Three Minute Song - Royal Variety Version Songtext

von Tim Minchin

My people rang me up a couple of weeks ago
Yeah, I've got people, and a phone, and a sense of the passage of time
Yeah, they rang me up, said "Tim, do you wanna do the Royal Variety Show?
They want you to sing a song; it'll be fine, fine, fine"

But the problem with my particular oeuvre
Is that half my songs are five minutes and over
And the wisdom here at ITV
Is that viewers switch off if you go past three
And a lot of my songs have a bit of bad language
Which causes viewers untold anguish
It seems their tolerance for smuttiness is reserved
For pussy puns on ‘Are You Being Served'.

And so I…

Need a song that only goes for three minutes
Without no bums or blasphemy in it
For the delicate skin of contemporary Britain

I need a song with a and a verse
Without no nasty cussing and a-cursing
I'm a little too lewd and a little too long
I gotta write myself a three minute song

And they said "Remember, boy, that music is like lovemaking
It's simply self-indulgent to take it past three minutes.
Remember, boy, that music is like lovemaking
Everybody loves a pianist but length must have a limit
So I

Need a song that only goes for three minutes
Without no pornography or politics in it
A little less rude and more concise
Be yourself but brief and nice

Three hundred beats at a hundred beats a minute
With a nice clean joke and a hoe-down in it
I'm a little verbose and a little bit wrong
I gotta find myself a clean-living three minute song

And even in the bridge
I won't be lyrically adventurous
Conceptually contentious
Or racially offensious
And I won't make double entendres
At the expense of the Chinese
For China is a country that can bring me to my knees
For China
For China
For China
For China
For China is a count-ry that will bring us to our knees

Ooh Mr Humphreys, my pussy is out in the rain a-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha

Two, three, fore skin

I need a little happy-clappy country song
Nice and repetitive and not too long
Boring enough but not too boring
With a key change here to prevent us snoring

I need a song that is only three minutes
Without no bums or blasphemy in it
You don't get laughs by lingering
But I'd better get a giggle with my fingering

PIANO SOLO

I need a song that'll render me
A favourite of royalty
In the hope that a copy of my DVD
Will end up under the Royal tree
The Queen's got a stocking and I wanna be in it
And apparently she'll only watch for three minutes
Don't mind me, I'll be done in three