How the Kingz got Easy Easy (aka The Kingz Fling)...

...and how ACFC got We’ll Be Coming Down The Road. A true story.

The year is 2000 AD. A young boy, let’s call him Ultra, is scouring the internet for material (images, audio, chants/songs, links etc) for a Bloc 5 website. Back then the internet was still in its infancy (no broadband for a starter) and there were far less football related resources to determine what fans around the globe were up to. Nowadays all you have to do is click on Youtube to find out what football fans are doing from Taiwan to Tel Aviv – so there can be no excuse for turning up and yelling “Who are ya?”, “She fell over”, “Eeyore” and all those 1966 Stockport versus Huddersfield style chants (ie “Build a bonfire, build a bonfire, put the [insert team] on the top etc ”, “In your [insert town] slums, you look in the garbage for something to eat etc”, “Oh [insert town] is wonderful etc”) and thinking that it constitutes decent football support.

The best sites back in 2000 were the European ultra sites ...that’s why Bloc 5 did a number of Fossa dei Leoni style chants. Working out the Italian/French/Spanish/Polish/German/Russian etc words for “songs”, “chants”, “audio” and “images” could be hazardous. I couldn’t tell you the number of times I stuffed up the computer by downloading rogue files/viruses when I thought I was downloading a Magic Fans chant.

I digress. I could see on some of the Scottish football forums and websites that there was quite a bit of reference to a chant with the words “When you hear the noise of the Tartan Army boys we’ll be coming down the road” but there were no audio links and no-one could tell me the tune. Colin fae Manurewa (via Dundee and Arbroath) thought it might have something to do with the Civil War song “We Are Coming Father Abraham” – I wasn’t so sure. Nowadays you could just use the inbuilt microphone on your laptop to record yourself and send it via email as an audio file. I left my contact details on a few Tartan Army message boards hoping someone would get in touch.

The only person to contact me was a Scot living in Melbourne called Ross. He sent me a CD “The Tartan Army: Scottish World Cup Anthems” with the note: “Richard, A cultural masterpiece from Scotland. Cheers Ross” (in return I sent him a copy of Messieurs Stantiall and Stephens’ Pulitzer Prize winning Stand Up If You Love The Kingz season review and a Kingz keyring). There are some great World Cup/Euro Cup anthems on that CD (Big Trip To Mexico, Fergie’s Fusiliers, Viva Scotland etc). In fact, Rod “the mod” Stewart’s Ole Ola and Purple Heather are two of my favourite football anthems of all time. The CD also contains the 1974 Scotland World Cup squad singing Easy Easy. It does not contain We'll Be Coming Down The Road.

Fast forward to 2001 and the Sky TV operated Kingz are looking for an anthem for the start of their third season in the NSL. Being someone with a bit of an interest in these sorts of things I sent a tape recording of some songs (including Easy Easy) through to ...I think it was Dean Pooley ...and Glen (insert name here) was another ...and quite possibly Simon Massey ...all at Sky TV.

What might have been? Here are some of the other tracks that were on that tape: I know The Offbeats’ Dad’s Army was on that tape; I’m pretty confident Ben Gunn’s Viva Scotland (or was it Ben Gunn’s Fergie’s Fusiliers) was on that tape; I’m also confident Bloc 5 favourite On My Radio (The Selecter version) was on there; I think maybe Carry, Go, Bring, Come was also on it (The Selecter or Justin Hinds version, I can’t remember which). I’m not sure why I included Easy Easy. Possibly to show what could be done with glam rock – I mean everyone loves jumping round to Tiger Feet. I didn’t think Sky TV would just copy it. Anyway, I take full responsibility for my part in the Kingz Fling – cue ex-pat Scots to ring talkback radio and whine about how it was the Scotland 1974 World Cup anthem.

Fast forward (again) to 2004. Someone seeing the contact details which I had left many years before on one of the Tartan Army message boards sent me a link to the Tartan Specials' We'll Be Coming Down The Road. I forwarded it on to Colin fae Manurewa (via A House In The Ferry). ACFC did a recording. I wasn’t there for the recording. I’m not quite sure they got it right. I reckon you need to hold the “...down...” in “down the road” for it to work.

What I do remember is a 20 minute rendition of “We’ll Be Coming Down The Road” by the Bloc 5 Boyz when the Knights got hammered 4 – 0 by Melbourne at North Harbour in October 2006. Scott (not Archie) Gemmell came off the field at the end of the game and just stood in front of the Bloc and applauded.

The end.