John Harris - "Oi, David Cameron, lay off our anti-Thatcherite music"

The plan was for him to have his photo taken in front of the building à la the Smiths, but the local Labour party got wind of the script, and dispatched a pack of activists to foil him. Their placards featured such slogans as "Salford Lads not Eton snobs" and "Oi Dave - Eton Toffs' club is 300 miles that way", and they would not be moved, so Cameron went home without his snap.

That is quite funny tho.

They should have let him do it tho. It'd be Hague and his baseball cap all over again!

8/10, needs a hoodie doing a gun finger.

In all honesty I think it's the ageing indie kids that don't get it - proclaiming the Jam and the Smiths your favourite bands in 2008 is an inherently conservative aesthetic choice to make.

Also it's hardly just Tories who make these sort of politically incongruous choices. David Cameron needs to defend that choice no more than leftish listeners need to defend their listening to, for example, violent or misogynistic rock or hip-hop.

David is a Smiths fan
He's not strange
He just wants to live his life this way

Also that Salford story would have been better had it been genuinely fucked off Smiths fans and not Labour activists looking for a bit of point-scoring.

Repetition of myth that 'anti-establishment music' is anti-establishment

"There isn't much in the way of pro-Tory popular music"

??

Pro-capitalist maybe, but actually pro-Conservative Party?

Billy Bragg, who had recently prepared for the worst by having his picture taken with Gordon Brown at a Fabian Society event...

... 'It'd be great to get a photograph of you and Gordon, I suddenly sat there, thinking, 'Yes! At last! I can send a clear message to the Cameronistas that there's absolutely no chance of them fucking coopting me

Animal Farm

the "doughty" Hazel Blears.

"How Dare Tories Like Music Blears And I Shagged To ALLEGEDLY" by Worzel (Oxon).

Pro-capitalist maybe, but actually pro-Conservative Party?

Wouldn't frame it that way exactly, pro-conservative with small c might be closer to the mark, but sure, they don't want their funds meddled with. They get to support Labour instead and have cake and eat it

LOL at Weller, "Even with that div who's running for mayor - Boris Johnson - there's some things he's said that I've found myself agreeing with, like bringing back the Routemaster buses."

If anyone con't see what a Tory would find attractive in the Jam or Billy Bragg, beyond liking the sounds or whatever, then they're pretty thick.

That doesn't equate to pro-Tory in any publically visible way, though

xpost

Really did think Weller was protesting way too much with the whole "omg Tories liked my old band!?" thing - yes the one that was the biggest in Britain at the time of a relatively new Tory govt, that one

"At least Hitler Boris made the trains buses run on time."

The idea that Cameron would be sufficiently desperate for credibility as to line-up next to Billy Bragg is hilarious. I'm pretty sure the Emily Parrs of this world don't know who Billy Bragg is.

He'll have to make do with Ben Elton or Madness instead.

LOL @ lining up next to billy bragg and the jam. Other ILX grey panthers may remember red wedge and what a success that was at getting the opposition govt into power.

But the kids are 20 years shallower now, Pash.

Cameron with Peaches Geldof and him out The Horrors would be a good photo.

What, to play "spot the tory"?

Actually I bet the whole Brit School mob will turn out for him at the next election. Amy singing "Imagine" - I can just see it.

Mark Ronson to compose their new theme tune.

I'm trying to think of a link between Smiths and Smythsons but am drawing a blank.

Morrissey thought Rymans smelt of sex but I bet he's upgraded by now.

freshly baked ink mmmmmmmm

is David Cameron a fan of The Dears and The Enemy?

Is anyone?

Morrissey thought Rymans smelt of sex but I bet he's upgraded by now.

He meant the Rymans *League*

Mr Brown said he had spoken to the Chinese premier on Wednesday morning and had made clear his view that the violence must end and called for restraint. He said he would be meeting the Dalai Lama when he visits London but the most important thing was to bring about reconciliation and see talks and dialogue.

Mr Cameron congratulated Mr Brown for taking "exactly the right decision" on meeting the Dalai Lama and for not delaying it. Mr Brown responds that "We make the right decisions at all times".

Those two should get a room

That quote is creepy. I think Brown has been replaced by an alien robot.

http://www.doctorwhogear.co.uk/images/CutOutDalekSec.jpg

"WEEE. MAKE. THE. RIIIGHT. DEE. CI. SIONS. AAT. AAALL. TIIIIEEEEMMMZZZ"

they make the right decisions at all times, but they only act on those right decisions some of the times

http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/3592/cybermen2hi.jpg

"THE FUNDAMENTALS OF THE BRITISH ECONOMY ARE SOUND. WE ARE BETTER PLACED THAN OTHER COUNTRIES TO WEATHER THE CURRENT STORM."

