,

With mobile phones and faxes, dump pounds for Deutchmarks.

 

Falling in ERM,

Sterling’s down the drain,

Valueless again,

So don’t hold it.

 

Falling in ERM,

Sterling is the pits,

Norman’s got the shits,

And can’t help us.

 

DON’T FUCK UP THE ECONOMY

(To the tune of “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree”)

 

Don’t fuck up the economy with anyone else but me,

Anyone else but me, anyone else but me (no, no no);

Don’t fuck up the economy with anyone else but me,

We’re screwed financially.

 

We’ve devalued the currency with countries like Germany,

We’ll struggle internally, from now till eternity (no no no);

We’ve devalued the currency to purchasing parity,

With Spain and Italy.

 

WE’LL ERM

To the tune of “We’ll Meet Again”)

 

We’ll ERM don’t know why don’t know when,

But I know we’ll ERM our money pay.

Make Sterling true to the Mark and ECU,

Till the interest rate is ten percent a day.

 

Now we are not in at all,

But the pounds in free fall,

While the Deutchmark’s still strong;

And though Sterling’s now small,

Some of us still recall,

When we used to belong.

 

We’ll ERM don’t know why don’t know when,

It’ll cost us fourteen billion a day.

Parallel Lives, A NewsRevue Medley, 30 August 1992

I was clearly listening to Parallel Ines by Blondie in August 1992…

…and why not?

I wrote my “Picture Tits” lyric (about Sarah Ferguson) on 22 August and then my “Snooping On The Mobile Phone” (about Princess Diana) just over a week later.

It seemed that the princesses were leading parallel lives, so I tried combining the two into a medley…

…I’m not sure it was used. If it was used, it was only used for a week or two. Whereas “Snooping” was used on and off in various rewritten versions for years.

Anyway, for the completists amongst us (that’s probably just me) here is the medley lyric as published.

PARALLEL LIVES

(A medley based on Songs from “Parallel Lines”)

 

SNOOPING ON THE MOBILE PHONE (To the tune of “Hanging on the Telephone”)

 

VERSE 1 – DIANA

 

He’s on the car phone I am calling from the Palace,

I call James squidgy but my other words sound callous,

I hate the Queen, Prince Charles and Princess Alice;

 

Hope no-one’s snooping on his mobile phone,

Snooping on his mobile phone.

 

VERSE 2 – THE SNOOPER

 

I like to listen in on other’s conversation,

I am a banker so I know about inflation,

I intercept the lines and cause a press sensation;

 

That’s why I snoop on mobile telephones,

Snoop on mobile telephones.

 

PICTURE TITS (To the Tune of “Picture This”)

 

VERSE

 

NEWSHOUND:All I want is a picture of boobs;

A shot of Fergie, a nipple or two,

All I want is a picture of boobs;

Wo-oh-oh, wo-wo-wo.

 

FERGIE:All I want is financial advice,

John raises finance, I raise his vice,

What I get is a sensible price,

Oh-oh-oh, if I can…..

 

CHORUS

 

NEWSHOUND:Picture tits – with lenses and zoom tubes,

Picture tits – Fergie’s final boobs,

She’s got nothing to lose,

Since she jacked in Andrew’s,

Quiet life with his feet up reading Beano with a mug of hot cocoa;

FERGIE:Picture tits – and our peccadillos,

Picture tits – sucking ones big toes,

Johnny Bryan says he’s goanna sue,

He will instruct Carter-Ruck,

If the papers claim that we fuck – yeh.

January 1982 Keele/UGC Protest Did Make The Papers, Jon Gorvett Uncovers The Evidence

More than a year after publishing an Ogblog piece about our Keele students’ protest against UGC cuts – click here – I received a very pleasing e-mail out of the blue from Jon Gorvett, who had found the Ogblog piece by chance while having a quiet Google.

He had recently uncovered some old Keele scraps, including the following press clippings:

Page 11 of the Evening Sentinel – can we possibly do any better than this?

Yes we can! Page 3 of the Morning Star

So there we have it. Page 11 of the Evening Sentinel but, more importantly, Page 3 of the Morning Star.

Jon is the young man with the “numerate graduates” placard in the first photo above (naturally Jon has gone on to become a foreign correspondent journalist). Jon is also seen wielding a mallet on the far left of the Morning Star picture.

I can be seen in the first photo struggling to retain hold of both the campus model and my sartorial dignity (wearing THAT donkey jacket). I’m gutted that a photo with me in it didn’t make it to Page 3 of the Morning Star, despite the donkey jacket.

I did once make the front page of New India and the back page of the Bastar Sun for my exploits, but that is an entirely different story – click here.

Of course I am still part of the story in the Morning Star. But still, it’s not my image on Page 3. Close but no cigar.

The compensation for my Page 3 disappointment, though, is to be reconnected with Jon Gorvett. He and his treasure trove of clippings might prove very helpful for future Ogblog pieces about the Keele years. I also strongly suspect, based on our e-mail exchanges over the past couple of days, that I shall very much enjoy his company once our paths cross sufficiently for us to meet again in real life.