Sunday, June 14, 2020

The Divine Comedy: Becoming More Like Alfie


Neil Hannon told The Irish Times in 1996 that Becoming More Like Alfie is an "ironical attack" on the kind of sexism by another name laddishness evident in British working class culture: 

"I watched Alfie a long time ago and thought, 'what a horrible character', as in the way he was referring to women as 'it's a nice little thing', a complete dehumanising of the opposite sex. 

"But when I saw it again recently, I saw a lot of my own tendencies in it - which sparked the song. It is also a dig at the laddishness in Britpop at the moment. A lot of what comes out of the Gallagher twins' mouths, for example, is absolutely obscene. But many critics missed the irony and the fact that I'm criticising that kind of behaviour, in myself as much as in others."

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