Whatever happened to the Zeroes?

The above heading refers of course to the decade we're currently living through which so far has been true to the old Chinese proverb "may you live in interesting times". The pun is on a song by the 1970s pseudo-punk band The Stranglers who by the sounds of things were also living in interesting times back then. The reason this particular ensemble was on my mind was because I acquired a CD of their best-known works which came free with a Sunday paper. I often find myself buying papers I would never normally read let alone buy simply to obtain the complementary CD or DVD which seems to be the trend these days. This particular publication was a salacious tabloid with plenty of scandal and gossip, but very little in the way of news. This mattered little to me as I could scan through it in 5 minutes then dispose of it (in an environmentally eco-friendly way of course - although having said that huge swathes of forest could be saved from the axe in the first place if such rancorous periodicals ceased publication altogether, but that's a discussion for another day) and subsequently enjoy the CD for years afterwards.

It seems that The Stranglers were ahead of their time as demonstrated by one of their greatest hits. Back then when the current Prime Minister of the UK was a mere long-haired student activist protesting against Apartheid and showing solidarity with disgruntled miners they predicted a barrel of laughs under his prime ministerial tenure - "Never a frown with Gordon Brown" as the chorus goes.

The zeitgeist continues into the next song on the collection which seems to be addressing Amy W(h)inehouse - "Strange little girl where are you going?"

Interesting times indeed.