Tom Scott (the musician one, not the cartoonist one) featured on Radio NZ’s Playing Favourites with Kim Hill this morning. Discussion started on Scott and his music but moved on to talk about his infamous song that featured in the election campaign. See PM death threat in hip hop song.

ain’t doin’ nothin’ so I’m gonna kill the prime minister I been tryin’ to get a job but they got none so I instead I got a sawnoff shotgun and ‘pop’

And…

That’s why I’m going to kill the Prime Minister. I’m going to kill the Prime Minister, because we are down and suffering and the motherfucker ain’t doing nothing. Going to kill the Prime Minister.

There was more controversy over references to Key’s daughter in the lyrics.

One of these days I’m going to fuck your daughter. This poor boy going to make his seed, going to wake up in your girl – well hello Miss Key.

This came up in the discussions. Scott didn’t like Hill’s line of questioning. He dropped an f-bomb and soon afterwards walked out.

Transcript (excluding the general music stuff).

Hill: You also got yourself into a spot of bother. We’ll talk about that. Scott: Oh yep. What bother? I’m not bothered. Hill: No. No you don’t look bothered, but plenty of other people were quite bothered.

The next song was discussed and played, then discussed again.

Hill: Let us talk about the bother. The song that @Peace brought out. About you know, getting rid of the Prime Minister. And more importantly and more offensively targeting his daughter, the song… Scott: No, more importantly should be I’m trying to kill this man. Why, why are we not addressing the murder in this song? Hill: Well because everybody thinks that that’s full of nonsense but… Scott: That’s nonsense but the other part’s not… Hill: Well pulling family into the public eye… Scott: But I’m talking about murdering this man. Hill: Well you can stress that factor if you like… Scott: …so you should get me, should get me…you should call the police right now ’cause I’m obviously a murderer and a rapist… Hill: Ah I see what you’re meaning, where you’re going… Scott: You you can’t pick and choose what lyric you want to take out of someone’s song. I mean… Hill: What? Scott: Obviously, obviously I might regret what I said, I probably should have said I was going to rape his son. Hill: What do you mean obviously you might regret what you said, do you or do you not regret what you said… Scott: …I I don’t regret what I said actually. Screw that. Hill: Ok. Lot’s of people disssssss, dissed you for it. Scott: I I don’t like the man one bit. I mean I’m sure his daughter’s a lovely person but… Hill: Well yeah, so why bring her into it? Scott: Just ’cause that will piss him off more. Hill: Have you got any kids? Scott: No. And if someone said they were gonna – I never said I was going to rape her, I just said that one day I was going to come home with her. Hill: I don’t care what you said, you shouldn’t have talked about her at all is the feeling. Scott: Yeah well I did. Hill: Yeah I know. You won’t do it again though will you? Scott: I don’t know, I don’t like John key one bit… Hill: Yeah so you say, but you know you can’t go round threatening to kill people even songs… Scott: But I can, cause I did that. Hill: Come on. Did you vote? Scott: Yes. I tried my best to get everyone in my fanbase, in my demographic to vote and it didn’t work, and I think the system’s, it doesn’t cater for people that are getting the disadvantages of it… Hill: One of the justifications you said, um, about the song was that it was written with a purpose of getting young people to enrol, which most people … Scott: Yeah and it made more noise than any song I’ve ever made so… Hill: Yeah but it was hardly an endorsement of the democratic process Tom… Scott: But I wasn’t talking to your generation Kim. Hill: Oh. Scott: So your generation are always going to be offended by that. Hill: I’m too old to understand… Scott: Well you’re already voting. Hill: I don’t think that anybody who heard that song would think “oh, I must go and vote now”. Scott: Well they at least understood that maybe this man that is running their country isn’t liked by a lot of people. I think a lot of kids grow up when their parents are like, you know, this is a great man, he’s helping us, we own a business, um you know he’s the , the economy’s booming because of this man, and you know a lot of these things might be true. But these kids have no idea that this guy is the enemy to the working class. Hill: Oh hang on… Scott: So I just want, yeah a lot of my fanbase are wealthy middle class upper class kids who you know dream of  being the ‘have not, but they don’t understand the politics behind that kind of, um, being the ‘have not’, they don’t understand that this guy is making life hard for some people. Hill: Are you portraying yourself as a have not? Scott: Well growing up I was definitely a have not, I have a lot more, ah to be thankful now but i grew up in a working class neighbourhood where we needed people like Helen Clark and we needed people like David Lange, you know and the down my street that I grew on are still poor, and now they’ve got kids and now I go to the dairy and now the dairy owner’s son is running the place and nothing’s changed, it’s the