The Twentieth Century, In One Song

Well, pop-pickers, it's Christmas, and how better to celebrate it than with a song which neatly illustrates how 1914-1989 (or, in the lyricist's view, 1914 to date) is a continuum.

Jona Lewie, "Stop the Cavalry"

Hey, Mr. Churchill comes over here
To say we're doing splendidly.
But it's very cold out here in the snow
Marching to and from the enemy.
Oh I say it's tough, I have had enough,
Can you stop the cavalry?

I have had to fight almost every night,
Down throughout these centuries.
That is when I say, oh yes yet again,
Can you stop the cavalry?

Mary Bradley waits at home,
In the nuclear fallout zone.
Wish I could be dancing now,
In the arms of the girl I love.

Dub-i-dub-i-dum-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dum-dum-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dum-dum-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Wish I was at home for Christmas.

Bang goes another bomb on another town
While the Czar and Jim have tea.
If I get home, live to tell the tale,
I'll run for all presidencies.
If I get elected I'll stop
I will stop the cavalry.

Dub-i-dub-i-dum-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dum-dum-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dum-dum-dub-i-dum
Dub-i-dub-i-dum
Wish I was at home for Christmas.

Wish I could be dancing now,
In the arms of the girl I love.
Mary Bradley waits at home,
She's been waiting two years long.

Wish I was at home for Christmas.

Let's get one thing straight here: I loathe and detest Eric Hobsbawm for his hate filled, apologistic diatribes (or "Age of Extremes" as they're known) and his support for murderous dictatorships (as long as some socialist promised land is vaguely in sight somewhere - the Soviet Union must have been alright because, er, it had fewer prisoners than the US in 1989: that's his logic and it stinks like my farts) - but on this, he's right. 1914-1989 is better than his view of 1914-1991 (I think he said that so he could see the back of Thatcher and Reagan) - but I take his point that the war fever of 1914 is of a piece with Threads, and the population cowering underneath mattresses while they listen to or watch Casualties.

Why does the murder of Franz Ferdinand fill me with fear? Not only because of the unadulterated slaughter it helped to start, but because it so nearly led us to total destruction as well. When I posted earlier this week on "getting to grips with the twentieth century", I didn't mention this: but in my view Jimmy's mum and dad die as part of a series of psychoses, already existing, unleashed by that shot and built, sometimes lovingly, often carelessly, until this point where "we don't want the whole street blowing up while you're away" is a line of humourless irony in the face of total annihilation.