"I used to think that if you had an acoustic guitar that meant you were a protest singer".
Never have truer words been spoken. Sung. Whatever. Woody Guthrie set the tone with his guitar and the slogan 'This machine kills fascists'. Many more followed; brandishing an acoustic guitar and acerbic lyrics to swing the spotlight onto topics that mattered to them. Pretty soon it became obvious that as soon as an acoustic guitar was taken out people knew what to expect. But we Brits were more cunning than that. Much more. A bitter pill is much easy to swallow when it's sugar coated. So political pop pills became a very British way to protest, and boy are we good at it. From Billy Bragg to The Wonder Stuff, pop songs took on the establishment, got under the skin of political masters and in general made a nuisance of themselves. And, if in the process of doing so, they could get themselves banned from the airwaves then that was even better.
But some pop protesters managed to get their message across under the radar, in a Trojan horse and incognito. The Housemartins were one such band - they dressed up their political slogans in fast paced, guitar driven pop music and it sold. Now I'm not suggesting that those that bought the music were oblivious to the fact that many of their hits carried a political message. I'm not. Honest. But a lot of casual listeners may not; focussing instead on the upbeat music.
Take 'Flag Day' for example. On the outside a very charming pop song but take just a little notice of the lyrics and a sharp song about fund raising and the great wealth of the monarchy is revealed.
'Get Up Off Our Knees', 'Sheep', 'Me And The Farmer', 'Build'...... great songs with equally great messages.
If there was a message in 'Happy Hour' it was wasted on us as teenagers. We were too busy singing along. I remember being on the coach to our very first school camp in 1986 and the entire back of the bus was singing the song as it played on the stereo and we wound our way along the valley. What a good place to be and a great start to the trip.
So the next time you are casually humming a song you heard on the radio. Just take a moment and think - you might have just swallowed a political pop pill.
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