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Sandi Thom :: "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker"I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (2006)
I didn’t think it could happen, but, alas, a human larynx is the progenitor of a sound somehow more annoying than the latest Crazy Frog single. This is no “My Humps.” Not even Dido would touch this crap. This is the sound of thousands of coppers jingling to the dilapidated rhythm of the Britain’s latest runaway singer-songwriter.
Press pullouts neatly set up the mythical backstory: Thom’s career was launched following her sighting by a "multi-millionaire who had recently sold his business and was looking to set up a label." Convinced? Said "manager" then contacted various outlets to inform them of Sandi’s illustrious career streaming her basement Myspace gigs to online audiences of up to 70,000. Or 30,000, depending on which lie dances more trippingly off your tongue. First single, “I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker” shoots to the number 2 spot in the UK, only kept off by “Crazy’s” illustrious eight week run at the top spot.
It's a nauseating song. The lyrics explore new territories on the fringe reefs separating the twin terrains of banality and oblivion; "Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair / In 77 and 69 revolution was in the air." You can’t argue with stuff like this. With it’s insistent tambourine beat and full-bodied, expressive vocals. With the numbskull idea that the cyclic nature of time disintegrated with the Sex Pistols, that PiL were some Rubicon joke. ’69 wasn’t all that hot, anyway.
Alan Baban :: 8 July 2006 |
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