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PJ Harvey: Let England Shake

Andrew Mueller, Uncut, March 2011

THE FIRST OF Polly Harvey's eighth studio album was heard in April 2010, when she made a memorably peculiar appearance on The Andrew Marr Show. Wrapped in a black feather boa, equipped with an autoharp, watched by an audience consisting of the titular BBC commentator and the then-Prime Minister, Harvey performed a hauntingly jaunty ditty called 'Let England Shake', backed by a looped sample from The Four Lads' 1950s novelty hit 'Istanbul (Not Constantinople)' . Even by Harvey's formidable standards for presentational incongruity, it was one for the scrapbook.

Total word count of piece: 1048

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