[Intro]
And this is Steve Wright, we hope that those that lost relatives in this terrible disaster may be able to have a better life as a result of this great record
This great record
This great record
[Verse]
Watchers pray in times of trouble
Restless by the harbor wall
Waiting for the stormy winds to fall
With microphone and TV camera
Money and tears and a song to sing
This is where the buy and sell begins
For media and for industry
Consumers of the world agree
Nothing sells like disaster, let it be
This manufactured sympathy, drowing in hypocrisy
Smiles to clinch the deals to boost the sales
All the owners of the printing presses
And postars crying phony tears
Nothing bleeds like the hearts of the millionaires
For the charts and the state machine
Consumers of the world agree
Nothing sells like disaster, let it be
Greed and lies and economics
A captains' crew to make the rules
And a band to play the waltz on this ship of fools
Media sales
Media sales
For profit, stars, and company
Consumers of the world agree
Nothing sells like disaster, let it be
Nothing sells like disaster, let it be
What would be better than a real-life disaster, with all the Hollywood-style news coverage and on-the-spot interviews with survivors as they discover the loss of their loved ones? “Quick boys! We’ve got some tears over here! Come on, we’ve got someone actually breaking down! Get that spotlight over here, quick! Oh, come on, quick, they’ve started crying!” Naked emotion at the mercy of the television cameras, and there we have it - the story that gripped the nation. Twentieth Century Fox was in. ‘The Herald of Free Enterprise’ - was this the name of the ship, or The Sun newspaper?
Meanwhile, back at Wapping, what do deaths make? Deaths make paper sales! And so The Sun takes it one step further: "You’ve seen the film, you’ve read the paper, now buy the soundtrack!" The Sun says, “The galaxy of stars on Let It Be all performed free - no one anywhere will make any profits.” Like fuck. Don’t think that The Sun makes nothing from blatant exploitation of misfortune of others. Don’t think that The Sun gets nothing from having it’s name plastered all over the pop charts, and all over the nation’s consciousness. The Sun says, “Go out and buy our disc today, and help wipe away the tears.” And The Sun sheds it crooked old tears, and the nation is brought together by the lowest common denominator for the highest possible sales potential
Five years ago, another ship sank; The Sun had a lot to say about that as well. That time, however, it used a different approach: "Gotcha! Our lads sink gunboat! The Navy had the Argies on their knees last night. The Belgrano and it’s crew needn’t worry about the war for some time now.” When is a dead body a saleable, compassionate product, and when is it a saleable, patriotic product? The Sun, with all its hypocrisy and obscenity, have no problem making the distinction because, quite frankly, it’s full of shit
“But don’t just buy one copy of the record, but another for you family and a third for all your friends! And it’s a great record, you’ll wanna play it again and again, and again, and again, and again.” And again, Rupert Murdoch is laughing all the way to the bank; and The Sun continues to spread it’s own brand of mass-manufactured Thatcher fascism. The Sun know how to capitalise on a crisis - what better way to show their concern? Their concern over the fact that many of the dead were also victims of The Sun’s one pound cross-channel voucher scheme
And what better way for pop stars like Boy George, like Paul McCartney (past victims of The Sun’s front pages) to grovel back into favour and pick up a bit of P.R. work for their own careers and their record companies. And every past pop-idol-turned-pantomime-cabaret-artist crawls out of the woodwork and on to the bandwagon. And even so-called ‘working-class heroes’ like Garry Bushell and Jimmy Pursey get the chance to scab - because they are scabs. All scabs together like Bushell and the rest of the journalists and printers and electricians and drivers who sell their dignity for a bribe and a no-strike agreement during the year-long printworkers dispute
And the scabs sang Let It Be the day Rupert Murdoch throw 5,000 people on the scrap heap. And the scabs sang Let It Be as they crossed the picket line to work behind barbed wire and surveillance cameras of Fortress Wapping. And the scabs sang Let It Be as the riot cops beat the shit out of the people on the Saturday night outside Wapping. And, all the while, pop-scab McCartney sings Let It Be as EMI make the surveillance equipment for the cops, and the weapon systems for the next Falklands War. And the scabs sang Let It Be as the union officials called off the strike, the picket, and the boycott of news internationally. And all the scabs together sing a big, rousing chorus of Let It Be to their boss’s every whim, as they side with government and declaring war on the people - the people who want something more from life than nice wallpaper, crap newspaper, and colour T.V. And the scabs sing the boss’s song as they do the boss’s dirty work, as The Sun arrives every new day. And The Sun says, “Go out any buy our disk, and Let It Be a hit!” And The Sun says, “Turn your tears into pounds.” And The Sun says lots of other things, and it’s all shit: reactionary, capitalist, hypocritical shit
And make no mistake, when Bushell, and Murdoch, and McCartney, and the rest of the scabs start to drown in their own shit, we won’t be starting a disaster fund to bail them out. We’ll watch them choke, and splatter, and we’ll all sing Let It Be
