There is not much to get excited about in music today. Very ordinary bands turn out very ordinary records until they come to be replaced by another very ordinary band. And so it goes on. Until this album, I had never bought a Chumbawumba album before, assuming they were just another very ordinary band. But this album may even surprise those most familiar with the group. With this, they prove that not only are good at pleasing the masses with chirpy pop records but also that they are extremely talented singers. The whole album is sung acapello and the quality of their voices help display these melodic anthems of the down-trodden at their most moving. A personal favourite of mine, set in world war one, consists of disgruntled soldiers bellowing out their marching song "Barbed Wire," and it makes the rather bitter point that it is often the least deserving who are the most rewarded. But the album also has it's tender moments, such as the sweet voices of the women who wash lemonade bottles standing up for a colleague who was sacked for standing up for their union on the "Idris Strike" song.

But these are much more than just pleasant, tuneful songs, each one is also a history lesson (except for a rather biased telling of the story of the Manchester martyrs, hung for shooting a policeman "accidently" while rescuing friends from a prison van on "Smashing Of The Van," the only Irish rebel song on the album.)

Perfect album.

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good stuff, 23 Feb 2004

By A Customer

Chumbawaumba started off recording punk stuff then discovered that there was a market for traditional music. A fact already appreciated by bands like The Pogues and Oysterband.

Rebel Songs is exactly that, some old, some new, but pretty much all excellent. And loads of variety. They've found their niche - how much more there is like it, I don't know.

Listen to it carefully - it's not background music.

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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Scruples, What Scruples?, 27 April 2008

By	Whistleblower "Simon in Derby" (Derby, UK) - See all my reviews

Firstly, yes this is a good collection of songs perfectly executed by the excellent Chumbawamba. Highlights for me include Song On The Times, Diggers Song, Hanging On The old Barbed Wire and the moving Coal Not Dole. My problem comes with the inclusion of Smashing Of The Van, an Irish Republican song praising three 'martyrs' who rescued two prominent Fenians from a prison van. What the song, or indeed Chumbawamba's sleevenotes, fail to address is that if we're to believe the 'martyrs' hanged for shooting dead a Police Sergeant were innocent then another of the Irish rescuers who did deliver the fatal gunshot, was happy to let his innocent conrades swing. Didn't have the courage to own up and face the consequences. Disgracefully in the sleevenotes there isn't even mention of the name of the policeman shot dead. His name was Sergeant Brett. He neither made the law or made judgements but was just doing his work to earn enough money to eat and live. He had parents, he may have been married with children or would have married. He was a living, breathing human being and his family would have been greatly distressed by their loss. During the ambush several innocent passers-by were injured and a horse shot dead. In Chumbawamba world this is perfectly acceptable. It says so much about the lack of scruples in Chumbawamba that the sleevenotes delight in saying that every year to commemorate this event Irish republicans march through Manchester.

How sad that Chumbawamba support death. As a footnote they have recorded a song called Passenger List For Doomed Flight (recorded early 2000's) in which they list people who presumambly they would like killed in a fatal aircrash. This sick wish-fulfilment (whilst listing some people I myself have no time for) doesn't consider the innocent air crew. Despicable hypocracy Chumbawamba! You're anti-Nazi (good in my opinion) yet delight in people dying thus becoming what you claim to most deplore. Scruples, what scruples?

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5.0 out of 5 stars You can't fault 'em
So very underrated are the Chumbas, Ive listened to them since the first vinyl release decades ago & this is a favourite. Read more

Published 10 months ago by R. sherratt

4.0 out of 5 stars Eleven English Rebel Songs, One Irish
I am surprised, and pleased, to see that my one reservation about this otherwise excellent collection of songs is shared by others. Read more

Published 17 months ago by John Jordan

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