AUDIO: Giving It Our Best Shot

It has been a while since there has been a song released about Palace. Most will remember the version of Glad All Over by the 1990 FA Cup Final squad, even a live performance of the track on a popular television chat show which the likes of Alan Pardew, John Salako and Mark Bright probably dread seeing. Now there is a new tune dedicated to the mighty red and blue which is available on iTunes. Here is co-writer JD McPhillips to tell us all about the track ‘Giving It Our Best Shot’ by The Arthur Holmesdale Band.

You might say that the roots of ‘Giving It Our Best Shot’ go all the way back to the sixties and, yes, I am old enough to remember when ‘Glad All Over’ hit the charts here in the United States. I still have my original vinyl version of the Dave Clark Five’s ‘Catch Us If You Can’.

Many of us in America fell in love with the British invasion, especially my friend Charlie. I also fell in love with another British import. Football, or soccer as we call it over here.

Charlie started playing in local bands at school. My music abilities at that time prevented me from doing that, but I found I had a relatively good foot-eye co-ordination and I ended up playing in my local school soccer teams.

We were inspired by England and their World Cup win in 1966. The final against West Germany was broadcast live on American television. A couple of years later, one of my team-mates started getting ‘Shoot’ magazine, and its stories and images provided additional inspiration.

Fast forward to 1990. I finally made it over to England. One of my former team-mates was living in London and, of course, I absolutely had to see a Division One game in person. My friend picked a match at Selhurst Park – Crystal Palace versus Sheffield United.

Just walking through the neighborhood streets from the train station to the stadium was unlike any experience I had ever had going to an American sports venue.

And once inside Selhurst Park, it was magical! The setting and the atmosphere was everything I had hoped for and more. I felt like I was twelve years old once again. Thankfully, Crystal Palace won and after many years I got to hear ‘Glad All Over.’

That experience turned me into a Palace fan, in contrast to other Americans who have made the more fashionable choice of supporting Manchester United or Arsenal in the Premier League.

In recent years I managed to reconnect with Charlie after a long time. He had pursued a career as a professional musician with, as you can imagine, the ups and downs associated with that. One of the downs I learned was that he had released an album in the late eighties on an obscure record label that went belly up right around the time the album came out.

It had some really good material and there was one song that stood out for me as having great potential if we were to re-work and re-record portions of it as well as do different lyrics. I thought, in particular, that it could make for a great song for fans to chant or sing inside a soccer stadium. So we went ahead and created that revised song which has turned into ‘Giving It Our Best Shot.’

I fully appreciate Palace fans already have ‘Glad All Over’ but I thought there could be a little room for a secondary recorded song to be played at Selhurst Park. One that, through the cover photo of my ticket stub from 1990 and the opening audio snippet of Andy Gray’s equaliser in the 1990 FA Cup semi-final against Liverpool, provides memories of a special time in the clubs history. A special moment that perhaps can be repeated in the coming weeks in the FA Cup with hopefully a more successful conclusion.

LISTEN to a preview of the track exclusively on TEB.

Obviously the band name too pays homage to the club and its fans – The Arthur Holmesdale Band.

We have pledged to donate to the Crystal Palace Foundation 50% of the revenues we receive during the first two months of sales of the song on iTunes so please go and download a copy.

I hope you all enjoy the song. Here’s hoping that giving it our best shot is lifting the trophy in May.