In my other post today I was asking where in the world you are so I thought I might add this extra post about our national anthem, since Australia is where I am.
Our national anthem in called Advance Australia Fair and you either love it or hate it. I love it, only because it makes me feel all patriotic, but I understand why people might not feel the same way.
In this clip the hilarious Adam Hills (Aussie sign language) shows us how our national anthem would sound if it was sung in the style of a great Aussie rock icon, Jimmy Barnes and the song Working Class Man.
Barnesy is known for his screaming, drinking and all round rock attitude, and he and his band Cold Chisel are responsible for a few other songs that also qualify for Aussie anthem status. If our real anthem was sung like this…well… we all might come over so Aussie we would explode. Apologies if you like the more serious version.
Buried words and Bushwa. 
omg, I lust had tears rolling down the my face. From both laughing and that weird sense of pride. That was brilliant! Would love to hear Barnsey sing it for real!
I have been feeling that weird sense of pride all day. While I was at work this song kept popping into my head and cracking me up. Not sure if I should feel guilty for encouraging boganizing the anthem though… (she writes, sitting there in a flannie and workboots) People would certainly learn the second verse if this is how they were taught it!
Imagine Barnesy doing it in the Cheap Wine days when the scream was at its best….
lol, cheap wine style – gotta be good. 🙂
He’s brilliant. Love to see him sing my National Anthem though ‘Mae hen wlad fy nhaddau’. What , you thought I was going to make it easy with God Save the Queen? I’m a Royalist through and through but I’m Welsh not English. You can untwist his tongue when you get him home again.
This version is fantastic isn’t it! The real Jimmy Barnes was born in Scotland, another adopted Aussie, and still retains some of the accent. I bet he could give ‘Mae hen wlad fy nhaddau’ a better go than I could! Although if he messed it up you would probably be laughing so hard it wouldn’t matter 🙂
ps. For anyone interested to prove it does exist you can find it on youtube by any number of Welsh Choirs but if you can find the Morriston Orpheus Male Voice Choir, go for it !
LOVE IT! Now this I could sing along to 😀 I wonder if we could put the Dorothea McKellar poem to music too…Men at WorK perhaps?
Next time I hear the anthem at the kids school assembly I will be singing it this way on the inside. I promise not to be skulling a bottle of vodka and screaming the lyrics though!
The second verse goes really well with that music, doesn’t it?
Australians all let us rejoice,
For we are young and free;
We’ve golden soil and wealth for toil;
Our home is girt by sea;
Our land abounds in nature’s gifts
Of beauty rich and rare;
In history’s page, let every stage
Advance Australia Fair.
In joyful strains then let us sing,
Advance Australia Fair.
Beneath our radiant Southern Cross
We’ll toil with hearts and hands;
To make this Commonwealth of ours
Renowned of all the lands;
For those who’ve come across the seas
We’ve boundless plains to share;
With courage let us all combine
To Advance Australia Fair.
In joyful strains then let us sing,
Advance Australia Fair.
I dare you to anything but read it in the Working Class Man tone now!
I’m not sure I want My Country put to music, I love it like it is and it would never be as funny as this, they would probably get some reality show winner to hack away at it for publicity sake and ruin it for eternity! 😦
Ugh – you’re right. I think I got a bit carried away with the moment. Btw I totally forgot to say how brilliant Adam Hills was in that video clip. Good looking, hilariously funny, AND talented 😀
The lovely Mr Hills is good in anythingI think. Not only is he all of those thing you said he is always nice! Never tries to be funny at the expense of someone else, and I really love that 🙂
Me too. He is another who has the ability to be funny without malice. It’s a rare gift I think but all the more precious when it crops up.
BRILLIANT!!! so very brilliant. Before retiring I delighted in teaching my “chickadees” all the words of our National Anthem and we’d sing it proudly and loud. If I was still teaching, they’d learn both versions 🙂 After all, wasn’t I the one who taught all my student’s Johnnie Farnham’s “You’re the Voice”!!! 😀 … thanks this is so so good.
It is a great version and I can imagine that people would be far more likely to sing along with Barnsey than the traditional version. I bet that more parents would sing along at assembly too! 🙂