…and the sacking (or “left by mutual concent” as it’s now called) was by Peterborough United, where Barry Fry is the Director of Football, when they found themselves in the relegation zone last season.

Now this “departing of ways” was at a curious time because it was only November, which was well before the traditional time for firings, which is usually after the Xmas fixture congestion.
Yes they were bottom and things were not going well, but this was a manager who had achieved back-to-back promotion for The Posh with only a limited budget. Ferguson was one of the bright stars of young management, seemed to be a very disingenuous way of thanking a man who had got them into the Championship.

Peterborough’s troubles continued for the rest of that season when in January they terminated the contract of Fergie’s replacement a few days after Preston North End, led by their new manager handed the Posh another defeat. After this Jim Gannon was appointed but he couldn’t help them stay in the division and by March (instead of the end of the season as previously announced) Gannon left and Peterborough were relegated back down to League One.

Now these farcical attempts by Peterborough to keep themselves in the Championship (by the hiring and firing of these managers) was watched with interest by some musicians who had just formed a new group.

The group is called ‘Land of Bingo’ and the above events at Peterborough (specifically the firing of Fergie Jnr) inspired them to write something about it….

Before that song a quick bio about who and what »

“Band names are not often inspired by jumpers, but whilst watching an episode of Alaska based TV series ‘Northern Exposure’ two musicians from the equally mountainous north Wales were inspired to form a band. The name ‘Land of Bingo’ was taken from a jumper worn by the character Ruth Anne Miller, and so began collaboration between fellow recluses Haydon Hughes and Rhys Edwards.

Despite growing up in close proximity, they only met each other whilst performing in a cowhouse as part of a music festival which was held in rural Carmarthenshire. Bonding over the fact that both have heart murmurs, these oddballs began to experiment with sounds merged from their solo material. Haydon has recorded as Y Pencadlys and Seindorff, pioneering Welsh language electronic music full of warped imagination. Rhys also known as Jakokoyak – a folktronic project flirting casually with brilliance has released music in the UK and internationally and supported the Super Furry Animals in Japan.

The result is a musical project specialising in off kilter pop gems full of bass driven electronica with looped vocals singing tales as varied as Barry Fry’s audacious sacking of managers and the bizarre National Library of Belarus in Minsk.

They entered the studio in May 2010 to record an EP featuring bass playing by Guto Pryce (Super Furry Animals), drumming by Arran Ahmun (Australian Pink Floyd) backing vocals from Gwenno of The Pipettes and is produced by Kris Jenkins (who is often credited as ‘Sir Doufus Styles ). It will feature 7 tracks, including remixes by international friends, and will be released in November on coloured vinyl with a tour of the UK and Europe to follow.”

This track is here for a LIMITED TIME only. The song will appear on their debut EP, released in November on Peski Records.

More info:

- www.myspace.com/landofbingo   (also on Twitter.)
- www.myspace.com/peskirecords

Extra Time:

Since they mentioned Super Furry and have a sort of link to them… also thanks @hogiani for his mention of the following track, something to accompany the above Land of Bingo tune if you will…
Additionally – since we are also #keepingitpeel :

Ask your Dad or Grandad and they’ll have very clear memories of watching The Gentle Giant:

The 6ft 2in Welsh legend was originally signed in 1948 by Leeds United after a trial and initially played at centre half. In fact in his first team debut (in a friendly against Queen Of The South) he was given the task of marking Billy Houliston, who a few weeks before had run the English defence ragged when playing for Scotland (in a match they won 3-1), but when Houliston was up against the 17-year old John Charles, he never got a shot in and the match ended in a nil-nil.

When playing for Leeds and a couple of seasons later he was put up front and scored twice in his second match at centre forward, but spent the rest of his time at the back. Two years after his professional debut Charles was named in the Welsh national squad and in 1958 he appeared – and scored in the World Cup finals.

Whilst also at Leeds he played a pivotal role in helping them get promoted from the old 2nd Division back into Division 1, but after a terrible fire gutted the West Stand the club were in financial straits so they listened to offers for their star center half-turned striker.

It would be the Italian club Juventus who came calling and they paid a world record (at the time) fee of £65,000 for him. Unlike other British players years later Charles settled very well in Italy and n his five years at Juve he scored 93 goals in 155 matches. He was an intergral part of a side who won the Scudetto three times and the Italian Cup twice.

John was given the nickname of “Il Gigante Buono” because in all his time playing for Leeds, in all his time at Juventus and for Wales, Roma, Cardiff and Hereford afterwards the big near-14 stone centre forward was never cautioned. In his entire career was never sent off.

In 1997 on their club centenary the Juventus fans voted him to be the best-ever foreign player to play for their team. John Charles is still talked about by the supporters at the Stadio Olimpico, even by those who never saw him play.

