So here we are in the UK entering a general election period. Not before time if you ask me (and a significant chunk of the country, I suspect). But it’s probably fair to say that the reputation of politicians of all stripes is at something of an all time low. Which reinforces the eternal relevance of this song.
By 1992, XTC were not the quirky spring chickens they were when they first burst onto the post-punk scene in the late 1970s. A studio-only band since singer Andy Partridge’s breakdown during a US tour in 1982, the band had taken a winding road through the 80s, including recording under a pseudonym (The Dukes of Stratosphear), but they were always somewhat at odds with the musical zeitgeist, and commercial success was an increasingly elusive proposition.
That position didn’t change with the release of 1992s Nonsuch album. Against a musical landscape where dance music was increasingly the standard lingua de franca, and where guitar-based music was now equated to grunge, XTC’s persistent clinging to songcraft and melody felt like an anachronism. But Nonsuch did receive a positive critical response (“XTC makes alternative music for people who don’t like ‘alternative music'”), and it led off with this cracking tune.
How this wasn’t a hit amazes me (one week at number 71 is all it achieved in the UK), but it didn’t really fit with the times. Initially inspired by a decaying jack-o’-lantern that Partridge had carved and placed on a fence post in his garden at Halloween, he began to feel sorry for it, and started thinking about “what would happen if there was somebody on Earth who was kind of perfect … God, they’d make so many enemies!”. The video (see below) for the song makes some very obvious and specific references to both John F. Kennedy and Jesus Christ, but Partridge has always insisted that the lyrics are more fable than fact – hypothesising what would happen if somebody came along and spoke the truth, encouraging humanity and humaneness, love and sharing and giving – and reaching the (somewhat cynical, but borne out by history) conclusion that the powers-that-be would ultimately put them down.
The song did reach a somewhat wider audience when it was included – via. a cover version by Crash Test Dummies – in the 1994 comedy film Dumb and Dumber. It’s a fairly faithful cover, although to my ears lacks some of the bite of the original.
So here we have the songsheet. It’s the same key as both the XTC and the Crash Test Dummies versions, and I don’t think there is too much tricky in there. One or two slightly unusual chords, but not hard ones. This feels like a song that (unfortunately) is somewhat timeless, so give it a go. And enjoy!
Uke Tunes 