Bogans
I’ve never had a job or finished school
I sit at home in me wife beater watching movies
Government pays for my address
But I still head out
To flog shit from Northgate
(ALL)
And everybody’s like dole scum, welfare, Centrelink bludger,
Drug fucked dopeheads, go and get a job champ,
Like they care
But let me tell you we’ve got it made
Coz we’re all like: Jim Beam, flatscreens, Commodore or Falcon,
knife fights, neck tatts, puffs of marijuana
We don’t care
This is what it’s like to live the dream
(ALL)
And we’ll always be bogan (bogan)
(solo)
Youse can call me Char-neree
Me kids are seven, five and three,
Different fathers, obviously.
(ALL)
All the dads are in Risdon (Risdon)
Most for armed robbery
But mate that’s cool (that’s cool, that’s cool, that’s cool)
(solo)
I get child support money.
ALL
You can find us in: Chigwell, Bridge-o, Huon and Glenorchy,
Clarendon, Risdon, Moonah and in Rokeby
Everywhere
We’re doing blockies of the city square
But in the north we’ll be at ‘Mifton, Penguin, Ravenswood and Rocherlea,
Hangin’ outside of that park with the monkeys
Don’t you stare
We’ll fuck you up
And we’ll always be bogan (bogan) (solo)
You won’t catch me in Sandy Bay Those pricks are high societ-ay
I can’t speak Chinese anyway.
Coz life is good when you’re bogan (bogan)
This is how it’s meant to be,
Baby life’s good (life’s good, life’s good, life’s good) When you’re living the bogan dream...
Living the bogan dream
Bogans has been a weird one for Old Nick. We are very aware that picking on bogans is punching down. But it’s also hard not to be aware that our audiences LOVE bogan content, and perhaps paradoxically, the bogan element REALLY love bogan content. So relaunching Bogans was a little controversial. Is it out of touch? Yeah, a bit. Does it punch down? Yeah, a bit. But have we had people clamouring for its return? You bet. And the strongest, loudest voices asking for its return were the “bogan” element. It’s a tough call, because our director Justin Wildsmith grew up in Gagebrook and Bridgewater, and for him the question is asking at what point we’re “erasing” bogans and their pride in who and what they are, and their lot in life. He made an effort in 2020’s Pundemic with “We’re Bogan” to write a bogan anthem that was more inclusive and more celebratory of what being a bogan is, but it never reached the popularity that “Bogans” had in 2017. After some necessary edits, Old Nick can now present - in perpetuity - Bogans.
Bogans originally appeared on stage in Uni Revue 2014: The Habbott, and some footage of this can be seen on a television in the background of several shots.
The original attracted a ton of activity - almost 2 million YouTube views, thousands of comments and shares on Facebook, and of course a mountain of controversy. It appeared on podcasts and even breakfast TV. We were certainly accused of being classist elitist uni students, the education department asked us to remove the shot of the school, it was shamelessly stolen and reposted by other Facebook pages and YouTube channels, and Old Nick’s channels gained thousands of subscribers, all based on this one video.
Bogans: a parody based on Royals by Lorde.
Written by Bodane Hatten and Victoria Croall
Directed and Produced by Justin Wildsmith for The Old Nick Company, Inc.
Recording and mixing by Tom Howard
Originally appearing in Uni Revue 2014: The Habbott
Bogan Trivia
This music video was filmed in two days - on day one we filmed everything in Hobart and the surrounds, usually in one or two takes. Then on day two we took a road trip up the midlands.
The school in one of the first shots was the primary school our director attended and has very fond memories of, and he specifically included it because it was where he grew up.
When we make music videos from songs that have appeared in stage shows, we always give the original stage cast the first right to refuse appearing in the video version. One of the original cast had moved interstate, so the television in the background showed her in the archival video of Uni Revue 2014. For this re-release she was able to appear in person, marking only her second video appearance despite a ten year Revue career!
The Commodore wagon belonged to the director’s brother, and the Falcon AU II belonged to the director (and can be seen in the background of quite a few Revue videos!)
When Char-Neree counts her kids ages this was neither scripted nor rehearsed, we didn’t spot the visual counting gag until we were in the edit suite!
The heavily graffitied skate park looks the part, but is actually in affluent North Hobart
The most hilariously misheard lyric? “All the dads are in Brisbane”. I guess that’s where you go after committing armed robbery…
There are a few shots we cheated to reduce the travel time - the Huon shot was a tree in the Launceston city park, Smithton was the Bass Strait at Penguin, and if we want to get pedantic, technically the Chigwell shot is in West Moonah…
The burnt out car was legitimately there in Rocherlea. We came around a corner and there it was, our holy grail. Thanks, wayward youths of the north!
The music video “We’re Bogan” appearing in Uni Revue 2020: Pundemic was actually made in response to criticism this video received, particularly that it punched down. We’re Bogan was conceived as more of a bogan pride anthem, to amuse, to be relatable, and to highlight some issues faced by those in low socio economic circumstances.