The lyrics in bold type below are from a 1983 track by the Hull group Red Guitars. Entitled "Good Technology" it was the bands most successful release. The words and sentiments are very much of that decade and after recently hearing the grating guitar and staccato delivery for the first time in perhaps 30 years I felt that there was a real case for an update for the 21st Century. The original video can be found on the link below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cs0OkiCZNRI
We've got photographs of men on the moon
We've got some grainy photographs of the farthest planet in our solar system Pluto
We've got water that is good for us
We've got sorts of energy drinks and gels, fully isotonic and sugar free
We've got coffee that's instantaneous
We've got latte, capuccino, chai latte, americano and all in a small home machine
We've got buildings that are very tall
We've got buildings that are very, very tall- even in the UK
We've got cigarettes that are low in tar
We've replaced cigarettes with those electronic vapour efforts
We've got policemen can tell us who we are
What are policemen?
We can reproduce a work of art
We can buy adult colouring in books
We've got missiles can tear the world apart
We've told other nations that they cannot have bad things like that
Good, good, good, good, good, good technology
Oh, you mean The Apple Corporation
We've got trains that run underground
We've got underpaid and exploited Tube employees who are justified in striking
Aeroplanes that fly very fast
Aeroplanes that sometimes fall out of the sky
We've got music that is popular
Don't kid yourself Coldplay
We've got machines that sound like orchestras
We've got machines that have replaced orchestra's
We've got ability to transplant a heart
We're close to being able to transplant a human head
We've got freezers full of body parts
We've not been caught yet
We've got computers that can find us friends
We've got Facebook to make us enemies
We know roughly when the world will end
We know that we might not be able to do anything about it anyway
Good, good, good, good, good, good technology
Oh, just bought shares in Skynet, wonderful organisation building cyborgs
We've got animals with transistors in
We've got animals grown in a test tube
We've got pills that can make you slim
We've got pills to do you in
We've got factories turning frozen chickens out
What's a factory?
We've got ovens that cook in seconds flat
We've got Takeaways that can do the cooking for us
We've got plastics that are indestructible
We've got oceans full of non-degradable man-made materials
We've got deodorants that make us smell of flowers
We've got deodorant based CFC's that are killing off all things in nature
We've got detergents to clean up the sea
We've got a short memory if you read the previous two lines
We've got sounds can turn you inside out
We've got a loss of much of our mid range hearing as a consequence
Sometimes I wonder what it is all about
Sometimes I just despair what it is all about
There's lots of leisure time to sit and work it out
Frankly, that;s the biggest lie and myth of the 21st Century
There's a TV show I've got to see
There's another series of TOWIE to avoid like the plague
Good, good, good, good, good, good technology
Good technology
Good heavens
The album featuring the Good Technology track was reviewed by Melody Maker at the time .."a suitcase full of freshly crafted tunes, intelligent thought-provoking lyrics and razor edged, always cutting sounds...nothing less than astounding"
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