Football and Music

With apologies to the late great DNA

It was only a few weeks ago when it was high flying Arsenal. Leading the Prem, in the Champions League and on form to take it all…

But the wheels slowly came off.

They put their FA Cup embarrassment behind them, vowing that this wouldn’t happen again and focused on the double.

Then another hit to the body with a Champions League Quarter Final 2nd leg in the fierce atmosphere of the Anfield Stadium. They fought back in that game, playing some of their best football all season, but it wasn’t enough.

Finally the win or bust match last Sunday and the promise from only a month ago finally disappeared.

So what happened ? What should they have done differently ? How could they have continued with their campaign ?

One major factor was with their comparatively small squad. Wenger didn’t spend in the January sales and when the injuries hit them Arsenal had very few options left to them.

This season has turned out to be a long harsh lesson for them, one which they will be sure not to repeat come next August.

Arsene has said that the trophies will come, and next season will probably be the biggest and most pressured one for him.

- Trying to find an appropriate tune to go with this was difficult. Usually when a team or related record a song it is in celebration of being in a cup final or with winning something. But I do have a few that just sing of their pride and I found one that has a doo-wop style:

» Tina and the North Bank - Come On You Gunners (The Arsenal Doo-Wop)

Plus to accompany it - an original 50’s doo wop with a vaguely sporting/footie title:

» Tommy Edwards - It’s All In The Game

In the not too distant near future the suits at the Premier League have their way and now every EPL match is played abroad. But the effect is felt on the local economies of some American cities after they fielded some of the matches.

Boston never recovered from hosting Wigan v Sunderland.
Atlanta was financially crippled after they got Reading v Birmingham and then West Ham v Middlesboro.

At first the impact of the league was instantaneous.
American soccer fans embraced this new craze and after studying the newly franchised BBC archives, they took to emulating their English counterparts with full vigour. In fact it became an obsession. They studied everything. Including the music.

Hoards of replica shirt wearing chav homies roamed the streets looking for some “bovver”. (Even though they didn’t know what it was. Some thought it was the half-time Bovril, others thought it was a new dance).

But eventually this new obsession ate into the culture and left some places in ruins. - There were only matches once every other week and none in the summer. What were they going to do the rest of the time ? What are they going to do with all these pies..?

——–
[SCENE]: An trash filled alley somewhere in Chicago.

A gang of red shirted, baseball cap wearing footie/gangstas enter from one end. They wear an emblem of an 18th century cannon.

From the opposite end of the alley others enter. They are wearing red shiny shell suits with stripes of white down each side. Their emblem is a fabled bird with something in it’s mouth.

The two groups meet in the middle and stare each other down. A kid separates from one of the posse struggling with an 80’s style boombox. He sets on an abandoned car and waits…

Bob Fossil suddenly appears.           “Holy shitsauce we’ve got outselves a rapoff !”

First to step up is the 1988 Liverpool team including Alan Hansen, Jan Molby, Ray Houghton and Mark Lawrenson:

» Liverpool 1988 FA Cup Squad - Anfield Rap (Red Machine In Full Effect)

One nil Liverpool.

Looking for an equaliser is the A Team …

» The A Team - Arsenal Rap

The score is one-all.

Liverpool come back looking to take the lead again:

» Brize-E And The Anfield Posse - Anfield Rap

Ooh did it go over the line..? There’s an appeal… and it’s just given. Dodgy decision there.

It’s Arsenal on the counter attack, they want to level the scores again:

» Steven North and the Flat Back Four - Gus Caeser Rap

…and they smash one into the back of the net with that WTF moment.

With only seconds to go Liverpool are looking for the winner and…

» Liverpool FC - Anfield Rap (Red Machine Dub)

Ah but it’s ruled offside ! No goal !

Fossil blows the whistle for full time and it’s a draw. Neither side won this one. In fact it’s embarrassment all round.

I also liked telling people that I liked going up the Arse. I especially liked their bogs and spent many a pleasant time in there.

Well I mean come on… You’ve been around some grounds and seen some of the troughs you have to pIss in (or in this case, slide down). I myself have visited a number of grounds in my time and as I said I liked it when I got off the Tube at Highbury, turned the corner and there it was.

Most of the clubs had a bit of wedge and could spend (talking about off the field now) some money, but more often than not the budget went on the prawn sandwiches for those posh nobs in the boxes. Little attention was given to us plebs down here who spent their hard earned every week going through the turnstiles.

Then you queued up at half-time to buy a KitKat and that coloured water they called tea, after that you held your nose while you relived yourself before going back to your seat for the 2nd half. But with the Highbury Stadium there was no need to take a deep breath before entering. You didn’t have to look at the fag ends, urinal cake and chewing gum while you emptied the bladder. When you went to wash your hands too, turning on the tap and then taken aback when hot water came out. Hot water ? In a public bathroom ?! Paper towels as well ! Eee… thought my other Northern chums, I could live in here…

But now they have gone. Or have they ? What have the redevelopers done with them ?
Were the fixtures and fittings removed and stored somewhere or were they just taken to the dump ?
What of their location ? Is that bit still there and is it now somebody’s bedroom ?

