35 Replies to “Tony Blair’s Britain”

  3. “I suppose the Beatles were what, chopped liver?” with fava beans and a nice chianti… But that is another story. If you don’t get it, you have not been paying attention.

  6. It is a great song and it’s also kind of great to see elder lads singing about important things. Not sure this is a call to a return to nationalism, though. Did the singer not give a passing hat tip to other cultures who celebrate their own roots?
    The guy makes a strong point. Maybe if we had stronger roots here in Canada we’d have more Muslims in the upcoming NHL draft, eh?
    I not entirely being an asshat with that remark. If we had stronger roots folks coming here would be attracted to what’s here and more interested in buying in. Good song. Ear worm.

  7. Eastern Paul – you don’t get it? Take a trip to England and have a good look around – you’ll get it. Take a trip to Denmark – you’ll get it. Take a trip to France – you’ll get. Or better yet, stick around in Canada for a while longer – you’ll get it.

  8. Sorry, I don’t get it
    Maybe ya gotta be a Caper or a Newfie to get it. I’m one of the two and liked the song. No bagpipes though. 🙁
    The world needs more pipes.

  10. It isnt a negative nationalism thing. It is celebrate your own roots, others do, and you have nothing to be ashamed of.
    As for dont get it, this singer is saying “english” culture is disappearing…where they used to sing “folk songs” in pubs till 2 am they dont anymore. And all he gets requests for are non english songs. He is speaking from his perspective.
    At the end of the day he is saying why do i need to be ashamed about my background becasue it now almost gone, how can i be “oppressive” anymore (my interpretation).
    This is a positive expression of English ethnicity and culture, but there is underlying edge. This isnt the only example. Give it long enough and there will be a voice but it wont be a positive one. Someone else has said you need to listen to the voters, if they dont find what they want in the mainstream parties they will vote for another who expresses their hopes fears and concerns.
    I do not have an “english” background but the singer is correct. When do we enter the age when it isnt about holding someones head under water to let others swim?

  11. I lived in England for many a year before returning to Canada recently. I love the place, notwithstanding the idiocies that go on there.*
    It is not surprising the English are finding a voice; they are at last realizing that there is bloody well nothing wrong with being English for its own sake.
    I live in the Ottawa Valley and a good part of daily life is conducted in French (a language I love). But here are three gifts from England every Canadian should be thankful for:
    1. Our Parliament.
    2. Our body of laws.
    3. The language in which I write this.
    * I mean, a TV licence? Come off it!

  12. CHILLS. Long time since I got them listening to pop music. Thanks Kate.
    Piper Paul: Yeah, I’m from one of the two places too. I get it.
    Afterthought: And this is how the decay will be overcome perhaps. A groundswell. A resurgence of art, literature, music. The effete elites are into crowd control, merely managing the decline which they think inevitable. (See very long essay Surrender, Genocide… or What? at Gates of Vienna, sneered at by Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs, who also doesn’t get it).

  16. I don’t like the nouveaux-folk stuff. It’s not terribly imaginative. Great Big Sea is the worst of the bunch IMO.
    As for the lyrics – the reason why the song is on SDA – they seem more anti-american and anti-pop than anti-muslim which is what is the real threat to UK culture and democracy.
    Of course much of what is UK tradition came from the celt/roman/norse/gallic/teutonic etc. external influences.

  17. Why do you think the vested powers have diminished the teaching of history in our education system. If a people know not their history it is much easier to mold the future the autocrats desire. History teaches one that the is ‘nothing new under the sun’. But then we can’t teach that maxim for that strays into religion; especially Christianity. That’s the biggest taboo.

  18. Which brings up an interesting point. Why is there so little real Canadian music?
    Maybe “O Canada” is our national anthem only because there was no competition.
    Can anyone name a song about a Canadian city? I’ll start with “Runnin’ Back to Saskatoon” by the Guess Who, other than that I can’t think of a single one.

  20. Well, cities I’m not sure, but places… Alberta Bound, Paul Brandt… The Last Saskatchewan Pirate, The Arrogant Worms!… so many songs out of Newfoundland that I can’t name them all… Canadian Sunrise, Prairie Oyster… so many good songs… I am not fluent in Rap or Pop but there might be a couple from those genre as well.

