World Cup Theme Songs

This week marks the commemoration of the event that inspired England's most well known International theme tune - The Dam-Busters.

While the song was originally meant to commemorate the brave men of 617 squadron it has become universally known as a tune to taunt the Germans with at international matches, But what other World Cup songs have we had? Here I take a look at the past and give my opinion on if they were good or awful.

World In Motion - Probably the best England song ever. Fresh from their success with True Faith, Blue Monday and Bernard Sumner's Electronic collaboration with Johnny Marr and Neil Tennant New Order tried their hand at writing an England Football song with Comedian Keith Allen and came up with an inspired dance-floor hit. Combining Sumners earnest singing with a John Barnes rap was the perfect recipe for a number 1 hit. - OUTSTANDING

Three Lions - The Lightning Seeds and Baddiel & Skinner tried to replicate New Order's success for Euro 96 and were in general successful however subsequent new remixes of it have been a bit repetitive and it is released again this year with Robbie Williams lending his vocals. - GOOD BUT OVERPLAYED

Jerusalem - Released by Keith Allen (this time as Fat Les) he teamed up with Alex James from Blur and Damien Hurst to produce a rousing version of this classic hymn. A Remix By Pet Shop Boys was released to clubs with great success. - OUTSTANDING

Back Home - The first official song was a fairly standard sing-along affair from the England squad setting a precedent for less than harmonic communal singing - CATCHY BUT CHEESY

Vindaloo - Another Fat Les offering it was another catchy anthem for World Cup 98. The song was inspired by an incident on a BBC politics show when Keith Allen said to a minority spokesperson It's not a chip you've got on your shoulder, it's a vindaloo!" explaining to press reporters that a vindaloo is as faux ethnic (this piece of Goan cuisine actually originated from Portugal) as those who masquerade as self-appointed spokespeople for ethnic minority communities' rights in order to censor arts and culture according to their own pet prejudices. The song reached #2 with some conspiracy theorists claiming that it sold more than the Three Lions remake but was kept off the number 1 spot deliberately by the BBC - CATCHY BUT REPETITIVE

All Together Now - This re-working of The Farm's classic 1990 anthem was well-received and commercially successful. Originally produced by Suggs (Madness) it was re-edited by DJ Spoony. NICE, CATCHY ANTHEM

World At Your Feet - absolutely AWFUL. This shocker by Embrace was the theme tune for 2006 and although it reached #3 in the charts most England fans hated it. - AWFUL.

This year there will be no official theme tune but I suspect their will be several unofficial anthems to sing along to. What we really need is a remix of GO WEST to round it off but can't see it happening.

Together We will go away
Together We will win some day
Together Do something new
Together This is what we'll do

Go South
Win a trophy there
Go South
Give everyone a scare
Go South
Wear with pride the shirt
Go South
End all those years of hurt

Go South
Bring the cup back home
Bring the Cup
back where it belongs
Bring the Cup
Home to Wemberley
Win the cup
With Rio and Rooney

Anyway we have a good chance this time as the squad will not be distracted by recording chart-topping singles (unless Tennant/Lowe get hold of these lyrics and finish them) and hopefully we will be seeing Rio holding that trophy aloft in July.