Language | richardsandwell

The Final Countdown.

I know, I could be considered xenophobic for this – after all, this was written by a Swede, and so I should forgive it and walk away from the temptation to rubbish someone’s efforts that aren’t in our mother tongue. But, no – Benny and Bjorn wrote sensible and well constructed English lyrics, Roxette did the same (um….bites lip) and of course, who can forget the classic lyrical gymnastics of the Cardigans (“I need some fine wine, and you, you need to be nicer” is utterly brilliant, in my opinion). The Final Countdown, then, has been knocked and laughed at for so many years, it is almost the “Hi Ho Silver Lining” of cheesy 80’s hair rock – played at the end of the evening by way of lampoonery. Although, thinking about it, interchangeable with any Bon Jovi or Whitesnake track you can care to mention. Poodle-rockers, I salute you all – you have donated a wealth of lyrics to take the piss out of. Mr Coverdale? Back of the queue, sir, you’ll have your own article in due course.

The music – I have no problem with, it is the benchmark for formulaic 80’s rock that is defined as Hair Rock. Poodle rock sounds better to me though. To the lyric then. I can’t be bothered to type out the refrain (some would call it the chorus, but no, it is a refrain , no more) but here is the second verse, I think.

We’re heading for Venus.

Why? Lads, it has a surface temperature of 460c, an atmospheric pressure 80 times that of earth, an atmosphere of dubious gases, and clouds. Lots of them. Are you stupid?

And still we stand tall

Which way is ‘up’ in space, exactly?

Because maybe they’ve seen us, and welcome us all. Yeah.

So, they are looking at us? Who? Venusians? Small rodents called Gerald?

With so many light years to go

Here’s the thing, Joey. I think Venus is something like 25 million miles away from us, and in terms of light years, it is about, give or take a bit – 3 minutes away. That is an epic fail in terms of your astrophysical calculations, right there.

And things to be found

You’re not really getting the nature of space, are you? Empty as fsck, it is…

I’m sure that we’ll all miss her so

Who? You’ve just introduced a random female into the song. Good grief….

It’s the final countdown.

This begs the question what you all sang about in the penultimate countdown, doesn’t it?.

I think I rest my case. If you want space rock, try Brock and Calvert – they’ve been (lyrically) doing it better for years.

Hello children. Today, we are going to look at how the English language evolves. Now, as we all know, there is no English equivalent for the german word “shadenfreude”, so we have adopted it into our mother tongue – this is called a “loanword”. There is a branch of irony (ask a grown-up what that means – although do avoid asking an American grown-up or anyone called Alanis) that I feel deserves it’s own word, so today, boys and girls, I am creating the word Ironfreude, the joy at finding that someone who has been slighted by someone getting their own back in an ironic way.

Now for an example of this, we are going to look at that nice Mr Branson’s desire to acquire a high street presence and look a little closer at his right hand person, Jayne-Anne Gadhia’s background. Jayne-Anne used to work for Virgin Direct, and then moved to the RBS to do – oh, to run mortgage stuff, I think. It is said that RBS, being a dour and unprogressive bunch didn’t care much for an English person telling them how to lend money and so, Jayne-Anne moved back to Virgin. Then she and that nice Mr Branson attempted to acquire the Northern Rock when it got into it’s troubles [*] but they failed to persuade the government to let them have it. Nasty Government. So, having failed to acquire the Northern Rock, and having bought ^h^h^h^h^h established their own banking license, they are now looking for a high street distribution method. That is a bit like having your own sweetshop in every town. What fun!

Ironfreude, then, is the humour found in the discovery that the RBS is being forced to sell 316 branches under EU competition law, and finding that Jayne-Anne/Virgin Money is stepping forward to try to buy them.

It isn’t very often that I find banks funny, but I do love the idea that the most aggressive and acquisitive upstart in the UK banking sector, the RBS (who I have been with since the year dot – the Hotel California of the banking world – when they were Williams and Glyns and they used to send me cheques back with my statements every month. Proper customer service, that was) finally have to sell off some branches to someone they decided to….part company with.

And that, children, is how we get new words in this language of ours. Geoffrey, Bungle? Shall we go and meet Zippy at the gay bar?

[*] Am I alone in blaming that Peston fool for creating the run on that bank? Where is responsible journalism when you need it? In the pub with the same policeman that is never around when you need him either, I expect. Perhaps the teacher joins them every time it snows, I don’t know….

Daft lyrics #2 in an occasional series

Are you ready children? We’re going to learn a new word…