Private Eye's Dear Leader stuff to thread.

"BRITAIN IS SAFE! WE USE POUNDS NOT DOLLARS!"

Repetition of myth that 'anti-establishment music' is anti-establishment

-- laxalt, Wednesday, March 19, 2008 10:10 AM (13 hours ago) Bookmark Link

worst old-ilx meme going.

the jam remain shit, however.

[proclaiming the Jam and the Smiths your favourite bands in 2008 is an inherently conservative aesthetic choice to make]

I don't know if 'taste' has to do with 'conservative'

or if it does, so what?

if you like it you like it?

you don't throw it away cos some Spurs fan says it's 'conservative'

What The Smiths mean in 2008:

http://www.topman.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?beginIndex=24&viewAllFlag=false&catalogId=17551&storeId=12555&categoryId=40705&parent_category_rn=38973&productId=525993&langId=-1

;_;

It'll be The Pop Group's "We Are All Prosititutes" t-shirt next, you mark my words... 'cept it'll be Gordon Brown in place of Thatcher

for a second there i thought you meant dave cameron would be *wearing* a 'we are all prostitutes' t-shirt.

Pinefox - I'm not criticising the music on the grounds of being inherently conservative (although I dislike both the Smiths and the Jam). I'm criticising the attitude that both bands are somehow so radical that David Cameron, and Tories in general, still shouldn't be going anywhere near them in 2008. As if it's in some way perplexing that right-wingers should like guitar-bass-drums 80s guitar music.

(I wonder what Cameron actually listened to in the 80s).

for a second there i thought you meant dave cameron would be *wearing* a 'we are all prostitutes' t-shirt.

*hoping some researcher at Conservative Central Office googles this*

As if it's in some way perplexing that right-wingers should like guitar-bass-drums 80s guitar music.

overtly left-wing guitar-bass-drums 80s guitar music tho

(I wonder what Cameron actually listened to in the 80s).

Recordings of police truncheons cracking open striking miners heads, brother

It's a gross out comedy, I hear

One of the most remarkable things about Glasgow is how rare it is to see Glaswegians cry. You meet so many human beings there who are forced to endure the most unthinkable, unconscionable poverty, disease and neglect; and yet invariably they do so with a smile so big and true it breaks your heart. How, you wonder, do people literally grin and bear such horror? Among the many things that makes Paul Coia's documentary We Are Together so moving, therefore, is its observation of Glaswegian grief. Don’t get me wrong, there are laughs galore and plenty to smile about in this uplifting tale of a group of Sydney Devine fans who live at a school called Cowlairs in a village in Parkhead Cross, and who are hoping to come to England for a pillaging tour – the music itself is enough to make the soul soak.

hey, Obama being the American David "Dave" Cameron is my oh-so-hilarious running gag. I don't appreciate my bad non-jokes being co-opted for Conservative political rhetoric.

serious question: who was the last british politician who could have done a speech like obama's on tuesday?

both in terms of awesomeness and oratorical skill.

the current set of barely distinguishable rival factions are an absolute shower -- but i'm guessing you have to look back as far as churchill for rhetoric on obama's level.

[This realised many a sharp vignette from the barricades of the early 1980s. To particularise, I can remember watching them playing "The Eton Rifles" (a song inspired by a "Right to Work" march which, passing by Eton College, had been loudly disparaged by some of the young gentlemen within) on Top of the Pops in the college junior common room one winter night in 1979, and hearing the peacock voice of a well-bred girl named Kathy Shipsey exclaim "Gosh, Hamish, you were at Eton. Whatever are these chappies on about?" What Hamish said in reply was lost in the rousing chorus ("Hello, hurray I hope rain stops play, for the Eton Rifles") but the point was made. Class, never absent from the dappled lawns of Oxford, came capering ominously through the autumn mists.]

'To particularise'!

'peacock voice'? not very nice to say this about her, and name her, after all this time

THE POINT WAS MADE

DJT: "I'm all for consensus and an end to the class-based political antagonisms of the 1970s, which McElvoy's panel rightly deplored"

but i'm guessing you have to look back as far as churchill for rhetoric on obama's level

Warning - Hyperbole Alert

amazing (or maybe not) to see DJT repeating the same non-anecdote with the same characters in each of these articles

such a dullard!

I'm not sure hack Lezard counts as literary, or rather, as Stevie would say, 'litewwawwy'.

