"It is alleged that you did pose as a clergyman in order to carry out sham marriage ceremonies ..."
After the punnery of yesterday's advent cartoon, this one is possibly a little more sophisticated -- by which, I mean that some people didn't get it. Private Eye did though, and it was in the magazine last Christmas.
This cartoon is one of two I've got in the Private Eye Christmas Special and it refers, as I'm sure most of you know, to Fairytale of New York, by the Pogues and Kirsty MacColl.
I love the song (I still have a battered 7in single of it somewhere) but I do find it funny that it has become such a Christmas favourite despite those lyrics.
You're a bum
You're a punk
You're an old slut on junk
Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed
You scumbag, you maggot
You cheap, lousy faggot
Happy Christmas your arse
I pray God it's our last
Like the best Christmas songs, it has an edge of cynicism and melancholy, the latter made worse by the tragically early death of Kirsty MacColl. I was a big fan both of her solo stuff and the contributions she made to records by some of my favourite acts, such as the Smiths and Billy Bragg. She was one of a kind.
