There were red faces galore the other night at the Swiss TV channel SRG during the Germany-Austria Euro 2008 match. Someone had the bright idea of subtitling the national anthems. Unfortunately, that someone was using an outdated lyric book, as the German anthem came with the words, “Deutschland, Deutschland über alles… (Germany over all)”. Yep, the infamous first verse which was amputated after the second world war for being too invasive (the anthem has since been reduced to the third verse).

According to Associated Press, “The full anthem was written by poet Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben in 1841, and expressed a yearning for unity in a splintered nation.” It was particularly dear to the Nazi’s hearts, who were hurting after the embarrassment of the First World War. The third verse is a call for “unity, justice and liberty for the German fatherland” - an altogether more PC sentiment.

What’s funny is that it is based on a tune by the composer Haydn who was… Austrian (just to add insult to injury).

But I have to ask: if it’s so embarrassing to subtitle national anthems, should we be singing them at all?

A perfect pop band (Superbus) playing a perfect pop tune (”Heart of Glass”). It doesn’t get much better than this on a rainy Friday. But what about the words?

Once I had a love and it was a gas
Soon turned out, had a heart of glass
Seemed like the real thing, only to find
Mucho mistrust - Love’s gone behind

Once I had a love and it was divine
Soon found out I was losing my mind
It seemed like the real thing, but I was so blind
Mucho mistrust - Love’s gone behind

Well, it’s pop music isn’t it? Easy to remember, easy to sing. It’s interesting to note that the expression “Heart of Glass” is not in the chorus. The only thing I can knock is the “mucho mistrust” phrase, which is quite a mouthful if you’re in a hurry (or foreign).

Apart from that, we are close to pop perfection. What do you think?

The funny thing is that Blondie were largely known as a New Wave band, and this track was added to the album “Parallel Lines” just to add variety. “We didn’t expect the song to be that big,” according to composer and guitarist Chris Stein. “We did it as a novelty item… It’s not selling out, it’s only one song.”

To check more Superbus tracks, visit

My, my how times change. This item covered in journals such as Forbes and the International Herald Tribune, no less, is an indication of two things. The first is the importance of words. The second is the increasing number of women in armies around the world. The story they are covering is the announcement of the US Army’s West Point military academy to accommodate the many women that have attended it - and died in action. PC? A fair tribute? Here’s what I think…

The army has traditionally been the reserve of men. But perhaps starting with armies such as Israel and later Iran, women have been taking a far greater role over the past few decades. But what to do about army songs such as “Alma Mater” and “The Corps”. After attending the funeral of a female, Superintendent Lt. Gen. Franklin “Buster” Hagenbeck felt that singing, “Guide us, thy sons…” was a little inappropriate. At a ceremony commemorating the 30th anniversary of women being admitted to West Point, he listened as the female alums sang lyrics that included, “We sons of today, we salute you.”

So Hagenbeck has been considering changing expressions such as “the men” to “the ranks” and “we sons” to “the corps”.

It doesn’t seem much to ask for the contribution women are being asked to make, and doesn’t change the core message. I salute the idea.

If you’re fast, you can probably catch the music biz chat show that goes out live from the pretty island of Malta. Thursday at 19.30pm GMT (20.30pm Europe) you can watch the latest edition of new music industry TV chat show “Let’s Talk Music”, co-sponsored by SongLink. Hosted by Tony Moore, this week’s show is on the subject of Artist Management, with special guests Ann Barrett, Lionel Martin, soul diva Kym Mazelle (singing live) and others. To watch it live go to One TV and click the PC logo top right of screen to open the player.

The New York Times ran a short piece about the then 16 year-old Gail Renard who snuck into the bed-in organised John Lennon and Yoko Ono in Montreal in 1969. At one stage, she witnessed some 50 people sing “Give Peace a Chance”. Choirboys included Timothy Leary and Allen Ginsberg as well as Petula Clark. Lennon handed Renard a lyric sheet of the song when leaving, saying “one day they will be worth something”. At an upcoming auction, Sotheby’s has estimated the something to be in the region of $400-600,000. This is a hefty chunk. But it must be pointed out that at most auctions of this kind, lyrics only rarely meet the estimates. It’s the actual authors’ rights that bring in the money.

If you’re a regular reader, you are probably aware that I have come to the conclusion that most anthems are dark, mean-spirited affairs. When they’re not calling for the spilling of blood (Ireland, France), they are stomping on other people (like the infamous sixth verse of “God Save the Queen”). It looks like someone in Florida actually sat down and looked at their state song again, and the result is not pretty.

Their state song, “Swanee River”, is another old Tin Pan Alley concoction (yup, like “Danny Boy”) written by someone who had never seen the river, misspelled its name (on maps it’s clearly written Suwanee River) and simply imagined a “darkie” far from home longing for the “de old plantation”.

ll de world am sad and dreary,
Ebry where I roam,
Oh! darkies how my heart grows weary,
Far from de old folks at home

Like any song that you heard as a child, some people still like “Swanee River”, warts and all, and are pushing for a simple re-write of the lyrics. But as far as keeping it as a state song, I know which way my vote would go. As local blogger Gregory Lewis says, there are better choices - notably something written by a Floridian!

