We’re Not The Band

You’re checking out the festival, you want to catch a show
There’s a lot of acts you’ve never heard, and one or two you know.
You’re looking through the calendar for good ideas and then
You see a name you recognise,
It’s right before your searching eyes:
The band of fairly sketchy guys
They call The Spooky Men.

“Well, that will do,” you understate, “I wonder when they’re on.”
You know there’s barely any time before they’re up and gone.
But Spooky Men are popular, the lines will be appalling
So you better get your striding shoes
And get there early on and choose
A seat, before the endless queues
Decide to come a-calling.

The gig is on at nine o’clock, but now it’s half past four
You’re sitting in your precious seat, on guard like it’s a war.
And we’re up here, a local band you’d never pay to see,
Just playing loud and singing out,
But never in the slightest doubt
That all the crowds that mill about
Aren’t here for such as we…

We’re not the band before the band before the band before The Spooky Men,
You read the bloody programme wrong, they’re on tomorrow night at ten.
We thought we’d have a bit of fun, and maybe sing a song or three —
We’re pretty good, we’ll dazzle you
On fiddle, harp and bass kazoo,
And half a set to still get through,
To plug our new CD.

We did the Wild Rover and you didn’t even clap.
Clearly Maggie May was boring you, you even took a nap.
We travelled Down The Castlereagh, you dreamt the Shearer’s Dream
Oh but nothing we perform for you
Will obviously ever do
We’re clearly nowhere near as Spoo-
-Ky as we’d need to seem.

We’re not the band before the band before the band before The Spooky Men,
You think you’ve got the seat you want, you’ll work it out, I don’t know when
We’re playing all our greatest hits, two hundred years of history
We’re pretty good, we’ll dazzle you
On fiddle, harp and bass kazoo,
And half a set to still get through,
To plug our new CD.

Now an artist has integrity or else he’s just a hack,
Without a certain pride he might as well lay on his back
But we also have our appetites, that only cash can feed
So while they fixed the lights just then,
We had a think, and thought again —
You know, we could be spooky men
To fill our people’s need…

[to the tune of the Spooky Men Theme]
We are the Folky Band
We dream of record deals
Practice mysterious bagpipes
And we can drink beer if we want to
We can drink beer if we want to…

[reconsiders career change]
Naaaah…

We’re not the band before the band before the band before The Spooky Men,
You’ve worked it out, you clever boy, but stick around and hear again
How every song we ever sing is like no other band you’ll see:
We’re bloody good, we’ll dazzle you
On fiddle, harp and bass kazoo,
And amped-up cast iron didgeridoo…
Now buy our new CD!