Songwriters Andy White and Tim Finn have reunited to created a tongue-in-cheek musical commentary of the United Nations World Happiness Report with the song ‘The Happiness Report’.
White and Finn, along with Liam Ó Maonlaí of Hothouse Flowers released one album as ALT in 1995.
Says Tim Finn, “The Happiness Index” is a wry look at the United Nations-sanctioned World Happiness Report, whereby countries are ranked according to the emotional and mental well-being of their people, with Finland regularly top of the pile and an assortment of Third World nations lagging behind.
“How happy are we? The king of Bhutan wants to know. His Buddhist Kingdom allows itself to self- examine. We in the West however have turned his Happiness Index into a trans-global competition. Apparently, at the time of writing this, Finland is on top and Chad at the bottom. How sad to view an existential question in such a limited way. But the AT song is a joyous and belligerent revelation of these tragic-comic contradictions. You will come away feeling better!”
‘The Happiness Report’ is the second track from the upcoming Andy and Tim album ‘AT’. The album was produced by John Leckie (XTC, Stone Roses, Simple Minds).
“We sent John every one of our ideas,” Andy said. “If I had three bass parts I’d send all three, if we had sung six harmony vocals they were there for him to play with. Listen to how much is going on in The Happiness Index! We didn’t think he was going to use everything, but he painted with every colour we sent him.”
‘AT’ will be released on 31 March 2023.
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