Pass, Shoot, Goal: Football and Music

Football and music: small words that evoke memories of players singing out of tune, or Chas and Dave being dug up ahead of a Spurs appearance in the FA Cup final. Or ‘Back Home’ by the England World Cup squad, that dismal Baddiel and Skinner effort … the list of cultural criminality goes on and on.

Music has often used football for its ill-gotten gains and, on the other side of the coin, the sport has gotten a piggy back from the industry to promote a forthcoming tournament or boost the bank balance of a striker.

But perhaps it isn’t all bad, after all The Fall wrote a couple of songs about the sport.

So, here’s our resident Montrose FC sympathiser Craig Stephen, with the top football recordings of all time:

New Order - World in Motion (1990)

It included a rap and was England’s official World Cup anthem of that year but it’s by New Order, a band that could compile a range of fart sounds, add a drum’n bass beat and it would still be the best track of the year.

I was living in north-east Scotland at the time, and buying this at the local Woolworths would have resulted in pelters from the lads who would have accused me of being a traitor. So it was a furtive buy, carried out when the young shop assistant was someone who didn’t know me and probably knew nothing about football.

New Order had taken a new turn on 1989’s Technique, an album that revealed that they’d been listening and taking drugs to the emerging rave and electronica scene. For this single they teamed up with six members of the England squad for Italia ’90 and comedian Keith Allen. 

Footballers don’t tend to have very good musical tastes so it all made for an interesting session. It has a catchy chorus, a passable rap, a brilliant video and was devoid of much of the pommy arrogance that it could appeal to the masses. And it did. But perhaps not in Montrose.

The Undertones - My Perfect Cousin (1979)

Ostensibly about a family member who's good at everything including table football: "He always beat me at Subbuteo/ 'cause he flicked the kick/ And I didn't know," and the cover of this single features a Subbuteo player about to “flick the kick”. Believe me, that game was popular in the 70s and 80s.

I, Ludicrous - Quite Extraordinary (1988)

Graduates of The Fall school of witticism, I, Ludicrous spewed a handful of football-related songs, such as ‘We Stand Around’ (about hardcore fans braving all the elements and bad players), and ‘Moynihan Brings Out The Hooligan In Me’ (about the odious little shit of a Tory Sports Minister at the time).

‘Quite Extraordinary’ was a piss-take of the BBCs footballing and athletics commentator David Coleman. “Same routine year in year out/ It's predictable every summer/ Mispronouncing the Kenyan runners/ It gets worse in the winter/ with the goddamn videoprinter/ That's Stenhousemuir's 13th game without a scoring draw.” 

Getting the name of an obscure Scottish league side deserves a Brownies badge on its own.

The Proclaimers - The Joyful Kilmarnock Blues (1987)

“I'd never been to Ayrshire/ I hitched down one Saturday/ Sixty miles to Kilmarnock/ To see Hibernian play/ The day was bright and sunny/ But the game I won't relay.”

And the bespectacled Leith duo have also gifted the world ‘Sunshine on Leith’ which is now an anthem for Hibs fans.

Billy Bragg - The Few (1991)

Britain’s favourite lefty muso, Billy Bragg, also wrote ‘Sexuality’ which isn’t about football per se (you may have guessed as such from the title) but contains the remarkable line: “I had an uncle who once played, for Red Star Belgrade.”

‘The Few’, also from the Don’t Try This at Home album, was a grim tale of hooligan firms: “At night the Baby Brotherhood and the Inter City Crew/ Fill their pockets up with calling cards/ And paint their faces red white and blue/ Then they go out seeking different coloured faces/ And anyone else that they can scare/ And they salute the foes their fathers fought/ By raising their right hands in the air.”

Bragg’s ‘God’s Footballer’, by the way, was about former Wolves player Peter Knowles, who retired early to become a Jehovah’s Witness missionary.

Half Man Half Biscuit - I Was A Teenage Armchair Honved Fan (1985)

Written in recognition of Hungarian football, and with the almost obligatory “hungary for” joke, it’s actually not even the best song about eastern European football on the Back Again In the DHSS album.

‘All I Want For Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit’ is mainly about Subbuteo, well, actually, Scalectrix, but Subbuteo gets the gig among the young crowd when the racing game conks out due to a dodgy transformer.

Barmy Army - The English Disease (LP, 1989)

The English Disease (a reference of course to hooliganism) was very much of its time, with tracks such as ‘England 2, Yugoslavia 0’ and a protest song against a plan in the UK by the then ruling Conservatives to issue all football fans with ID cards.

