That song must have been round the same time when their creative well had run dry so horribly, that they had these two Dutch creeps write them a song:
I liked that song when it came out in the early 80ies, it was a major dance floor hit in Germany. Quo's version a couple of years later paled compared to the original. Bolland & Bolland also gave Falco his second career with the Rock me Amadeus smash hit.
I don't think they are such an awful songwriter pair, you are being too tough on your countrymen. Hey, I like Dutch pop!!!
Don't deride it, it's something you guys (and girls) dingadong-do darn well.
(Listening to it again, I only realize now how much they emulated The Carpenters sound with it.)
As for Status Quo's Marguerita Time ... that is not nearly the quality of Dutch (or good English) pop, even for its don't-take-it-quite-serious novelty hit status. That said, Alan Lancaster overreacted when he refused to play it on TV (which is how Jim Lea came into the picture for that one appearance). "In the Army Now" wasn't written for them. They heard the original in a Dutch disco and liked it so much, they did their own version of it. That is exactly how they came to hear The Doors' Roadhouse Blues (only in a German disco) and decided to cover that some 15 years earlier. Quo's version of "In the Army" was not only musically watered down from the atmospheric original, but they also emasculated the anti-Vietnam War lyrics a bit. They didn't match the doom and gloom of The Doors' original take of Roadhouse Blues either. When Jim Morrison leers and Alan Lancaster barks "When I woke up this morning, I got myself a beer - the future's uncertain, but the end is always ... n-n-near", it's just not the same thing.