As mentioned John found himself suited to Italian football and was very at home in Italy. He had a powerful set of lungs on him and we are privileged to be able to hear the great one sing some (gentle) love songs:

» John Charles w/William Galassini Orchestra – Love In Portofino » John Charles – La Fine

Additional:
Some video of the Juventus 1957/58 season, including the arrival of John Charles:

Extra Time:
The Welsh singer Lorraine King sings a tribute to King John which reflects on his life:

Lorraine King – Il Gigante Buono: [See post to listen to audio] Stream only. Find more by this artist here. » A visual representation of the song.

Further reading:

Possibly because they don’t have much to sing about, which is a pity because I would have liked to have seen Ian Rush or Mark Hughes or Ryan Giggs and Craig Bellamy play in at least one major final. (In the case of Bellamy there’s still Euro 2012…?) Aaron Ramsey then.

Wales have already failed to qualify for 2010 but they still have play two more matches. Which will be away to Finland on Saturday and then away to…ah nobody cares.

We are not here to reflect on their current disappointments though, this post is about another disillusionment (I’ve got a dictionary next to me here) when Wales had another disenchantment (ok I’ll put it away) in the run up to the qualifying for the 1998 World Cup. In what is now seen as a dark period of Welsh football the then manager Bobby Gould had public fallings out with Nathan Blake, Robbie Savage (well that’s not difficult), Mark Hughes – and the Manic Street Preachers…

Thanks to Fredorrarci from Sport Is A TV Show who tipped me the nod to remind me of this previous incident. He writes:

“At a Manic Street Preachers gig in Cardiff in 1998, James Dean Bradfield renamed “Everything Must Go” as “Bobby Gould Must Go” for the occasion. (Gould was managing Wales at the time, of course.) It caused a minor stink, I remember: Gould retaliated by criticising MSP (he called them the Manic Street *Peachers*), on Football Focus, I think it was. This was shortly after a BBC documentary about the band, which of course discussed Richey Edwards’ self-harm and the whole 4 REAL thing; Gould had a go at Richey for setting a bad example to the kids. The band responded by criticising Gould for giving stick to someone who wasn’t around to defend himself.”

- Article at the NME which covered this event.

…and the live recording of that song:

[See post to listen to audio] » Manic Street Preachers – (Bobby Gould) Must Go

Extra Time - Have a remix:

[See post to listen to audio] » Everything Must Go (Chemical Brothers Remix)

I noticed I think about three quarters of the way through last season, that the Beeb had him back on 6-0-6 on Tuesday nights. Luckily there was a podcast done of the entire show, so I was able to listen in. (Because of the timezones – I’m in the USA – I catch up with it a day later.) But sadly I thought of something afterwards which I should have thought of back then – I should have saved these pods.

Hopefully for this season they will do the podcasts again (because of my time difference).
The returning show in which Danny will put on his pirate hat and set sail in, will have and Ian Broudie from The Lightning Seeds and Stoke’s long thrower Rory Delap.

Links:
Danny’s old ship on the 6-0-6
» Danny’s new place (imaginatively titled: The Danny Baker Show)

The Music:

Whilst wandering past Danny’s entry on Wikipedia I spotted this curious bit of trivia:

“The song ‘Dethink To Survive’ by British band McLusky finishes with a repeated, screamed refrain of ‘Danny Baker!’ “

There must be a reason why, but either way it led me to discover what is sadly a now defunct band:
Mclusky

[See post to listen to audio]» Mclusky – Dethink To Survive

A few more selections from the 3-piece Welsh outfit:

[See post to listen to audio] » Mclusky – There Ain’t No Fool In Ferguson [See post to listen to audio] » Mclusky – World Cup Drumming [See post to listen to audio] » Mclusky – Undress For Success This one was played 3 times in one show by Colin Murray. [See post to listen to audio] » Mclusky – To Hell With Good Intentions

The first two chosen because of the could be footie related titles.

* If you like that sort of thing then you should definitely head over here.

This next film was a Hollywood vehicle intended to launch someone into future starring roles.

What happens is the person in question was a support in a.n.other movie and subsequently got a lot of notice in this role (c.f: Russell Brand in Forgetting Sarah Marshall) and then the big studios take a gamble by putting together something in which they hope will put the leading actor onto the A list.
And of course make the studio a ton of money as well.

