are there any tracks that have radically changed you in any way?...

 

i think the track that possibly changed me most was tom robinson 'glad to be gay'...

 

in the 60's 70's when i was a schooly, gay people (or poofs as they were then refered too) were objects of ridicule, with most tv comedies taking the p*** out of camp, effeminate men. even the great monty python and spike milligan often lacing their shows with gay pisstaking rhetoric. knowing no gay men (no one came out pre-punk, so who nows?) my understanding of gay people was somewhat taken off how they were portrayed on these tv shows.

 

'glad to be gay' however gave me a wretched insight into how life was for many gay people in the 70's. what the comedys didnt tell you was the way gays were really treated, beaten up, mocked, openly hated, hospitalised.... as if a good thumping could change your sexuality!

 

 

 

The British Police are the best in the world

I don't believe one of these stories I've heard

'Bout them raiding our pubs for no reason at all

Lining the customers up by the wall

Picking out people and knocking them down

Resisting arrest as they're kicked on the ground

Searching their houses and calling them queer

I don't believe that sort of thing happens here

 

Sing if you're glad to be gay

Sing if you're happy that way

 

Pictures of naked young women are fun

In Titbits and Playboy, page three of The Sun

There's no nudes in Gay News our last magazine

But they still find excuses to call it obscene

Read how disgusting we are in the press

The News of The World and the Sunday Express

Molesters of children, corruptors of youth

It's there in the paper, it must be the truth

 

Sing if you're glad to be gay

Sing if you're happy that way

 

Don't try to kid us that if you're discreet

You're perfectly safe as you walk down the street

You don't have to mince or make bitchy remarks

To get beaten unconscious and left in the dark

I had a friend who was gentle and short

Got lonely one evening and went for a walk

Queerbashers caught him and kicked in his teeth

He was only hospitalised for a week

 

Sing if you're glad to be gay

Sing if you're happy that way

 

So sit back and watch as they close all our clubs

Arrest us for meeting and raid all our pubs

Make sure your boyfriend's at least 21

So only your friends and your brothers get done

Lie to your workmates, lie to your folks

Put down the queens and tell anti-queer jokes

Gay Lib's ridiculous, join their laughter

'The buggers are legal now, what more are they after?'

 

Sing if you're glad to be gay

Sing if you're happy that way

 

imho this was far closer to the real life of gay people in the mid 70's then the often horrendous charactuers the tv comedies depicted ....

Has to be Meat is Murder by The Smiths.

 

It was one of the reasons I gave up eating meat.

I'd say three songs that helped to shape me politically, religiously & socially:

 

The Special AKA - Free Nelson Mandela (1984)

 

XTC - Dear God (1987)

 

Elvis Costello - Tramp The Dirt Down (1989)