Check what some locals have to say here. Incidentally, I have now introduced anthems as a category all its own. Check the link above.

I sometimes wonder if there’s a large book with complaints one can make about Eurovision entries that people pull out every year. French MP Jacques Myard is complaining that France’s Eurovision is partly in English. Post-modern dandy Sebastien Tellier’s “Divine” is in English (of sorts). Almost predictably, a number of politicians have taken it upon themselves to chastise the television company and label for choosing it.
The complaint is an old one: why is France representing itself in English? It’s a good enough question, as Edith Piaf’s biopic continues to generate huge interest in chanson around the world. But it’s also a pointless question. Lots of artists perform in English these days.

It’s just a shame Tellier couldn’t find a lyricist, and resorted to stream-of-consciousness drivel such as:

Oh oh oh
I’m alone in life to say
I love the Chivers anyway
‘Cause Chivers look divine

…
Oh oh oh I’m
Looking for a band today
I see the Chivers anyway
I ‘ll be a Chivers guy some day
In my mind

Yegads. Here’s a good candidate for misunderstood lyrics! As one of the posters on the YouTube page said, “At least if we’re going to win, we’ll do it in style.” Amandine de le Richardière is credited as co-lyricist.

Britain’s Jarvis Cocker, formerly singer of Pulp, is to make an appearance at the Brighton festival on May 23. He is programmed to “explore the function of the lyric in popular song” (as it says on the website). Jarvis will start from the position that ’song lyrics don’t really matter’! From here he embarks on a celebration of his craft, putting his own lyrics under the microscope alongside firm favourites from Leonard Cohen and Pete Doherty to Hot Chocolate and Amy Winehouse. Including an in-depth analysis of Richard Berry’s notorious rock ‘n’ roll anthem “Louie Louie”. Trouble is, the event is sold out already.

Here’s something that I have basically being saying for a good while: the lyric sites are by and large spam. You’ve probably checked sites for lyrics and noticed that they often same very basic level of information, a few words. There is very rarely any information about who wrote the songs, nor who the publisher is, nor (in general) who has covered the song, nor info about translations. So by Google’s standards, most are spam as they consist of automatically generated pages of copied information with no added value.
It’s a sad state of affairs. But maybe Google will sort out the boys from the men, according to this article. Check Search Engine Land. The music publishers are also approaching the sites about licensing their material, which will cause them to look at their “business model” a little more closely.

By the way, we also have a user-rated lyric search engine. You can also paste in your website if yuo have a music-related site or blog:

Grab this swicki from eurekster.com

I can’t resist a plug for the TV series “Vermist/Missing”, taken from the film of the same name directed by Jan Verheyen. It will debut on Belgium’s VT4 channel every Tuesday from March 25 at 9.30pm. I wrote the track that plays out over the end, “Waiting”, with the series composer Steve Willaert. It’ll be available soon as a download. We also wrote a song for the episode called “Kika”.

For more about “Vermist” (one of the biggest grossing Belgian films last year), visit VT4.be. To buy the DVD collection of the TV series, visit Proxis.

I can’t say that I was disappointed to hear that the song “Danny Boy” has been banned from an Irish pub in new York for the month of March in the run-up to St. Patrick’s Day. Despite having a reputation as one of the quintessential Irish ballads, it’s another pure product of Tin Pan Alley.

The song was written by an English lawyer Frederick Weatherly in 1913, based on the traditional Irish melody “Derry Air”. Apparently, he had never even visited Ireland. It went on to become a hit when recorded by opera singer Ernestine Schumann-Heink in 1913. despite being massively popular in new York, it is rarely sung in Ireland - which has enough big ballads without importing others.

“Danny Boy” is, nonetheless, a classic weepie although it’s not clear whether it is a lover or a mother speaking to the departing Danny. Who could resist the maudlin sentiment of:

And if you come, when all the flowers are dying
And I am dead, as dead I well may be
You’ll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an “Ave” there for me.

“Danny Boy” has been the subject of a book by Malachy McCourt.

Visitors from Northern Ireland might want to check out the upcoming Belfast Nashville Songwriters Festival when US and Irish writers will be hooking up between February 20 ad 24. Nashville’s Don Schlitz will perform several of his 24 #1 hit songs including, “When You Say Nothing At All”, “The Gambler” and “Forever and Ever Amen”. Pat Alger performs his hit songs and Kevin Gordon, Ralph Murphy, Victoria Banks, Eliza Lynn and Tony Kerr all make the journey from America. “Heart On My Sleeve” and “Breakaway” writer Benny Gallagher is coming as is Ricky Ross of Deacon Blue, Chris Difford of Squeeze, Swedish songwriter Tobias Froberg, John Power and Dougie Maclean (’Caledonia’). Visiting American artists will join local writers on stage to perform solo and ‘In The Round’ concerts. Ben Glover, Bap Kennedy, Cat Malojian, Anthony Toner, The Delawares, Charlie McGettigan, Wally Page, Janet Holmes, Kevin Doherty and Paul Casey are all taking part. For details, visit Belfast-Nashville.