Last week, our Music Supervision team was sent “The Official 2010 FIFA World Cup Album”. I know…we could barely contain our excitement either. It seems FIFA have been putting their name to a glut of songs from Shakira’s “Waka Waka” to K’Naan’s “Wavin’ Flag”, the latter isn’t even on the album. How can it be that there are so many so-called Official World Cup songs?
This year we’ve been granted the power to choose our own World Cup song, as there is no FIFA approved song for England. So, left down to popularity (surely the fairest way rather than whoever gives FIFA the most money!) we, the British public, have chosen “Shout For England” by Dizzee Rascal and James Corden. Like it or not, this has topped both the iTunes chart and the official UK top 40 this week.
The closest English competition came from…yes you guessed it, “Three Lions ‘98” at no 10 in the UK top 40. Terry Venables came a not-so-close 3rd with “If I Can Dream” coming in at 23, which The Sun has picked up as the soundtrack for its World Cup Campaign. They should possibly have taken a leaf out of Coke’s book who really did their research and sent out detailed briefs to get sent a list of 55 songs. Coke finally landed on K’Naan’s “Wavin’ Flag” which is arguably the most globally popular World Cup song this year:
So, if we can choose our own World Cup song without FIFA’s help, why can’t the rest of the World? For a start there’d be far fewer official songs, and maybe there’ll be one that the whole world can get behind and enjoy without the clutter of all the other FIFA approved tracks.
Matt Lee, Music Supervisor
soundlounge
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