I just had an email from the lovely Pete at SiteMost, the Australian SEO agency, who I met at SMX Sydney last April (remembers being on a beach, rather than in a freezing house waiting for an engineer to come and unfreeze pipe. Sigh). In it he suggested I check out a track called I’ll Kill Her by SoKo and so I did.
It’s a very strange little song and really rather sweet. SoKo has a charming voice, especially when she’s singing English with her French accent (she’s kind of reminiscent of a Gallic Bjork) whilst the backing is a very simple bit of James Morrison-ish rock (accoustic guitar, gentle drums, slight hint of soul – you know the sort of thing). It seems that I’ll Kill Her is a bit of an Arctic Monkeys style internet sensation. According to her site:
It was featured in a 2007 Stella McCartney fashion show, played by radio DJ’s from all over the world and even managed to chart in several countries, without a “real” CD release.
The video above has over 3 million views on YouTube so they’re obviously not joking.
Whilst it’s quite a cute song the lyrics are anything but and I can only assume that these are the reason the song has been so incredibly successful. I’ll Kill Her starts as a slightly sad love song, with SoKo talking about what she planned to do with her sweetheart.
You were supposed to call me tonight
We would have gone to the cinema
And, after, to the restaurant, the one you like in your street
But it soon turns out that SoKo is one girl you shouldn’t mess with: if there’s a picture in the Oxford Book of Quotations under the phrase “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” I’m guessing it’s of SoKo.
I would have waited like a week or two
But you never tried to reach me
No, you never called me back
You were dating that bleach-blonde girl
If i find her, I swear, I swear…I’ll kill her, I’ll kill her
But she doesn’t stop there. Oh no, not our SoKo. Like some sort of terrifying French Glenn Close she starts detailing her terrifying fantasy life:
I would have met your friends, we would have had a drink or two
They would have liked me, ’cause sometimes I’m funny
I would have met your Dad, I would have met your Mum
She would have said “please, can you make some beautiful babies?”
As if that wasn’t enough she then turns on the woman who stole her man – apparently she’ll end up leaving him, which I guess would count as natural justice:
She’s a bitch you know, all she’s got is blondeness
Not even tenderness, yeah, she’s cleverless
She’ll dump your arse for a model called Brendan
He will pay for beautiful surgery ’cause he’s full of money
I have to say that I think this particular verse must be one of the greatest I’ve ever heard: I just love the fact that the model will be called Brendan.
There are of course lots of famous songs abut real people: Pattie Boyd had four songs written about her (Something by George Harrison and Layla, You Look Wonderful Tonight & Bell Bottom Blues by Eric Clapton), whilst there have been many rumours as to who You’re So Vain is about (with Warren Beatty brilliantly saying “That song was about me”, just as the lyrics predicted he would). However whilst it would be pretty cool to be the subject of a song in most circumstances I think thatif I were the man (or blonde) that KoKo is singing about in I’ll Kill Her I’d be hiding right now (and probably changing my hair colour!)
Image (entitled Murder) by F.S.M. on flickr