Our Kid Eh [ECD] - Shirehorses (The)

Author's product rating:   

Originality
Lyrics
Quality and consistency of tracks
Value for Money

Advantages:	funny lyrics, poor/funny music
Disadvantages:	poor/funny music

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Mark and Lard have become my idols over a period of months, and when I discovered that the Shirehorses was actually their band, and not an ongoing joke, I thought I would have to buy and see what was what.

The band line-up is:
Mark,
Lard,
The Dark Prince and
Dick ‘The buttocks’ Scruttock. Right…..

Just looking at the track titles, you know that this is one album to not take seriously. I will write it out later. Well, I would have already typed it out before posting, just that I’ll type it out later from now. My time, not reading time. Forget it, here it is;

If you tolerate the p*ss - Manic Street Sweepers
No big sizes - Radioshed
Ars*holes - Robbie and William
Why is it always Dairy Lea - Dave Lee Travisty
F*cking around - Dave Lee Travisty
Pardon? - Indecipherable Boys
Quorn Medley - Status Quorn
Bellow - Foreplay
A roll with it - Po Fasis
Horny - Chocolate Mousse Tea
Feel like Sh*te - Doofergrass
Country Spouse - Blurb
Tony - M&M featuring Birdie from the canteen
Planet of sound - The Pixiedancers

The idea is that the band has moved through time changing their name as they went along. I say this because on the CD-extra’s, there are three videos - A roll with it, Feel like sh*te and country Spouse - and Radcliffe talks about this. They then accuse bands of doing songs very similar to theirs, and taking names similar also. - A big joke, which does kinda work. The bands who did the ‘real’ songs are guessable, and are follows:

If you tolerate this your children will be next - Manic Street Preachers
No surprises - Radiohead
Angels - Robbie Williams
Why does it always rain on me - Travis
Coming around - Travis
Intergalactic - Beastie Boys (although is more of a general mick-take)
Whatever you want - Status Quo
Yellow - Coldplay
Roll with it - Oasis
Horny - Mousse T
Feel alright - Supergrass
Country House - Blur
Stan - Eminem
Not sure about the last one!!! Any idea anybody?! I am guessing it is the Pixies…

Anyway. This album is not one to take to heart. This is probably a good one to have on… at some point! I have no idea when a good time would be to listen to this album because to appreciate the idea of the album, you have to listen to the words. On some albums you can hear the words and not take them in, not think about them. On here, you have to listen quite carefully to the lyrics if you want to get the most out of the album. You only have to do this a couple of times I suppose, after that you can just have it playing.

The album contains tracks about getting rat-ars*d and p*ssing yourself, being overweight, sharing a bed with a gay bloke, (him wanting you to touch his bits), cheese, a prat (f*cking around), nothing in particular, something, needing to "back off the mike" (radio joke), food and meals, sex, being old, the wife, a fan/stalker and more something!!

To be honest, the music really is bad. I don’t mean your average "this is a poor track", I mean really bad. But that is the idea of it. If you know the Blur song Country House, this version is a perfect example - the introduction of the guitar sliding down the scale is totally messed up by Lard (the guitarist) and is really quite funny. If you want decent music, I advise Muse, (some would argue) if you want a laugh, this is your CD.

The lyrics are also terribly bad. Well, in some ways. They are also extremely funny. You can tell just by the titles of the tracks that they are not serious songs in any way, shape or form, and that these guys really just want a laff, and make a bit of cash out of it too.

Mark and Lard use their radio voices to make the tracks sound funny. They are funny blokes, and the way that they communicate the lyrics (i.e. through half singing, not proper singing) is perfect in all the tracks.

The tracks do not take the mick out of any of the artists really (except indecipherable boys) and the lyrics are all written by Mark and Lard if not by the original artist. The tracks really are about normal day things, and they just try to trivialise them all a bit, and make them funny. Mission accomplished really.

The production is also poor. I think that, although the bands involved (who had their songs changed etc.) would have given Mark and Lard the rights to do what they want, this would have cost them a fair bit of money because of copyrights etc. that they could not really be bothered to spend more money on making the album SOUND good. The poor production does work though, as they do not want to sound to professional I doubt, and this is achieved.

The inlay just gives the disclaimers for all the tracks really, a lot of bands to thank! A few pictures of the boys in their bucket hats and jeans is basically all else.

The CD-extra’s of the three videos recorded live at the Enormodome are pretty good, and give you a good insight into how they are live. I would like to see them I think, would be a good laugh, and I know they do not just perform their tracks, they do some comedy too, and some gags from their radio show such as "I was ‘aving a dawink then" where water does fly as it were.

After "The worst album in the world….ever…… ever" which I must listen to sometime, I think this is much bigger for the band, and as their popularity grows, so will their album sales. With minimal external advertising they must cover costs!

The album can be picked up very cheaply online or in larger record stores for less than ten pounds, I think I bought mine for £8.99 from Audiostreet.

In a sentence this album is, "One to buy for a laugh, and for no other reason because everything on it is poor apart from the humourous lyrics."

Ta

DAN