Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Song for the Socceroos

I got the following email from a Socceroos diehard yesterday and it left me humming for hours and thinking for minutes.

Hey Tony
Seeing as though you’re a media identity – I have a song to be sung in the stands and at the bars
To the tune of Pet Shop boys ‘Go West’…and plays on what was sung in Germany where the crowd would sing ‘stand up for the socceroos’ and repeat that line over and over again and it went nowhere.
I was motivated by the Croatians fantastic singing in Stuttgart main square before the game – earlier that day – we had nothing to match them - except such great lines such as – ‘you’re shit, but your chicks are hot, repeat’ again with the go west melody

Anyway – here we go

STAND UP FOR THE SOCCEROOS
SING LOUD FOR THE SOCCEROOS
FEEL PROUD OF THE SOCCEROOS
IT’S THE TIME OF THE SOCCEROOS

Can you get it out there?
I tried in Stuttgart – wrote it out 25 times on a single A4 page – went to the Stuttgart train station photocopier – printed it off 30 times and then handed out all 700 of them to the Aussie crowd in the bars in the hrs leading up to that famous night. George Negus called me the ‘bearded bard’ at the time! And Tony Wheeler in his book referred to me in some way too

Anyway

Its in your hands now…

Martin

Four years ago I thought I might write a song too. I had heard that Mark Schwarzer's favourite artist was Jimmy Barnes, circa Working Class Man, so a I penned a tribute which begand "Let's all cheer that magic man, Schwarzer!" What followed was a long (and some said painful) celebration of the Australian number one, intricately woven around the lyrics of Khe Sahn, a great choice - or so I believed - because it was a backpacker in foreign pub staple and had been for years. I told a few friends and you know what? It never stuck. For a start it was four minutes long. Secondly, the stutterers I know had trouble with the line: "We're gunna drink in Kaiserslautern all night long".
Despite Martin's comment, I thought my song was bested by the "You're shit, but your chicks are hot" song, which was carried over into the Italy match, and certainly made more sense to me that day.
Other favourite chants along the 2006 way included "You only sing when you're whaling" (at the Japanese) and "One tonne Ronaldo" at the hefty Brazilian bloke.
What I found out with my overwrought Cold Chisel Schwarzer tribute, and Martin will probably learn, is that after several hours drinking in a town square songs need to consist of as few words as possible.
Let's keep track of the chants in SA, if you hear a good one, let us know.

4 comments:

  1. "STAND UP FOR THE SOCCEROOS
    SING LOUD FOR THE SOCCEROOS
    FEEL PROUD OF THE SOCCEROOS
    IT’S THE TIME OF THE SOCCEROOS"

    One word sums that effort up - cr@p.
    Stick to your (stolen) oi oi oi chants

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  2. You'd prefer
    "Ingerlund ingerlund ingerlund, ingerlund, ingerlund, ingerlund..." and on
    ?

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  3. I've always liked Soceroo oos Socceroos, Socceroo oos Socceroos, Socceroos rock Socceroos, Socceroos rock Socceroos! (You get the idea, insert exclamation marks where needed.) Sung to the tune of Gary Glitter's Rock n Roll. Nice and easy to sing after a few.

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  4. Martin - you succeeded in getting it out there - the morning after the Croatia game my husband, still drunk, was standing at Stuttgart train station at 7am with all the business commuters singing it at the top of his voice!!

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