[what is this Obama speech, btw, and how come people in the UK have apparently heard it?]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWe7wTVbLUU

He's only a candidate for the Democratic nomination, no reason why people in the UK should have heard it

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=%22Kathy+Shipsey%22&meta=

He mentions her by name in the Guardian and the Indie! No other results for her though. She's too posh for the internet.

serious question: who was the last british politician who could have done a speech like obama's on tuesday?

both in terms of awesomeness and oratorical skill.

Yes the way he blamed nasty foreigners for taking all the country's jobs was so unlike anything we hear from British politicians.

Churchillian

Also cursing radical Islam is unprecedented in modern politics.

Next he'll be getting firmly behind stalwart allies like Israel...

(note, I want Obama to win. I just don't see the awesomeness about saying "blacks are bitter, whites are bitter, lets all hate big corporations and foreigners and terrorists!")

ya boy winnie got behind worse allies

true

http://www.adso.it/uploaded_images/DontBelieveTheHype-703280.jpg

it's not that hyperbole-y -- i'm not seeing any great speeches by post-churchill british politicians being cited here. are there any?

some guy did one about 'rivers of blood', people like that

Best British political speech I can remember in recent times = Ken Livingstone on 7 July 2005.

I'm not for one second claiming Ken as a spellbinding orator or anything, btw.

Hague, Tory Party Conference '96

I seem to remember that virtually every speech Blair ever made was hailed as a great one

That Callaghan one where he sang a little song.

The Jack Straw one where they beat up that Holocaust survivor

Robin Cook, response to the Scott Report

Best British political speech I can remember in recent times = Ken Livingstone on 7 July 2005.

-- Matt DC, Thursday, 20 March 2008 13:10 (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

seconded

"Fight and you may die. Run and you will live at least awhile. And dying in your bed many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance, to come back here as young men and tell our enemies that they may take our lives but they will never take our freedom!"

Alex Salmond, 2007.

hell yeah re Robin Cook

Maybe Ken's team ought to put that 7/7 speech of his on a loop and remind people what London's going to be like under Boris, viz. rivers of blood.

Political music isn't dead, it's just different
Today's musicians create subtler protest songs than their rage-inflected predecessors. Must we keep harking back?

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/music/2008/03/political_music_isnt_dead_its.html

ironically his contemporary examples are like 10 years old

Who wrote that rubbish?

The guy's so shit yopu get an error page if you click for his profile.

He keeps up the Guardian blogger tradition of having his profile pic taken using a camera phone on a breezy day. They don't have Generation MySpace skillz of taking a good self-photo.

at least the error page has the proper guardian logo unlike the main culture page

Proponents of this theory still believe Red Wedge was the pinnacle of political commitment in music

This is so wrong and shit that any further comment is superfluous. Stupid cunt.

They don't have Generation MySpace skillz of taking a good self-photo.

or embedding an elegant fixed background image

Paddy, is this the same Matt Bolton whose taken most of the photos on the website of the indie beat combo Longblonde?

Personally I always quote Van der Graaf Generator's towering Every Bloody Emperor as an example of a great political song for the 21st century:

Well, I think we can safely ignore anything you have to say then

Lol, I'm Paddy now!?!?!?

Nah, the photos are by Matt Bolton of White Stripes alike "No New Yorkshire" group The Sugars. (x-p)

It was either that or Packie. That nickname for people called Patrick seems to have fallen out of favour in the past 40 years. Wonder why.

it is a mystery

http://www.celticcollectorsclub.co.uk/testimonial/packie180597.jpg

In the north I get Paddy which I'm used to, in the south I get Pat which feels weird.

World famous music writer Matt Bolton mentions Super Furry Animals and thereby discouraging me venturing any further into his doubtless radical exegesis.

Alex Ross going to Michael Hann for job interview:
"Yes, all this classical referencing is very CLEVER CLEVER but can you do 100 words on Danny and the Champions of the World as any PROPER TRAINED JOURNALIST has been TRAINED to do instead of self-indulgent blog-style writing? What relevance does Webern's Bagatelles have to my children and local services provided for local people?"

"Furthermore I see from your CV you have not been to an Oxbridge college and that you give no family history of journalism."

(exit Ross sheepishly)

"That'll teach those so-called writers to try it."

worst thing on internet since David Mamet

people just can't WRITE!

Obama departed with gifts including a box of CDs by some of Cameron's favourite British musicians, among them The Smiths, Radiohead, Gorillaz and Lily Allen, and a copy of Hague's recent biography of the anti-slavery campaigner, William Wilberforce.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/26/barackobama.gordonbrown