Barmy Army cut and paste interviews and match commentary, using them ad nauseum; expressing their love of West Ham United with snippets of the ‘Ammers theme tune I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles, and songs dedicated to Alan Devonshire and Billy Bonds. 

On a hit-and-miss (the goalpost) album, the strongest moment is ‘Sharp as a Needle’, featuring the Anfield Kop in fine voice.

The Pogues - Down All the Days (1989)

My own favourite football-related song, even if the core subject is writer Christy Brown, is this track from the Peace and Love album, for the line, “And I’ve never been asked, and I’ve never replied, have I supported the Glasgow Rangers,” which can mean many things to many people.

Super Furry Animals - The Man Don’t Give A Fuck (1996)

The Welsh superstars’ expletive-ridden tale of a man who, well, you get the idea. It was dedicated to 1970s Cardiff City player Robin Friday and featured the Welshman flicking the Vs on the cover. Apparently, he really didn’t give a fig, and who can argue with that kind of footballer. It was a great song too, but let’s forget that it used a Steely Dan sample.

The Sultans of Ping - Give Him a Ball and a Yard of Grass (1993)

“If God meant the game to be played up there, He would’ve put goalposts in the air.”

The speculation is that this single was about Nigel Clough. Was he any good?

Primal Scream, Irvine Welsh and On-U Sound - The Big Man and the Scream Meet the Barmy Army Uptown (1996)

Three magnificent talents who utilised those skills in very different ways in this one-off single, Scotland’s unofficial theme tune for the nation’s team’s participation in the 1996 European Championships held south of the border, which ended in predictable glorious failure.

Welsh describes a boozed-up trip to Wembley to watch Scotland play England as opposition supporters chant “who are ya?” in the background, but the writer is essentially hitting out at certain Scotland fans.

“In every hick town/ Across this pseudo nation/ You can see the most fucked up scum/ That was shat into creation/ Where a blue McEwan's lager top equals/ no imagination/ You're hunbelievable.”

Oh, isn’t the mention of the top a reference to supporters of the now defunct club called Rangers? Tee hee, you cad Welsh. 

Gracie Fields - Pass, Shoot, Goal (1931)

And just to prove referencing football in song is not a new fad, Gracie Fields recorded this track before Hitler had even taken power. Fields was apparently a big Rochdale FC fan. The song was written and recorded for a film called Derby Day about a derby match between Rochdale and Oldham Athletic. 

The film was never made but the song survives, with a bedazzling chorus sung in magnificent Lancashire tones: "Football, football, it drives me up the pole. You hear their gentle voices call – pass, shoot... goal!"

Listen here

The Fall - Kicker Conspiracy (1983)

Let’s read what The Fall’s Mark E. Smith himself said about ‘Kicker Conspiracy’ in an interview with Uncut:

"It's about English soccer violence being triggered off by rubbish management and frustration that the game's been taken away from its support, that the English game is so boring there's nothing else to do.”

Like most Smith songs, the lyrics are obscure. It namechecks Jimmy Hill (as J. Hill), Bert Millichip and George Best, but also ‘Pat McCat’, “the very famous sports reporter” ...

The Fall also released a track called ‘Theme from Sparta F.C.’ which contained lyrics in Greek. Here’s some of the most transparent English words: “Cheap English man in the paper shop/ You mug old women in your bobble hat/ Better go spot a place to rest/ No more ground boutique at match in Chelsea/ We are Sparta F.C.”

Trout - Green and White (1995)

This is a single I can't recall buying by a band I had never heard from (nor since). And that's almost the same amount of knowledge as Dr Google has. 

It is gloriously non-produced with incomprehensible vocals - I can detect something about Partick Thistle and “doing the conga” in The Jungle at Parkhead but the chorus is quite transparent: "Green and white and Rangers shite/ Green and white and Rangers shite" repeated several times. And what more would you want in a song?

The single (entitled "A Tribute to Celtic") is shared with electro-friendly act Cha Cha 2000 who's ‘Tired Legs at the End of the Game’ is equally word-unfriendly but I can make out a "Celtic Celtic" chant and some sort of football connection. Somebody out there must know something?

