The BC Parliament theme

ABOUT 21 years ago, Gary Hector, jointpop’s lead singer/songwriter, gave Lou Reed’s hit from 21 years earlier, Halloween Parade, a Trini twist.

Gary Hector, in his own tune, Basement to Halloween, sang:

“I didn’t mean I didn’t mean/Who tell me to go to a party last Halloween?/Y’Boy dress up/Like a top cop/ Only to make out/ It was a big set-up Cause when I reach to the party scene I find out was last week, was really Halloween/Never go to Halloween party after Halloween/

You’ll get the shock of your life/Still I see Dennis Rodman/Chatting up a nice-nice woman/ Some Jamaican diva/It coulda been Patra/ I see a foreign superstar/He liming with a t’ing like Madonna/.. I see Marilyn Monroe/Look she and the big man’ son, yes, they putting on a side show/I swear I see a Spice Girl/She ent care ‘bout nobody, like she living in she own world/.. And sometimes it does get me sick/My people, like they only on gimmick/And sometimes it does make me grin This country I living in.”

Ad lib. Fade.

Another 21 years or so later, today, looking at our Parliament on this Halloween weekend (and wanting to avoid thinking seriously about TT’s curses) I’m moved to pay a small tribute to Lou Reed and jointpop’s great songs by using their masterpieces to parody our Parliament.

Here then, to the tune (mostly) of jointpop’s Basement to Halloween, is a little ditty I hope will be adopted as the Official TT Parliament Theme.

And it goes-a-little-something-like-this:

“I didn’t mean/ I wasn’t sent Who tell me to go last week to visit Parliament?/Y’Boy dress up/ Tie and jacket/A good suit of clothes does/Cover a multitude of racket ‘Cause when I reach to the jackass scene/I find out Parliament was really Halloween/

“Still I see an exact Yul Brynner ‘Cept lil bit darker, lil thinner/He’s the first man to pelt big stone/‘Cause he sure he not a sinner and he know he not alone/He head shining like a cue ball/And he have a real Mason White Hall crawl/ He really full of style-uh/But he’s snarl like a RottweilerAround he neck is a long silken scarf/But from he mouth the vocabulary is Caricom Wharf/

“I hear one set of hundred-dollar words, like a dictionary explode/But was just a little Pompek barking at traffic on the road/I saw a little imps skinning he teeth at every chance/ “You’re pleased to meet me,” he declared/“I’s Minister of Finance/I raise the price of gas and they still ent riot yet/And what Gates, Buffet & Bezos know ‘bout money/Does add up to less than I forget”/A political mini-Spoiler/‘He want to rise, not fall-uh/But I swear he wouldn’t be there/If he was three inches taller/

“I see a sexy grandma/Leaning sexy on the wall/Like she built for bacchanal/I kinda ‘fraid to get a proposition/From the Leader of the Opposition/I studying to leave fast although I only now just reach/‘Cause if you only talk to she too long/You does find yourself impeached/

“I see a strong man in a tight suit/Muscles straining at the chest/ You know it have biceps in that jacket/Lesbians and all does be impressed/But you know that’s not the thing/That this man Strongy does do best/If you want to find out his real million-dollar tal-lent/ Ask him if he family/ Have any property to rent/

“I see a choonksy little fella/Charcoal grey suit and jet-black hair/He only singing a-capella/To Trump ambassador to here/He begging and he pleading/For the USA to make the PNM make a jail/Something ‘bout Venezuela/And embargo and gas sale/And as he stand so dignify, I realise the thing, but well/Patriotism really is the last refuge of the scoundrel/

“And sometimes it does break my heart/You doesn’t know which part to start/But Explainer done do the explainin’/In Parliament they kicksin’.

Ad lib. Fade. Weep. Reposition nose to grindstone.

BC Pires is singing for his supper as effectively as Sisyphus rolled the boulder up the hill.