same working class neighbourhood. People are still struggling. Hill: Well if it’s still poor Tom then David Lange and Helen Clark didn’t make much difference either, did they. Scott: Well I don’t think they did. I don’t think, I mean I’m quite disillusioned with it all after that election to be honest. It was really heartbreaking for me ’cause I really put a lot of effort in. I mean that was one song that ah old boy Whale Rider or whatever his name was chose to pick up and you know make a big fuss about, because that was going to make the left look like a bunch of morons, and you know I never chose to release that song, it’s not like it was some kind of song I was going to be proud of, I just hate when people pick it apart when, you know, you should be focussed on the part about me saying I’m going to murder this man if you’re going to be focused on anything. Hill: And it was um pointed out that it’s all very well to talk about have nots but you did quite well out of New Zealand On Air… Scott: What do you mean? Hill: Well New Zealand On Air granted @Peace something like thirty thousand quid, ah dollars, and so you can hardly, oh well you feel free to bite the hand that fed you in some peculiar way didn’t you? Scott: Well what does that, I don’t understand. Hill: Well if you get money from New Zealand On Air can you simultaneously use that money to say that nobody’s helping us and John Key is leading us to hell in a hand basket because he’s mean and nasty? Scott: That that money goes straight to making a music video, it doesn’t go to paying the rent, it doesn’t go towards anything like that, it goes to making a creative piece of work and what we made out of that was a video for a song called Matter which ah shows the funeral of an average bum who never meant anything, and I thought we depicted that in a good way, and spent the taxpayers money well. But um, I mean I’m not asking for taxpayers money to go around and blow it on things that aren’t important, you know, I mean this this, every musician gets grants from the Government. Hill: Whoa. Some might say not. Scott: And it’s not like John Key set up New Zealand On Air. Hill: Poor John Key. Scott: He’s probably doing everything he can to get rid of it. Hill: I, well, I’m not sure whether you could say that, and I’m inviting John Key to respond to that calumnious accusation… Scott: I just really worry about how misled the population are by this dude. And I know he runs this, I know the reason I’m sitting in this room is because the Government are paying for it. But this is not a good leader. I’m no better. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just a musician but… Hill: How are politics in Australia? Scott: Worse. Hill: Yeah I would have thought they might be a spot worse… Scott: And that’s why we need to make action now I think. And look I honestly don’t, I honestly don’t claim to be some kinda leader or some kinda politician… Hill: No no no no but what kind of action do you think is… Scott: I just came to play music. Hill: I know. But music that immediately got yourself into political hot water, and it’s not the first time, so you know you need to take the heat. Scott: No no I came onto this show to play music, look I was told I was just here to play three songs, I didn’t know I was coming to get executed on public TV, on public radio… Hill: Oh. Do you feel like I’m executing you? Scott: I don’t know, I just think it’s a bit of a played out issue bringing that song back up when that was like months ago and look, who lost in this, who who really lost? The guy I voted for didn’t even get anywhere near close getting in. Hill: Now we’re not talking about that… Scott: So at the end of the day you don’t have to worry about Tom Scott, ’cause him and the working class got fucked. Hill: Well I don’t think you can say that on National Radio Tom. So let’s edit you out… Scott: Well it’s nothing less than that. Hill: Let us edit you out, try to persuade people to forget you said the f word, and play your next track which is Free Life – There’s Something Better, which should make you feel better. Um what’s Free Life, I don’t know them? Scott: I don’t know. Some group. Hill: Some group. Also from the seventies? Scott: Uh-hmm. Hill: Let’s have a listen.

The song played.

Hill: That’s Free Life, There’s Something Better, from the 1979 single from an album Free Life, that was one of Tom Scott’s picks. Ah Tom, having become perturbed at the question line about his song threatening to kill John Key, has ah bailed on the rest of the Playing Favourites, good on you Tom. Um leaving with the f-bomb which is always a nice touch.

Audio. Listen to Kill The Prime Minister

EDIT: Joel has asked me to take down a photo, I’ve no reason to doubt his claim that he took it so fair enough. It can be found on Google images and this is the source at The Orange Press on a post TOM SCOTT – DANCING BY MYSELF MIXTAPE that says:

Tom Scott from Home Brew and @Peace is a pretty interesting character, full of dichotomies and contradictions. An man of impressive intellect, who seems to court controversy at virtually any opportunity…

Scott does court controversy, deliberately with his promotiion of Kill The Prime Minister. “Impressive intellect” is debatable.