I looked around and found this blog which has a photo of the East Stand under redevelopment. The blog describes the area :

With Arsenal tube station closed for refurbishment, fan’s heading to the Emirates Stadium need to take the Victoria line to Finsbury Park and then make a fifteen minute trek across the Borough of Islington to the Gunner’s new home. This walk can take you past the old Highbury ground – and what a bizarre sight it is.

All that is left of the 1990’s North Bank is a few steel girders, while the other end, the former Clock End, is completely gone, leaving an uninterrupted view from Gillespie Road across what would have been the pitch to the backs of the terraced houses on Aubert Park to the south…

…The listed Art Deco East Stand and it’s opposite number on the former west touchline are to be preserved, and turned into apartments (700 of them), in a housing scheme known as “Highbury Square”. Where the pitch once lay there will be a communal garden.

(The clock itself, by the way, was moved from the Clock End and installed at the Emirates.)

There is a website where you can view artist renderings of what the place will look like once finish: www.thestadium-highbury.com.

It’s a pity that they couldn’t leave the stadium as it was, do like Real Madrid and create a B team to play there. Or if the Gooners themselves played their League Cup matches there or something. I for one didn’t want to see the place go, but I understand that it was necessary.

On the last home game of last season before they moved out the Arse had a big ceremony and send off. They also had Roger Daltrey, who I didn’t know was an Arsenal fan, compose and sing a commemorative song - Highbury Highs.  [lyrics here]

There was another musical act who wrote and sang about Highbury. This one was done in 1994. The name of the band was “Yeah” . One of those names like The The which is impossible to Google.
However I did have some success in finding more info: There isn’t a website for the band (who existed from the mid to late ’90’s), but there is a website for their lead singer Don Sebastiano.
It’s a bit of a cliché, but Sebastiano is a huge Arsenal fan. He’s recorded songs about the club numerous times. In fact he’s recorded an entire album which you can download via here. Today though we are featuring one track which is now in my list of the best footie&musical songs:

» Yeah - Highbury Sunshine

Extra Time: Have a listen to “Arsene Wenger On Bass” on his MySpace page

Many times you when you hear about a footie players attempt at singing you ask yourself - Why ?
For what reason is he doing this ?
If it is for charity then fair enough. Buy the CD and donate it to an Oxfam shop afterward.

Why do you do it ? What makes you suddenly think (at the time) that you are at the king of all football and everything you touch will turn to gold ? Who is it who advised you ? Was it that ginger Evans ? Did you manager or your agent see dollar signs in their eyes ?

You must - and I’m addressing all footballers here past, present and future - to please sit down and think about it first. Phone your mates. Not your mates who have been around with you when you hit the big time, but your mate mates who knew you back when. Ask them if they think it is a good idea. Ask them - and this is the more important bit - if they think that you can sing.

The answer you’ll get back will always be. NO.

You have the talent with the outside of your boot when you make it curl around two defenders in front of you and just past the keepers reaching fingertips, but you don’t have the same when you stand in the studio reading out the lyrics. Trust me on this, you don’t.

Up next is the first in a series of individual footballers and their attempts to achieve chart success.
I’ve previously posted examples of some other footie players solo efforts, but none of them, as far as I know… I still have to do more research into it… were actual singles released with the aim of pop chartdom. I think they were tracks included on album compilations. But as I said I may be wrong on that. I still have to check.

Another big question is for the people who help these football stars get on record. These people are usually and unsurprisingly already in the music industry. So why ? You muso’s. Why do you do it ?

I think I can understand your thinking. To use a footie cliche - at the end of the day you stand (or sit nowadays) on the terraces watching them play and you imagine yourself in their place. Even though you are on stage and are too performing to a crowd it’s not the same elation as a footballing crowd. In music your fame can be fleeting. Maybe forgotten about a few years down the line. But with football that, on the most part, doesn’t happen.
If you end up in a Premier League team, if you end up playing for England you are remembered. The fans years down the line will talk about the legendary Number 9 and the goals he scored. Something that you, even though you archived stardom in your own right imagined yourself when you were a kid.

In this instance the guilty party who helped commit a musical crime is Chris Lowe of the Pet Shop Boys.

Chris, originally from Blackpool is an Arsenal season ticket holder and obviously must have shared some prawn sandwiches with the players in the lounge after the match. At one of these receptions he got talking to the striker at the time and they must have swapped stories of how he wanted to be a pop singer and the musician told the center forward that he, like many kids, wanted to be a footballer.

It was too late for Chris Lowe now, he was old and the opportunity (arf!) had passed, but he could help Mr Ian Wright Wright Wright record a single. In fact he would write and produce it for him as well…

» Ian Wright Wright Wright - Do The Right Thing

Brace yourself for the middle bit when he stops ’singing’ and starts talking about the media and about the pressure of it all.