Come on Eileen

Come on Eileen

In 1997 Save Ferris released their hit single "Come on Eileen." Let's take a close reading.

Is that a monster! No, it's an wacky asian guy who you know is going to be a good time. I like this band already! What a guy. Let's be friends. These are plucky amateurs just like you and me. It's just like when your cousin's mate played that one gig out of town that one time. Support your mates, yeah? And who is your mate? That wacky asian guy.

A woman is nurturing a young man. Just like you should nurture this band. Loading up the gear. The ac-tu-al-it-y cuts like a knife. I'm feeling this story.

Middle aged woman holds back young man. Let's pause on that a second. No, the agent is the young man. This is for young people. It's time to step out from the shadow of the people around you. Maybe express an opinion. A good opinion might be "I like this band!"

Now there's a red haired woman driving a bus. And she's singing. What? Wait, the vocals have been in for a while and they're definitely hers. Where's the wacky asian kid? who is this woman? She's no Gwen Stefani that's for sure. Oh. I see what's going on.

Here's our friend the asian kid. I guess all he does is makes that one face. And plays the bass guitar. That's your chance kid. The machine is chewing on you right now and it's going to spit you out as soon as this video's done.

The horns don't match. They're different colours. That's punk. Just the the drum kit of that guy from No Doubt.

This singing lady has a fan pointed at her face. She's supposed to be attractive. This is her big break. She's going to be a pop star, just like Gwen Stefani. She is a pop star just like Gwen Stefani! Except she isn't. She's a blank canvas waiting to be painted. She thinks that the record company are the artist come to paint her story. But they're not. Because nobody can paint that portrait but her, and the great tragedy of her life is that she doesn't even try to paint it. She thinks she's already interesting enough.

Shot of the drummer drumming like a monkey. There is a call back later on for the line "so young and clever" when the camera focuses on him again but that's all he gets. There's your career. Hope you enjoyed it.

Blah blah blah.

When they play their show there's a scene where the audience comes flooding in. At the front of the queue is a blond girl in a fine knitted blue woolen top of the type that high quality middle class girls wore in the 90s. She runs in first because she's excited and also because she's privileged and used to being at the front of the queue. And that's the target audience for this. That's who this is for.

"Hey Dad," she says when she gets home, "Hey Dad, I saw this great band today. It was really neat and I really enjoyed it." "That's great honey," says the father, "what sort of music did they play?" "Well, they had this great song called 'Come on Eileen'." The father sighs. The time has come. He knew it would. That moment when the music industry began to pillage the crown jewels of his private canon. He puts a protective hand on his daughter's shoulder and walks over to the record player. From the cabinet he takes a 7" single and puts it ritualistically on the turntable. He drops the needle, the music begins and the daughter sees in her mind's eye her ancient inheritance.

A violin is cut across by a dotted bass rhythm. Johnnie Ray is waving from the steps of an aircraft. Who on earth is Johnnie Ray? He was as forgotten in Rowland's day as Rowland is now. Rowland's Penny-Lane-esque invocation of his mother's heart throb is a perfect mirror for Save Ferris' lazy cover version of Dexy's master work. As soon as the mirroring manifests the structure of the relationship between Ray, Dexy's and Ferris collapses and for an instant there is flavour and meaning in the world. Then it is gone and we awake from the slumber of gnosis, freed from the dream of agency into a world without form or meaning. The girl is floating. She thinks she can remember her father but what is memory but lies and ego? All that exists now is Rowland's transcendent act of art. This achievement is sufficient to justify a hundred lifetimes. A pure point of light in a dark night's sky.

The girl in the blue wool top floats down towards the industrial housing of a former age. A gang is assembling at the street corner. This is the meaning of society, the manifestation of culture. What does it mean to stand with such powerfully identified people against this dominating backdrop? There is no answer, only change. Come on Eileen. The superposition of possibilities. The possibility of grace. Come on. Will you or won't you? The listener doesn't want to know. They want to feel what it is to stand on the precipice of choice. This man, this leader, this iconoclast, this bastard. Is he worth the cost? The doors he will close and the doors he will open. A giant bird weighs fate. Two girls pass with a baby in a pram. They are the target for sexual intent. This must be Eileen. The burden of her decision sits heavily on the listener. To step from the realm of the ordinary into the other of Kevin's gang. To run away with the circus. To travel with Gypsies. To pass over into the faerie kingdom. Can you trust him? He is far too young and clever. And yet Eileen is already garbed in Kevin's uniform.  Here she is in dungarees, one foot over the magical threshold but refusing to enter. Eileen is the superposition of choice. Eileen is the possibility of grace. Eileen is the distilled central atom of narrative personified.

Slow. The girl in the blue top is walking through the void. She is being chased by a record company executive. He is waving a wad of cash in one hand and a shinkwrapped CD in another. Her pace picks up and she takes a few lurching steps as she begins to run. There is a figure ahead in the mist. It is the asian kid. She is chasing him and sees fear in his eyes. He casts off his hat and wacky glasses and as they fall to the ground she sees a jester's robes and puppet. Turning to look at her pursuer she sees not the record company executive but Eileen herself. The blue girl is sprinting now, fleeing from the instant of choice but she already knows to much. The moment of decision is collapsing. They are all sprinting, the blue wool girl and Kevin Rowland and every musician. You look and see yourself in the crowd and I am there as well. At the back of the peloton there is Johnny Ray as terrified as the rest of them, fleeing from Mrs Rowland who is both in front and behind of Kevin himself. The whole cast of characters, each one chasing the others. The music speeds up and up and the flight grows ever more manic. A moment of pure light and then silence.

She is in the room with her father. She sobs. Her father takes her in his arms and kisses the top of her head. "It's OK," he says, "I forgive them. All of them. Each one as vulnerable as the next. Their ambition, their greed and ignorance. I forgive you, my daughter, and I forgive Dexy's for taking the bargain and creating the cosmic debt that was repaid to them in 1997. Slowly, the girl stops crying. Eventually she looks at her father, smiles, and forgives him too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCzWPBR30Nk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc-P8oDuS0Q