…and listening to our national anthem being tortured by a singer who stretched every syllable to include twenty more notes than Francis Scott Key ever intended. More to the point, wouldn’t it have been just a bit more sly and fun if she’d sung “My Country Tis of Thee” instead of The Star-Spangled Banner?
Sung to the same melody as God Save the Queen:
My country,’ tis of thee,
sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing;
land where my fathers died,
land of the pilgrims’ pride,
from every mountainside let freedom ring!
I wanted to include a recording of this atrocity to share with those readers who were fortunate enough to have fast-forwarded their recording past all the pre-game stuff. I couldn’t find one, so I suppose even YouTube has standards.
It’s bad enough that we are forced to listen to this wretched American Idol-style garbage before games on our own turf. But to hear it in Wembley…
I was saved from total mortification by the sight of David Beckham. That reminded me that at least England bears full responsibility for The Spice Girls.
And if the national anthem weren’t a bad enough omen, the rest of the night was doomed as soon as I saw that Josh Wolff and Eddie Johnson were starting up top. I know it’s a friendly, but don’t you usually at least try to be competitive in these things?
And now we get to play Spain, and…gulp…Argentina.
