Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Revelatory Moment Of Irony Not Noticed

Interesting choice of soundtrack :

Protestors swarmed on the Gold Coast City Council headquarters in Queensland to vent their anger over a planned Muslim school yesterday as rock anthems blared from loudspeakers.

Almost 200 residents turned out for the demonstration, draped in Australian flags and shouting pro-Aussie slogans while Australian rock classics such as Land Down Under and Great Southern Land boomed across the parkland.

Let's take a look at some of the lyrics from Icehouse's Great Southern Land :
so you look into the land and it will tell you a story
story 'bout a journey ended long ago
if you listen to the motion of the wind in the mountains
maybe you can hear them talking like I do
". . they're gonna betray, they're gonna forget you,
are you gonna let them take you over this way?"

Great Southern Land, Great Southern Land
you walk alone like a primitive man
and they make it work with sticks and bones
see their hungry eyes, its a hungry home
I hear the sound of the stranger's voices
I see their hungry eyes, their hungry eyes
Great Southern Land, Great Southern Land
they burned you black, black against the ground
I'll just take a wild guess here, but whoever loaded up the music was probably captivated by this single line "...are you gonna let them take you over this way?" not realising, presumably, that the lines were about Aboriginals reacting to the invasion of their lands by the English.

The full lyrics are here