Info on the show here: tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/nathan-willcock-state-of-the-nathan
The Kinks - Village Green Preservation Society.
I love this song as I think it is simultaneously a scathing satire and a warm homage to the idyllic view of England and the mentality of the little Englander - I imagine the village green sung about here voted overwhelmingly for Brexit.
Such a great song about struggling to make ends meet, how no matter how hard you work, financial security is always out of reach. Also there's a great verse about the rise of the Tea Party in America but could easily be applied to the rise of the UKIP influenced right in Britain. "It's deception how absurd is this/How are so many poor people conservative....Make you think you're taking back your nation/Then they turn it over to a major corporation/Those companies took the jobs overseas/And you handed them the wallet out your pocket for free/You're staring in the sky with dollar signs for eyes/The blind right wing of a bird that can't fly"
A failed Swedish Eurovision entry. Which I hope will now become a rallying anthem for the disenfranchised 48%
A snapshot of the millennial experience, which captures this generation's feeling of hopelessness in facing down humanity’s great challenges as a result of the economic forces stacked against us. That’s how I read it, or it could just be a song about roadkill.
Ezra Furman - Lousy Connection
Further millennial whining.
I talk about William Morris a lot in my show. Darren Hayman set the words from William Morris’s ‘Chants for Socialists’ pamphlet to music, this is the most upbeat song on the album, hence why it's the one on this playlist.
A song ostensibly about a breakup, but it's in here because of the warnings of environmental failings and the line “Goodwill trailing/And all our money running out/ what seemed a good idea has fast become a fraying waste of time” I think, could perfectly be applied to the Brexit experience.
Speaking of Brexit, and songs that sum up my views on it, I present this delightful little number from Goat Girl.
Eight words giving me the green light to wallow...
Most of the problems with our current political situation and discourse summed up in a jaunty pop song from the 60s.
Turns out bankers being dicks has been the case for a while. As relevant today as it was when it was written in 1931. Which is rather worrying…
Future of the Left - The Hope That House Built
“In the end everybody wins, as long as we remember there’s a reason for incredible wealth, incredible luck” is such a cutting critique of modern economics, especially the way he sings it. The other reason I put this in was because I thought that a band called Future of the Left singing “come join our hopeless cause/ come join our lost cause” was a really relevant, if depressing mantra. But since the last election, that's all changed and every thing might be OK...
thanks x
BONUS SONGS!
At the end of the show I talk about the depressing state of the country and myself over this, Caliban's Dream by Underworld, played during the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics. A really beautiful piece of music, which I thought it would be funny to play whilst I talk about how shit Brexit Britain is, everyone liked us during the Olympics, now no one does. LOL.
Firstly the horns on this are a great way to end the show, epic and uplifting as people file out (oh god I really hope there are people.) In my show I talk about how despite being really angry/worried about the world's problems I do very little to try and stop them, also I talk about how I am getting married, and this is a song about being in love and thus not really caring that everything's going to shit.
* I've realised that reading these descriptions it may seem as if my show is really depressing. It's not it is very funny, I can assure you.