Founding member, singer and lead guitarist of British punk band Chumbawamba, Boff Whalley, hadn’t heard of Winston Peters until Stuff emailed asking if the NZ First leader had permission to use the band’s hit song Tubthumping at political events.
“My first thought was, oh no, not again,” Whalley told the Tova podcast.
Peters joins a long line of politicians who have used the song with the popular refrain, “I get knocked but I get up again, you are never gonna keep me down”, for political events without first seeking permission from the band.
They include populists Nigel Farage from the United Kingdom Independence Party, Clive Palmer who was dubbed “Australia’s Trump” and even – Whalley says -Trump himself before he was elected.
“It’s always alarming realising how these people don’t research anything about what the song is for and who wrote it and what the band stood for, that they’re so stupid that they just think oh, that’s a chorus I can use. It’s like the lowest common denominator,” Whalley said.
Stuff
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