Spend, Spend, Spend

Album: Spend, Spend, Spend (1998)
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Songfacts®:

  • In 1961, factory worker Viv Nicholson and her husband won £152,319 on the football pools. Asked what she intended to do with the money, she replied "Spend, spend, spend". She kept her word, and in less than 15 years it had all gone. She does appear to have been remarkably unlucky; her husband Keith was killed in a car crash, and on his death she had to fight the taxman for what was left of their windfall. She married three times after that; one of her husbands dying of an overdose, and another in a car crash. As Mr Wilde would have said: "To lose one husband is unfortunate, but to lose three..."

    "Spend, Spend, Spend" is the title song from the musical based on her life and misfortunes. It has music by Steve Brown and lyrics by Steve Brown and Justin Greene. It is not the first song to bear that title; Nicholson's brother wrote one, and The Slits wrote and recorded another. This though is the most thematic and unquestionably the best. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England

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