John Clarke aka Fred Dagg

This was a hub that had to be written! I don't even know how to make money from it - I have to write it for the sake of my National Pride!

I have published a fair number hubs about Australia and I list my address as Australia but I usually identify and have the accent of a New Zealander. I've lived in both countries off and on and I can tell you that we Australians and New Zealanders love to poke fun at each other, but we share far more similarities than differences.

One of the annoying things that Australian's do is assume that some New Zealanders are actually Australian - which agvulpes admitted to on a comment on my Melbourne Cup hub. So thanks agvulpes - because you got me to check out some of John's/Fred's work on youtube.  So after wasting quite a bit of time on youtube is the evolution of a great New Zealander who makes a living taking the piss out of Australian politicians - and the odd American!

John Clarke is a New Zealander who has been a satirist and comedian since the early 1970's. I still have an LP of some of his earliest work somewhere in a box. He was a phenomenon when I was growing up in New Zealand in the 1970's and the only home-grown comedian on TV that I remember who actually was political - unheard of at the time.

What amazes me now though is that 30 years on he is still doing it! The accent has changed, the politicians names have changed, but actually not lot else has - the man is still a genius! Enjoy - I have listed  the clips in roughly chronological order but he's right up to date - even on the current economic crises!

Fred Dagg was the "typical" New Zealand farmer: with the uniform of gum boots and black singlets. At the time NZ farmers still enjoyed a wonderful array of subsidies from the "townies"

The first part fo the clip was clearly filmed on the streets of Wellington in the mid-1970's. This is not a setup - this was definitely filmed on the real streets on the cheap. The cars really did look like that! The joke that most will miss is of course no one drove a 4WD in town - somethings have really changed!

New Zealand was a deeply conservative country in the 1970's. We were all pretty shocked because Britain had joined the EU and stopped buying anything we made and shipped there. That on top of the world oil shock - the 1971 one- meant that New Zealand at the bottom of the world with none of its own oil was in trouble.

Those that had cars (which wasn't everyone) had to nominate one day as a "carless day" - when they wouldn't drive it. There was outrage because and very,very few families had TWO cars so they wouldn't be inconvenienced!

There were two parties in NZ Politics at the time: National the incumbant run by Robert (Piggy) Muldoon and Labour - Labour didn't count they were never in power.

Fred - decided to start his own party ...

One of Fred's songs which has been re-released by John. If anyone can find me the late 1970's early 1980's version I'd include it but youtube has failed me! This is the updated version possibly from the 1990's? He still can't sing though!

A quick cultural guide for the Austalians:

Maui Maori God of the sea.

"world's largest fish" - according to Maori legend Maui is supposed to have fished up the South Island of NZ

pissed - drunk

Helen Clark is the current Prime Minister - and the "wife in the kitchen" clip. She must be a fan because she is NEVER photograhed in the kitchen!

The truth is of course that Kiwi's love whinging and tend to denigrate their own  country. John Clarke himself had to leave to further his career: he would always have been Fred Dagg in New Zealand. The song was humourous but was also very,very true of New Zealand at the time. Perhaps we've woken up a bit since then: and if Global Warming comes true we will have a fantastic country - and I might just go home!

Fred leaves his gumboots behind and moves to Australia in the late 1970's. Unfortunately he has never returned home. Interestingly in this clip - he still has the New Zealand accent!

At the time this was recorded there was a real estate boom on. Interestingly nothing much has changed in the last 25 years!

Clarke has a regular weekly spot on the 7:30 report which is a straight current affairs program on the Australian government owned station ABC. Brian Dawe is his straight man

The political background: John Howard is the ex-Prime Minister who lost an un-looseable Australian Federal election in 2007 partly because of his strong support for absolutely anything that George Bush did.

New Zealand on the other hand has pursued a non-alignment policy and has not had troops in Iraq, they do have peace keepers in Afghanistan and Timor

John's view on the trillion dollar bail out of Wall Street. The odd thing of course is that I haven't seen a serious journalist question the U-turn from free market laissez-faire economics to socialism - except these guys!

The only slightly sad thing is that probably in these politically correct days he won't be allowed to take off either Sarah Pallin or Barack Obama - but maybe he will I hope so. Most comedians stick to one or two public figures they slightly resemble - John Clarke only focuses on their vocal mannerisms and does it very,very well.