I didn’t have a television set between 1990 and 1999, so I probably wasn’t the most suitable person to write a critique lyric on the BBC.
There are one or two good ideas in there, not least the muddle you can get into when trying to be even-handed, but it’s unsurprising that this lyric was, as far as I know, never used.
Bits could be recycled still, though…
BBC
(To the Tune of “ABC”)VERSE 1
Do, do, do, do-do-do, do, do, do, do-do-do,
We pissed off Mr Aitken,
Which we’ve never, never done before;
We simply said that he’s paid by Mr Al Fayed,
And he made on Iran’s last war.
But now we’re duty bound to show you {show you, show you}
That we are unbiased {we cannot be biased}
There’s graft in Labour too,
We’ll also show the sleazy things that the Liberals do..CHORUS 1
BBC, we offer neutrality,
We’ll show it repeatedly, one-two-three, times to see, sleaze equably.
BBC, Charge a big licence fee,
Show a repeat or three, BBC, That’s how great TV can be.MIDDLE EIGHT
Tories trail dismally, blame the BBC,
Alan Yentob knows the way to sort it out,
Suppress half of the programmes and just watch the talent fleeing out.VERSE 2
FROM RIGHT: The Tories are in disarray,
FROM LEFT So the Labour party must be split;
FROM RIGHT: And now John Major takes the rap, the public say he’s crap,
FROM LEFT: So Tony Blair must be a heap of shit.
ALL: Now old John Birt is goanna show you {show you, show you},
How to make it pay {make a cut a day};
He’ll bump up licence fees,
And sack broadcasters who have got the nerve to disagree.CHORUS 2
BBC {it’s easy}, Broadcast unbiasedly {we report unbiasedly},
Else we get mad Tories, Crazily, claiming we’re to the left of C.
BBC {it’s easy}, It’s simply accountancy {it’s just counting beans you see},
Less creativity, BBC, And that’s the state of our TV.
And it’s not the way it has to be,
BBC, crap TV!!!!
The lyric is based on ABC by the Jackson Five: