By Tech Digest
Tech Digest World Cup blog Who Ate All The Bratwurst (
www.whoateallthebratwurst.com) explains how to have a footy hit in 10 easy steps:
1. Choose your song
Unless you are a musical genius, pick a 70s or 80s classic and rework it, a la Joe Fagin's That's Livin' Alright/That's England Alright (
www.thatsenglandalright.com). Something with an anthemic chorus goes down well, or something with adaptable lyrics, like 4-5-1's Stuck In the Middle With Roo (
www.whoateallthebratwurst.com/2006/04/stuck_in_the_mi.html) ("Cole to the left of me, Beckham to the right, here I am stuck in the middle with Roo...")
2. Choose your country
There are already about four million England songs (and counting), so think about penning one for your second team. Togo would be great, but coming up with a rhyme for Adebayor could prove tricky.
3. Make sure the lyrics fit
This is the tricky part. Anyone can rhyme "Cole" with "goal" and "Well-hard" with "Gerrard", but you might need to take a bit more care when coming up with a couplet for Jermain Jenas...
4. Record the song
Crucial, obviously. I spoke to Nigel Davies, director of design company 300 Million and one of the men behind Joe Fagin's That's England Alright. He says: "It's important to work with professionals, even if your song is an amateur effort. We hooked up with producer Clive Langer (the man behind much of Morrissey's solo work) and we had people who knew what they were doing." You may not be able to get a big-name producer or musician on board, but at least you should be able to get some half-decent musicians on board - no mater how good your song is, if it sounds duff, you're proverbially screwed.
5. Get a record deal
These days, there are better ways to promote your track than via a traditional record deal. The Joe Fagin peeps don't have a record deal and, as Nigel points out, they don't really need one: "Get the publishers on board first and then get a marketing and distribution deal. We felt that the profit margins involved with a record contract were too slim, so in effect we've started our own label, 300 Million records. Good PR is more important these days than a signed record contract."
6. Get listed on iTunes
Much more important than a record deal these days. It takes five weeks to get listed, so you need to get cracking if you want a bite of the apple. Even if iTunes doesn't take it you can always host the download on your site and get people to pay.
7. Make a video and YouTube it
As that German bloke on YouTube (
www.whoateallthebratwurst.com/2006/04/were_singing_fo.html) proved, high quality doesn't always equal popularity. Buzz, however, does. Get a camcorder, a bunch of mates, and a basic idea and away you go...then get a YouTube account and put it up there. Get said mates to vote for it and watch the hits go up and up. Also think about setting up a MySpace account - one of the best ways to attract the attention of like-minded people.
8. Get a blog
Tell people about how great you are. Simple as that. It's easy to set up a blog - check out Blogger or Typepad to see just how easy.
9. Spam loads of websites
Like some sort of web ninja, spend every spare minute of your waking life in chat rooms or posting to forums and message boards. The internet makes it so easy to PR yourself: Spread. The. Word. Everyone else does it, so why shouldn't you?
10. Relax!
Enjoy your new found fame/wealth/popularity. Buy speedboats, diamonds, your own football club. Set up interviews with regional DJs to tell people why you're great. Whatever takes your fancy. Just don't forget to give us a cut of your cash. Say, 15 per cent?
More World Cup tunes here (
www.whoateallthebratwurst.com/2006/04/world_cup_song_.html) and here (
www.whoateallthebratwurst.com/2006/04/now_thats_what_.html).
Forums 
