Song Of The Day 7/9/2016: Spitting Image – “The Chicken Song”

British Hits, American Misses II – Spitting Image was a television program (or as they spell it over there, programme) with a bunch of puppets. And I mean a ton of puppets. They made puppets for virtually anyone who was remotely famous in the '80s and '90s. The show took heavy satirical aim at politicians and professional fickleness, taking a fair-sized barrel of piss out of bloated media importance using the most lovably disfigured puppets in the industry. It was a big hit for a while in Britain, but never really caught fire in the U.S. aside from a pretty clever Genesis video. Music was a big part of the show, from "I've Never Met a Nice South African" (which bears a strong resemblance to Squeeze's "Cool for Cats") to "We're Scared of Bob" (which even Geldof found amusing).

They got a 1986 #1 hit in England from "The Chicken Song," a parody of what Wikipedia terms "summer holiday disco songs" that were popular at the time. This category includes Black Lace's "Agadoo," which I'm a little embarrassed to admit I featured here in February 2015. The lyrics are a grade above your usual mindless dance-craze fun box: "Skin yourself alive/Learn to speak Arapahoe/Climb inside a dog/And behead an Eskimo." All stuff we've seen for real at the VMA Awards, am I right Miley?