Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard visited the White House on Wednesday and gave President Obama an iPod. Imagine the joy on the manchild’s face when he saw the iPod, assumed he was being re-gifted the same iPod he gave Queen Elizabeth and got excited about the thought of being able to listen to his own speeches again.
No such luck. Gillard’s iPod was filled with an assortment of Aussie music, including some anti-American songs from Midnight Oil.
The Sydney Morning Herald explains:
As the lead singer with politically edged Aussie rock band Midnight Oil, Peter Garrett railed against “US forces”.
Now the Oils – whose singer is a minister in the federal Labor government – feature on US President Barack Obama’s iPod.
The music player, chock-full of Australian pop and rock music, was a gift to the American leader from Julia Gillard on her first visit to Washington as Prime Minister.
While US forces doesn’t feature on the iPod, the Oils songs include King of the Mountain, Blue Sky Mine, Beds are Burning and Short Memory – a lament of the superpower’s interference in nations such as El Salvador, Cambodia and Afghanistan.
Unfortunately, the most Aussie of all Aussie rock songs, Men At Work’s Land Down Under, was not included. So we’ll do what Julia Gillard didn’t do and offer it here.
Hell of a lot better than an Obama speech.
And, c’mon, Julia, what about the very first international hit by an Aussie artist, Rolf Harris’ Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport?
Source: Sydney Morning Herald
