Lily Allen: one of the artists talked about in LND Is A Victim
Just as I was getting bored of Dan Le Sac vs Scroobious Pip's Thou Shalt Always Kill - bored by Pip's "poetry" and irritated by the tune itself, and it's only released today - along comes LDN Is A Victim.
It's a similar kind of thing involving a jaunty electronic beat and someone talking over the top, and both tunes have been hammered by the taste-makers on Radio 1. This time around, though, the joke is pretty close to home, as the LDN song is one, long piss-take at the expense of the capital's scenesters. The action kicks off at YoYo in Notting Hill, the club run by Lily Allen's boyfriend, record exec Seb Chew, and the girl herself is there, having a pop at Adele and Kate Nash, in the company of Mark Ronson and Future Cut. Then on to the Garage in Highbury to see the ever-so-hot Remi Nicole.
Jack Penate "and his public school rock'n'roll crew" are also present, "saying things like 'It's soooo rock'n'roll, it's awesome, groovy,' but what do they know, this is middle-class, art school thing, yeah?" And so on ... The point being that the satire is spot on. But is anyone complaining? As yet, no one knows who's responsible for the tune, but LDN Is A Victim can count Lily, Adele, the Klaxons, Mr Hudson and the Library and more - in fact, every act mentioned in the song - among their friends on their MySpace page. Even Jack Penate represents. He does have a problem, but he makes his point so, so politely: "Wicked tune man, thanks for the shout, only problem is I'm middle class!"
The real problem is, as someone who is genuinely excited by all these acts, what am I supposed to make of it? Perhaps it's just a case of this particular scene being a victim of its own success. And waddya know? It's not even the first such satire. The band Hadouken - Home Counties types who went to Leeds University - recently mined much the same territory on That Boy That Girl.
One thing I do know is that the Scroobious Pip tune quickly palled, as did that awful Baz Luhrmann nonsense, Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen). Somehow, the idea that the novelty song has finally been reinvented doesn't thrill me.
