STEP WE GAILY , GOING FORWARD (2) By Perkin Warbeck

 

The two-bit RTE radio show on which Leo Vee opened his bid for the leadership of the FG Party two and a bit years ago was in Fine, oops, fine fettle yesterday, entirely.

And it came in two bits too: in this, the week of the Manchester Bombings, the first twenty minutes were handed over to a miked-up Fr. Brian who did what Fr. Brian is inlcined to do best : he effortlessly showed himself (yawn, stretch, trouser cough) to be on the side of the Angles.

And so, duly covered all the same with practised ease: from the Acute to the Obtuse, from the Straight to the Reflex, from the Right to the Right On, all the way from Enniskillen to Omagh to Manchester and back again, so he did, by Dad.

Fr. Brian was respectfully addressed as ‘Fr’ by the considerate hostesss (a courtesy not always extended to Catholic priests on all RTE shows, oops, Roman Catholic priests to employ the Paisleyite term so favoured by RTE types) from Minute One to Minute Twenty.

The second forty minutes of the two-bit show featured a Fine, oops, fine fellow entirely who had travelled ALL the way down from Grump Towers in Markethill, County Armagh. This is the county known as ‘The Orchard of Ireland’ and the Not-as-Famous-as-he-would-like-to-be-Seamus (for it was he!) showed and not for the first (and hopefully, not for the last) time that he is still the Apple of his Own Rheumy Eye, so he is.

As he duly did what he does best, proceeded, unhindered, to pat himself on his broad and roomy back in that extraordinatry routine of his known from Malin Head all the way down to the Nine O Clock Watershed as the Dorsal Self-Endorsement. (This, incidentally, comes out in dyslexic text as S.D.L.P.)

It should be pointed out that the hand over from the first distinguished guest to the second d.g. was seamlessly carried out even as it came down in a virtuous exchange of ping pong plaudits backwards and forwards from Fermanagh to Armagh over the airwaves, with Sunday Morning also Coming Down.

The next virtuoso forty minutes was like being transported back to the Malin heady days of Section 31 in the Free Southern Stateen as Seamus, affectionately known as the Ardvaark of Ard Mhaca to his legion of fans in that region, showed himself to be anything but over the, erm, Markethill.

As, untrammelled, Seamus yammered home, in that trademark modest, avuncular, anti-shameless style he has cornered the, erm, market in, and in miniscule detal too, his very own noble, if not prize-winning contribution to peace. He lamented:

-We are much given to commemorating the Past in this country: from 1690 to 1798 (!) to 1916.

And in so doing lamentably reminded us of just how long his absences of late from Sniffy Central on Liffeyside have been. For the Mallon Head would otherwise not have been unaware of the extra four digit number which has been crucially added to the Call Centre of Commemorations in the capital of the FSS:

-1418.

The delightfully deferential hostess reminded us too of just why The Mimsy O’Call Again Show (for it was it !) is so called for the last words of farewell she uttered to her second Distinguised Guest (D.G.) were by way of a welcome to (gulp) call again.

For forty minues were clearly too short a spell to journey back in time for the Spell-binding Seamus

Indeed, there was an element of the last minute Blood Substitution about the improvised introduction of the everready, battery-operated Fr. Brian. Almost as if S.M. had been slotted in to go the full Sixty Mintues. And he who once knew every twist, bend and turn of the S 31 from Armagh down to Dublin in G.O.D’s old time (ie. the Good Old Days) had, sadly, lost his way this time.

So deferential indeed was the thoughftul hostess that she restricted her interventions to his verbal flow by reading out in the manner respectful a selection of the tsunami of, yes, S.M.S’s which inudated the Donnybrook exchange. And which ranged from :

-S’wonderful and s’marvellous to De-lovely, delightful, delicious.

Just like it was a replay of the scratchy yet cherished S.D. L.P. of storied yore. If any curmudgeons (who are, alas, always with us) texted in to point out that the first s’wonderful part was penned by the (gulp) armed wing of the Geshwin Movement then he was given short shrift, and proper order too.

That forty minutes was too short a spell for the journey through time or Fahrt durch die Zeich (as the Germans have it) is evidence by the (gasp) Fianna Failure of the Spell-binding Seamus to utter his aphorism for the ages.

(Hint: it rhymes with Low Earner and Cunning Fail).

No surprised eye-brows so when Mimsy invited him to Call-again ! Nach fada uainn go dtiocfaidh a lá arís.

But that was yesterday, and this is today.

The Day of Daze when the mop flops and the cookie fnally crumbles for Leo Vee. The Day when the Poliburo Vision Contest reaches its, erm, delayed climax. When the Hustings are finally returned to the Dustbins, from which they ought never have been removed.

It has already been mentoned that a stunt had been cunningly but courteously pulled on the two-bit Mimsy O Call-again Show two and a bit years ago. That was when the Closet from which he, Leo, had emerged was double-employed as a, erm, Deposit for his Bid to become the top Bod in Fine Gay, oops, Fine Gael.

Which restless quest of Leo’s raises a question or two.

For should the Fopulists of Fine Gay (for it is they!) win the day (they wil ! they will!) and see to it that their man, Leo Vee, gets to wear the wet teeshirt of Taoiseach, will they have the Gaeity and treat the Free Southern Stateen as some sort of Phil the Outré’s Ball? The Politburo Vision Contest being, ar ndóigh, a derivative, a doctored spin off of the Eurovision Song Contest.

The nation (sic) holds its notional breakfast.

Now, the last time one watched the Eurovision was at least a Chic Ago when that cool cat hoofer on a hot tin roof riverdanced so awesomely well that the interval act was accused of being an accessory, both before and after the fact of stealing the show.

