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"John Wayne Is Big Leggy" is the debut single by British music group
Haysi Fantayzee Haysi Fantayzee were a short lived British pop band of the early 1980s. Their best known songs are " John Wayne Is Big Leggy", released in 1982 and " Shiny Shiny", released in 1983. Career Haysi Fantayzee was an avant-garde, new wave pop pro ...
, released in 1982. It peaked at number 13 on the
Austrian Singles Chart Austrian may refer to: * Austrians, someone from Austria or of Austrian descent ** Someone who is considered an Austrian citizen, see Austrian nationality law * Austrian German dialect * Something associated with the country Austria, for example: ...
, number 3 on the
German Singles Chart The GfK Entertainment charts are the official music charts in Germany and are gathered and published by GfK Entertainment (formerly Media Control and Media Control GfK International), a subsidiary of GfK, on behalf of Bundesverband Musikindust ...
, number 4 on the Swiss Singles Chart, and number 11 on the
UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...
.


Themes

The song was a combination of political satire and sexual humour, using nursery rhyme-style lyrics. The protagonist, John Wayne, is having sexual intercourse with a Native American female. When Wayne's
bandolier A bandolier or a bandoleer is a pocketed belt for holding either individual bullets, or belts of ammunition. It is usually slung sash-style over the shoulder and chest, with the ammunition pockets across the midriff and chest. Though functiona ...
restricts their intimacy, she suggests he remove it. He refuses and suggests he sodomize her instead. This surreal image is intended as a comment on the treatment of
indigenous people Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
during the European colonisation, and was written after
Jeremy Healy Jeremy Healy (born Jeremiah Healy, 18 January 1962) is an English DJ and singer. He is a former member of 1980s pop group Haysi Fantayzee. Career Healy was born in Woolwich, South London. In the 1980s, with Paul Caplin and Kate Garner, he f ...
read ''
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee ''Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West'' is a 1970 non-fiction book by American writer Dee Brown that covers the history of Native Americans in the American West in the late nineteenth century. The book expres ...
'' by historian Dee Brown. Wayne represents the European colonist, while his partner is the Native American people. Unusually for a song with explicit sexual content in the 1980s, the song escaped being banned from broadcast by the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
, was playlisted on
BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...
, and the band performed the song twice on ''
Top of the Pops ''Top of the Pops'' (''TOTP'') is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly between 1January 1964 and 30 July 2006. The programme was the world's longest-running weekly music show. For most o ...
'' and on Saturday morning children's television. The song, with its "Shotgun, gimme gimme lowdown fun, boy! Okay, yeah, showdown!" intro, was taken to be a nonsensical novelty song about cowboys.


Critical reception

The single was well received in the British and European music press. '' Smash Hits'' described it as a Wild West shoot-out between Madness,
Bow Wow Wow Bow Wow Wow are an English new wave band, created by manager Malcolm McLaren in 1980. McLaren recruited members of Adam and the Ants to form the band behind 13-year-old Annabella Lwin on vocals. They released their debut EP '' Your Cassette ...
and
Altered Images Altered Images are a Scottish new wave/post-punk band who found success in the early 1980s. Fronted by singer Clare Grogan, the group branched into mainstream pop music, having six UK top-40 hit singles and three top-30 albums from 1981 to 1 ...
. Stewart Mason of
AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...
wrote, "it all sounds like an enormous put-on, but it's an entertaining one for anyone with a taste for early '80s ephemera." The song was listed in ''Smash Hits'' top 10 lyrics of the 80s.
Boy George George Alan O'Dowd (born 14 June 1961), known professionally as Boy George, is an English singer, songwriter, DJ, author and mixed media artist. Best known for his soulful voice and his androgynous appearance, Boy George has been the lead singer ...
, who had been a schoolfriend of Jeremy Healy and a fellow Blitz club regular, spoke of his jealousy of Haysi Fantayzee's success:


Track listing


Charts


Weekly charts


Year-end charts


References


External links

* {{authority control 1982 debut singles 1981 songs Haysi Fantayzee songs Songs written by Jeremy Healy Songs about actors Cultural depictions of John Wayne Songs written by Paul Caplin Songs about Native Americans