Andy Cameron - Ally's Tartan Army (1978)

Glaswegian comedian and all round gallus Cameron released this wee cracker that even got the supporter of the old Rangers a Top of the Pops appearance when it reached No.6 in the British charts. Comparing manager Ally McLeod to Muhammad Ali was typical of the tongue-in-both-cheeks humour.

Listen to this verse with a straight face: "When we reach the Argentine we're really gonna show/The world a brand of football that they could never know/ We're representing Britain; we've got to do or die/ For England cannae dae it 'cause they didnae qualify."

Scotland lost to Peru, drew with Iran and found themselves out of the tournament instead of winning it.

Morrissey - Munich Air Disaster 1958 (2004)

He used to be an inspiration now he's a flag waver for all the shit political philosophies of the world. But back in 2004, when he was still much revered, Mozza recorded what I think is his only football related song, a tribute to the Busby Babes, the lightning Manchester United side of the 1950s, most of whom died in the infamous plane crash at Munich.

Luke Haines - Leeds United (2006)

The somewhat eccentric Haines, formerly of the Auteurs and various offshoots, wrote this about life in the 1970s of Vauxhall Vivas and Ford Corsairs; of Kendo Nagasaki and World of Sport. "From Wakefield to the Ridings/ To the ground at Elland Road/ At Leeds United they're chanting vengeance, it's a 13-nil defeat on the front page of the Post/ A last-minute substitution but we didn't have the talent/ I was beaten, we were gutted, I was sick as a parrot."

Mano Negra - Santa Maradona (Larchuma Football Club) (1994)

A typical brew of latino, reggae, dub and hip-hop from Mano Negra. There's big drums, tannoyed vocals, the sound of flares, football chants and a certain Argentinian player with a unique way of using his hands during a game. Sounds like Les Negresses Vertes.

Thee George Squares - 74 in 98 (Easy Easy) (1998)

"The official Fortuna Pop! World Cup EP". The A-side featured a “supergroup” of members of Prolapse, The Fabians and John Sims (a band) based around an actual world cup final held at Hampden Park in "92 or 93" in which Scotland beat the United Arab Emirates on penalties after leading 3-nil. 

The B-side, the "Sassenach side" by MJ Hibbert celebrates, as it were, England taking home the ‘Fair Play Trophy (Again)’. It was definitely the poorer cousin to Scotland's entry which when it comes to art and music is usually the case, and to prove how woeful the poms were, they had an image of Jimmy Hill on the back.

Colourbox - The Official Colourbox World Cup Theme (1996)

Despite featuring that same Mr Hill (on the cover, groan), this is actually supremely excellent, an instrumental built around a pumping bass and a horn section, it really does sound like it should be the theme tune for a World Cup highlights programme, or at least a segment featuring cracking goals and other choice moments. The story goes that Match of the Day producers were keen to have this as the soundtrack to its tournament highlights show. I don't care if it's true or not I'm going to tell all my friends that it is.

Pop Will Eat Itself - Touched by the Hand of Cicciolina (1990)

The Poppies were a bang average indie rock band from a humdrum town called Stourbridge; La Cicciolina was a blonde porn star who became an MP in Italy with a small left-wing group. A marriage made in ... ahem. Anyway, the Poppies eschewed their traditional greasy guitar sound for this very 1990 dance track peppered by samples from Bowie, the Human League and Funkadelic that could have been touched by Andy Weatherall. La Cicciolina doesn't have any input into the song itself but does appear in the video looking supremely lovely.

Real Sounds of Africa - Dynamos vs CAPS (0-0) (1984)

The (usually) 11-piece Zairean band who recorded out of Harare, Zimbabwe, also recorded ‘Tornados vs Dynamos’, ‘Soccer Fan’ and ‘Na Alla Violenza’ - likely to be a plea to footy fans. The band, also known just as Real Sounds, were one of the African bands, alongwith the Bhundu Boys, who came to Europe’s attention in the mid to late 1980s and collaborated with Norman Cook.

I haven’t covered everything … how can I? And there are club/band team-ups that are actually quite good, notably Shane MacGowan and Simple Minds appearing on a charity EP, in tribute to Celtic legend Jimmy Johnstone, plenty of songs by Serious Drinking, or more from I, Ludicrous and Half Man Half Biscuit, and an obscure indie trio from Norwich who issued one single in 1991 and who’s name I haven’t made up yet, blah blah blah, but you get the bloody point.

(But you have covered a full first-team squad’s worth, an OCD-defying and curiously symmetrical full score plus two, which in this case, might just about be right. - Ed)