An attempt at this was made with:

Vinnie Jones in: MEAN MACHINE

Previously known for his less than subtle tackles on some others and whilst still as a player Vinnie was paid to front the video: Soccer’s Hard Men which got him into a bit of bother:

…He also was the presenter of the infamous Soccer’s Hard Men video released in 1992, which featured archived footage of himself and many other “hard men” of the game, and included advice for budding “hard men”. After the release of the video, Jones was fined £20,000, banned for six months, and suspended for three years from The FA for “bringing the game into disrepute.” Wimbledon chairman Sam Hammam branded Jones a “mosquito brain”. Jones continued to find trouble. After exceeding 40 disciplinary points he was once again summoned to Lancaster Gate, but failed to appear. The FA banned Jones indefinitely. Jones explained that he had “mixed up” the date of the hearing; the FA imposed a four-match ban and told Jones to “grow up.” Jones commented later: “The FA have given me a pat on the back. I’ve taken violence off the terracing and onto the pitch.”     [source]

He liked this brush with the media and the exposure it gave him. After retirement from playing he subsequently began to appear on various telly programmes as well as a (thankfully) short musical career. [More about that at a later date.]

Then a couple of years later a mate of his who was a budding film director cast him in this low budget, UK made Cockerney caper and thus… Hold on a sec…

Can I get a… on this…? Yes…? Vinnie Jones is now a thespian. A confirmed one at that.

After the unexpected success of Lock, Stock and notice by everyone of Vinnie’s natural progression from a hard man into a err…. hard man, more money was thrown at Guy Ritchie to see if lightning can strike twice in the same place and it pretty much did.

After these two strong showings by Vinnie it was time to see if he could hold up on his own and with Matthew Vaughn, (the Producer of Lock, Stock and Snatch) & Guy Ritchie as Exec Producer they looked at how they could get a quick return on this investment by taking and remaking a well known story and tooling it for Vinnie’s obvious talents. Thus the change the American football into soccer Mean Machine movie was made.

» Click to view some stills from the film

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What’s the film like ? Dunno. I haven’t seen it myself. I’ve looked through a few online reviews and it’s basically what you see is what you get – an English accented remake of the 1974 Burt Reynolds movie The Longest Yard.

The Soundtrack:

Now this is the thing about what is billed as an original soundtrack. It actually is.

Just like the Jimmy Grimble soundtrack this is an album that could exist separate from the movie. If I played the whole CD to you, barring a few songs, you would not guess that this was a soundtrack for a footballing movie.

This compilation is a mix of genres with some familiar pop tunes as well as some obvious linked to footie songs.

A few examples:

[See post to listen to audio] » Krafty Kuts – Who’s Da Man
[See post to listen to audio] » Tin Tin Out -Strings For Yasmin
[Actual footie connection with that one.]
[See post to listen to audio] » Firstborn – The Mood Club
[See post to listen to audio] » Pressure Drop – Dusk

This next one which I’m led to believe was featured in the film but didn’t make it onto the soundtrack:

[See post to listen to audio] » Lo-Fidelity Allstars Feat Pigeonhead – Battle Flag

I’ve grouped together there what would be considered as dance music.
(Going a bit corny here, but these are some banging tunes)

There are some film score tracks on the CD too, which don’t actually sound like your average film score music. Especially when you read the title of the first track and then have a listen to it:

[See post to listen to audio] » Mean Machine Soundtrack – Danny In Solitary
[See post to listen to audio] » Mean Machine Soundtrack – Flight Night

Not what you expect when you think “solitary confinement”

Wrapping this up for now… I might post some additional if you ask nice, but for now a couple of very infectious tunes:

[See post to listen to audio] » Middlerow -Right Proper Charlie
“Bruv ! Are you sure bruv ?!” My favourite of all the tracks.

[See post to listen to audio] » Little T & One Track Mike – Wings

One each from both sides of the Atlantic there. Neither of them like the above (and previous soundtracks) have anything to do with footie. In fact the last one references basketball, but bugger it. I like the tunes.

» Link to video

Is it me or does it look like Jonesy has some hamster cheeks there…?

As it is well known the Welsh like to sing, every Welshman seems to born with a powerful set of lungs. When it comes to song about the national team though they are rarer than hen’s teeth.
Why is this ? It might be because there hasn’t been much to sing about but still… Wales has a fine heritage of musicians so why haven’t more of them done any stuff about their home nation ?

I’ve just found one which so far is the only one I’ve discovered but there has to be more. Come on you Wales fans, all three of you, there must be others out there. Post a comment or contact me if you know – or can send me any.

So with this (at the moment) token effort for Cymru I want to tip my hat to the 1958 Wales team which qualified for the ’58 World Cup Tournament (held in Sweden). This team included the Welsh gentle giant – still a giant in football and a legend of the game – John Charles.

Wales not only qualified but got through to the Quarter Finals where they were knocked out by a single goal scored by one Edson Arantes do Nascimento.

Edson, known better to some as Pele, with the Brazil team went on to win the World Cup.

(Postscript to the Wales v Brazil match – sadly John Charles was injured for this game.)

The song I know nothing about. It’s done by the Wales football squad but I don’t know which one.
- If you do then comments below…

[See post to listen to audio]
» The Welsh Football Squad and Supporters – Wales The Dragons Army