It might be a snap election but that doesn’t mean it’s funky. In fact, general elections are normally a good moment to appreciate just how astonishingly competent most music is. By contrast, election songs tend to be dismal pools of non-scanning meter congealed around dum-ti-dum melodies. Yes, politics and music can mix, but the song has to come first. Independent candidates from Devon trying to crowbar lines about Boris Johnson’s haircut into the tune of Rihanna’s Work seldom make for a pleasant three and a half minutes on YouTube. These are the tracks presently moving the needle in the election soundclash:
Corbyn Riddim (Prod DA)
DA/DecolonisingOurMinds
The best of a bad bunch, mainly because it just involves a straight-up sample of Corbyn giving his boilerplate stump speech about how great it would be if stuff was nice ’n’ that: “If, like me, you believe we can do things a lot better, then help us build support for a genuine alternative,” juxtaposed against standard spacey grime synths and a particularly muscular bass. The Soundcloud account it is linked to mainly contains recordings of lectures on Frantz Fanon and other critical theorists – something Jeremy might enjoy more than this moody head-nodder.
Theresa Ke Saath
Conservative Friends of India
With India’s illiteracy rates still high, election songs have long been important in the country, where they are a useful way to reach some voters. Now, thanks to Conservative Friends of India, the tradition is gaining a foothold in the UK. The organisation’s hit factory has already produced a catchy ditty about David Cameron (chorus: “David Cameron, David Cameron, David Cameron!”), and a confusing number about occasional Tory Zac Goldsmith. For Mrs May, it has adopted the flutey air of the opening credits of a 70s sitcom featuring a roguish neighbour in plus-fours. “For the pride of Britain,” vocalists sing (in Hindi), “let’s join hands with Theresa May – for a strong, stable government!”
LCN – General Election Song 2017
Ria Lina
Comedian Ria Lina begins her video by asking a man at a polling station who she should vote for, then reeling off a long list of incompatible demands. This descends into Lily Allen’s LDN, rewritten. “You might laugh you might frown when you read what Labour wrote down”, she muses. But in the spirit of the bland impartiality implied by a track called General Election Song 2017, she rounds on Theresa May too: “You might laugh you might frown as you watch her playing the clown.” “Yeah, that’s modern times. We demoralise. Lies. Demand compromise. Wolf in sheep’s disguise.” Key message: voting’s mad, but it’s all a laugh, innit?
Conservative “Rules?”
Phil Gray
Phil Gray is a Lincoln busker who is standing for his own Love Joy & Peace party. When Lincoln’s sitting Conservative MP sent round a letter from his lawyers, reminding all his rivals that he had been convicted of nothing in the Conservative election spending scandal of 2015, and that they should not imply otherwise, Gray was struck by inspiration. Though “afflicted” may be a better verb. “Ha ha ha! He he he! Karl McCartney’s threatening me!” he begins, roughly to the tune of nursery rhyme This Old Man.
Liar Liar GE2017
Captain Ska
Ska is already the default sound of cider-crusty protest skanking, so it was the obvious choice for this rapidly assembled collective of seven session musicians who “have performed with Vampire Weekend, Paloma Faith and the Streets”. “Nurses going hungry, schools in decline, I don’t recognise this broken country of mine,” it rants in an easygoing summertime-chill ska style, before rounding on Theresa May, the fibber of the title. Fuelled on social media by its backers, the People’s Assembly Against Austerity, Liar Liar spiked to the top of the iTunes charts, resulting in controversy over whether radio should play it, or whether it contravenes strict broadcast rules on impartiality. It may still contravene Ofcom’s rules on insipidity.
