Back in 2003, Vice Admiral Timothy J. Keating, Commander of the American Fifth Fleet stood in front of the crew of the USS Constellation and warned them that the President was about to order the first strike of the Iraq war.

Of course, being American – and clearly aware he was also standing in front of a bank of TV camera, Keating didn’t use those words. Instead what he said was this…

“When the President says ‘go’… it’s hammer time.”

No, really…

Unfortunately almost no news organisation broadcast the full text of Vice Admiral Keating’s speech, an omission I sought to correct by writing the following for that week’s issue of The Friday Thing…

…

BOUND FOR DA RELOAD: That Call to Arms In Full…

“Well, here we are and here we are and here we go. All aboard and
we’re hitting the road. Because we want to. And you may ask
yourself “Am I right… Am I wrong?” And you may tell yourself
“My God, what have I done?”. Mamma mia! Bend down low, let me
tell you what I know. I’m the leader, I’m the leader, I’m the
leader of the gang, I am. Let’s get ready to rhumble.

You have to show them that you’re really not scared. You’re
playing with your life, this aint no truth or dare. They’ll kick
you, then they beat you, then they’ll tell you it’s fair. So beat
it! The boys are back in town.

It’s the eye of the tiger, it’s the thrill of the fight. Rising
up to the challenge of our rival, Mr Boombastic. The winner takes
it all. Have I the right? I’ve got the power. All kinds of
everything. Great balls of fire, pink macaroons and a million
balloons and performing baboons and… I got you babe. You rock
my world. Oops I did it again.

I heard it through the grapevine… Saturday night’s alright for
fighting. This is what we’ve waited for, this is it boys, this is
war. The President is on the line. And when the President says
‘go’… Stop. It’s hammer time.”

…

I was reminded of that today as I read the press release for a competition being run by Nokia called ‘Music Millionaire’. It’s to promote the launch of their ‘iTunes killing’ (hmmmm) Comes With Music service, and involves inviting writers to compose short stories written entirely in song titles.

They’ve signed up names like Salman Rushdie, Andrew Morton and Hanif Kureishi to submit stories. Here’s Rushdie’s on the theme of ‘Commitment’…

Yesterday - John Lennon
I Saw Her Standing There – The Beatles
The Girl from Ipanema – Joao Gilberto
Venus in Blue Jeans – Jimmy Clanton
The Sweetest Thing – U2
Who Wrote the Book of Love – The Monotones
Then She Kissed Me – Bruce Springsteen
And It Stoned Me – Van Morrison
Crazy Love! – Van Morrison
Don’t Let Me Down – The Beatles

You see?

You can submit your own playlist (’competition’ link) and if Nokia’s judges (including Jeremy Langmead and Dylan Jones (I know)) like it, you might win some kind of Nokia music phone and unlimited downloads of millions of songs.

But fuck the phone and the downloads and all that crap, it’s just fun, and incredibly distracting as I’ve discovered for most of today.

If you do submit a playlist, send it to me as well and I’ll badger Nokia’s PR folks (see disclaimer below) to let me give away some extra prizes based on my own judging criteria including:

- distastefulness
- obscurity of songs chosen
- inclusion of songs by The Barenaked Ladies
- pornographic subtext

Ok Go.

(Full disclosure: Nokia’s PR in the UK is handled by Mission Media who I’ve been advising on their digital strategy; specifically how to talk to bloggers without looking like PR wankers. That’s how I found out about the competition. I’m reluctant to mention campaigns by any of Mission’s clients here, lest I become an ad man’s shill (ahem), but this is just great. Nokia culpa.)