The glamorous Michael Flatley (for it was he !), the ultimate anti-Clement Attlee, was so glam, indeed, that a pincher movement of the glum Galiphate and the glummer Galiban aka the mono-minded minnies of the media south of the Black Sow’s Dyke, clambered over each other, like so many lynchers, to flatly reject him. The pomaded dude was so hounded indeed by the Harpies that never once did let up, that he had to go into hiding in Castle Hyde near the Windy Town of Fermoy in the Re-bel County of Cork, like.

Guys are just not allowed to be purtier than the gals in the deep Ireland South..

Simple as, pal.

Since then one understands that the Eurovision (funny name for a audio contest, all the same) has been hi-jilled by the shrill Gay Commentariat in the Free Southern Stateen who have turned it into an Annual Beano of See no Medievel, Hear only Evil.

The sniffy, cant-riffing  fopulists on Liffeyside had morphed it into a Prissy Hissy Panti Blissy Blast.

Like the Stardust of Pat ‘No Agenda’ Kenny (‘it was Dublin’s Manchester !’) the nightingtale tells his fairy tale, as nostrils like trousers are flared, as if there is no pong like that like a song pong. Which is passing strange, rather.

Wrong, like.

Can this be a portent of what Eirevision can expect to happen should the Politburo Vision Contest 2017 turn out to be a victory for the Harliquinade of Hibernia?

Consider, after all, the following. Saying a good word for the Eurovision (!) Song Contest these days is like composing a a piece of music for a viola in praise of Ebola.

Yet, before the Jesters with their Jade and Jaded Jibes faded into the Forefront of the Free Southern Stateen, got to put their pointed winkle pickers into the Eurovision, the idea stood up. Take for instance, the song which finished third (of ten songs) in the the grim Year of 1958: .

-Volare.

Meaning ‘to fly’ this delightfully impish melody is also known as “Nel blu dipinto di blu” ( literally “In the blue that is painted blue”),

Curiously, the English lyrics of this most popular of all Eurovision songs were penned by Mitchell Parrish who was also the lyricist for Stardust, mentoned in the context of Mncstr by P. Kenny of this, erm, parish.

More to the point, it was later recorded by one, Luciano Pavarotti. Who, incidentally, made his first international appearance in 1963 as a neo-tenor in the same theatre which – mama mia ! – later housed the FSS’s first hosting of the Eurovision in 1971:

-The Gaeity Theatre.

One can only speculate would a latterday L. P. get to sing ‘Nel blu dipinto di blu’ if the current Polituburo Contest finishes with, as anticipated, Leo Vee flying high? Will the Fopulists aka Les Chemiese Bleues, see to it that the FSS is turned into a political Gaiety Theate ?

Where the Deity (as the Gods of the Gaiety are called, sans doute) sneer and jeer in a what’s-another-leer kinda way as they peer over their furbelow balcony at their victims far below even as they ‘award’ a thumbs down and bums up to the hetero Jetro Tulls an unavoidable Nul Points.

1974 was a not insignificant year for Eurovision: it was the year that its greatest justicification won the contest;

-ABBA.

Paradoxically, the Swedish group emphasised the visual as well as the audio, with their garish stage cosutmes – spangly flares, catsuits and platform heels. Predictably, the Fopulists honed in on the visual rather than the audio; in other words, they zoned in on the syle rather than the substance.

 

And what substance there was in ABBA: of the innemerable groups which have emerged in the second half of the Great European Song Book the Swedish group are but one of a handful which one could easily imagine, say, W. Amadeus Mozart tapping his fingers and toes to in appreciation of their intrinsic musicality. He would surely recognise in the uncanny Benny Andersson a kindred spirit.

 

A tsunami of dross does, in fact, justify the nourishing of even one group which is worthy of winning the, erm, equivalent of a musical Victoria Cross. (To put it in terms which even the Fopulists of Fine Gay would appreciate).

 

Naturally enough, ABBA are nowadays consigned by the bog-standard cognoscenti to the basement below such rooftoppers as U2 who put the cac into cacophany and whose sleep-deprived sound is derived from the ear-piercing beep of an Eighteen Wheeler in revese.

 

Clearly, according to the mascara set, ABBA ought to have dabbled less in mere melody and immersed themselves more in Sub-Saharan malady.

 

As already noted, saying a good word for the Eurovision (!) Song Contest these days is like composing a piece of music for a viola in praise of Ebola.

It is probably not at all eyebrow arching to discover that this dissing of Eurovison started in 1971, a year which coincided with the commencent of Sir Terence Woebegone’s career on the wild snide. His ribabld jibing found eventual favour with the Ultimate Queen from whom he got to walk backwards for his Prissy Dismissiveness.

 

Thus, have the Popinjays been allowed by a cowed consensus to hi-jill the Eurovision Song Contest for their annual shrilly ‘bitch’ at an event which doesn’t actually have to be a concelebration of kitch. But could instead lead the Contest to take a sally from the Lillies of the Valley into what ought to be its actual destination, possibly the most undervalued stretch of genuinely real estate today:

-Tin Pan Alley.

The Great Shakes who had a deep understanding of the shallows of the Popijay had an equally informed take on the heights of music:

-The man that hath no music in himself, Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils; The motions of his spirit are dull as night, And his affections dark as Erebus. Let no such man be trusted. Mark the music.

Will Fopulism, the FSS version of Populism, be allowed to do with the Politburo Vision what it has been allowed to do with the Eurovision ?

(To be contd).

 

Comments are closed.