  21. What about Sudbury Saturday Night and Tillsonburg by Stompin’ Tom? Bobcaygeon by The Tragically Hip?

  22. Rick in BC:
    Wayne & Shuster had “When the Swallows Come Back to Kapuskasing” and “Oh Chicoutimi, What You Do To Me” etc. There is (for real) “Farewell to Nova Scotia” and a Canadian version of “This Land is My Land”.
    Singing used to be a normal form of entertainment in which people participated. Now it is a spectator sport. When I joined the Air Force (back in the Stone Age) we sang around the piano every Friday night – wartime songs, irreverent songs, etc. The new generation would probably be shocked at the Political Incorrectness of the words we uttered and they are the poorer for it. Singing was and should be a social exercise of friendship and entertaining social critique. The singers in the video have it right.

  23. There may not be too much English-Canadian music, but there a fair bit of French-Canadian music. And First Nations music, but you no worries, you won’t be getting that on AM radio anytime soon…
    There is bangra, I think it’s called, that would be Indo-Canadian music. Kate told me Muslims are not allowed to sing, or they will get beheaded, so there is no Muslo-Canadian music, sorry…

  24. Can anyone name a song about a Canadian city?
    Cold, Cold Toronto
    Trooper, 1977
    There’s a cold wind blowin’ and I’m feelin’
    Like I’m banging my head on the wall
    I’ve been around (I’ve been around)
    And still I’ve been nowhere at all
    Cold, cold Toronto
    Is getting on my nerves
    ‘Cause it feels like this Knob Hilton boy
    Ain’t gettin’ what he deserves
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    To leave it all behind
    I’ve been thinkin’ ’bout the love I’m leavin’
    And the empty places I see
    I know it’s comin’, but I’m wishin’
    That it came more easily
    Cold, cold Toronto
    Has hung me on the line
    I’ve found myself up here before
    But I’m climbing down this time
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    To leave it all behind …
    I’ve been thinkin’ ’bout the love I’m leavin’
    And the empty places I see
    I know it’s comin’, but I’m wishin’
    It came more easily
    Cold, cold Toronto
    What can I say
    It feels like that cold wind of yours
    Is blowin’ me away
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    Here I am, makin’ up my mind
    To leave it all behind
    ====================
    I left Toronto in 1989.

  25. I was at Vimy on 9 April 2007 for the rededication of the monument and the 90th anniversary.
    When Sierra Noble played “The Warrior’s Lament,” the effect was electric.

  26. There’s plenty of good, Canadian music if you look hard enough. For a ex-pat Maritimer like me, nothing beats the late Stan Rogers.

  33. Songs about a Canadian city? Stan Rogers had this to say about the COTU:
    “Your scummy lakes and city of Toronto don’t do a damn thing for me.”
    From Stan Rogers’ “Watching the Apples Grow”
    http://www.guitaretab.com/r/rogers-stan/16292.html
    I second the sentiments of Aviator at 1:29 pm. I grew up with this culture too.
    The song on the video was pretty damn good by the standards we’ve had to accept lately. Damn right, I want my flag back.

  34. They dont want boys playing solder anymore they would rather have them play herb gardeners they no longer allow boys to have even pretend guns they want them to prance around wearing pink and be ballaet dancers or playing violins like the dweeb in that picture is doing

  35. “Maybe ‘O Canada’ is our national anthem only because there was no competition.” – “Rick in BC” on April 26 at 12:23 PM
    Oh yes, there was another legitimate entry for our anthem! It was pooh-poohed because it somewhat celebrated the 1759 conquest. Ever heard of “The Maple Leaf Forever”?
    —————–
    “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald […]” Johnny Maudlin at April 26, 2008 5:36 PM.
    A song featuring an American boat named after an American, owned by an American company with an American crew with a planned sailing between two American ports.
    The minor Canadian aspects to the tale are: Canadian singer-songwriter, ship sunk by (likely) a Canadian storm on our side of the line of dinghys, and commemorated every anniversary on Canadian national newscasts with barely a peep on the American alphabet networks.

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