Let's talk about our national anthem, Australia

The Horses is over-rated, stop playing it. Advance Australia Fair has never cut it. Waltzing Matilda is better - and we know what the unofficial anthem is

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah. Picture: Michael Nolan

THESE past 10 days have been what we in the newspaper game call The Doldrums, or Dead Week.

News is slooow, and what news there is, most people couldn't be bothered reading. They are in the Christmas/New Year fog and barely capable of recalling what day it is. Lucky them.

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah. Picture: swissmediavision

It is during this time of scratching around that the really important issues buried during the year bubble up to the surface.

Issues like the undeserved status of "unofficial national anthem” bestowed on a sub-par song like Daryl Braithwaite's The Horses.

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah. Picture: Marc Stapelberg

I concur with Nathan Davies' condemnation of the ABC's decision to play The Horses at midnight on New Year's Eve. Yawn!

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah.

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah. Picture: Shirley Way

Everyone knows the unassailable, unofficial national anthem of Australia is Cold Chisel's Khe Sahn. Put that song on at midnight and watch the crowd lose its mind, especially at the Langshaw or Pie Creek Hall.

In keeping with the hot cross bun vibe let's start the Australia Day debate early.

What should our national anthem be?

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah.

Advance Australia Fair has never really cut it. I get more emotional when I hear the Star Spangled Banner. Tell us what you think.

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LYRICS TO WHAT SHOULD BE OUR NATIONAL ANTHEM - KHE SAHN

I left my heart to the sappers round khe sahn

And I sold my soul with my cigarettes to the black market man

I've had the Vietnam cold turkey

from the ocean to the silver city

And it's only other vets can understand

About the long forgotten dock side guarantee

How there were no V-day heroes in 1973

And how we sailed into Sydney Harbour I saw an old friend but I couldn't kiss her

and she was lined and I was home to the lucky land

and she was like so many more from that time on

Their lives were all so empty until they found their chosen one

And their legs were often open, but their minds were always closed

And their hearts were held in fast surburban chains.

and the legal pads were yellow, hours long, pay packet lean

And the telex-writers clattered where the gun ships once had been

And carparks made me jumpy, but I never stopped the dream for the growing need of speed and novacaine.

So I worked across the country from end to end

I tryed to find a place to settle down where my mixed up life could end

I held a job on an oil rig, flying choppers when I could

But the night life nearly drove me round the bend.

And I travelled round the world from year to year

Each one found me aimless one more year the worst for ware

And I've been back to south east Asia

You know the answer sure ain't there

But I'm drifting north to check things out again

I have never understood its popularity. I don't like the tune - its lyrics are meaningless, its melody blah. Picture: Ben Beaden