The Hymn Remains The Same

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e’ve been struggling as to how best to address Canon David Mungavin’s stepping down as St Patrick’s National School chairman at the weekend, and all we can think of is Nickelback.

And Elvis knows, nobody ever wants to think of Nickelback, if they can help it.

Given that Mungavin is stepping down only temporarily, and that he has populated the still-standing board largely with his Mini-Mes over the past few years, chances are, nothing is going to actually change at St Patrick’s.

We hardly need to go into the troubles and controversy that has been revealed since Eileen Jackson resigned as principal at St Patrick’s in July over, well, principles, claiming the admissions policy had turned particularly incestuous. The peasants were soon revolting, and on August 29th, at a truly extraordinary EGM, parents at the school delivered an overwhelming No Confidence vote for both the chairman of the board (94 nays, 24 ayes) and the board of management (101 nays, 21 ayes).

And so, in an attempt to quell the uprising, Mungavin has effectively moved into the backseat of the car, leaving his even more unpopular board of management to continue steering the church on his chosen path.

We could get into the nitty-gritty over who exactly is on that board, and which of them are singing from the Mungavin hymn sheet, but, let’s save that for another day. There’s no point in embarrassing Robin George, Grattan Evans and Billy Markham right now.

Better to explain it through the power of Nickelback. Imagine, if you will, that this extremely Canadian band decided to try and turn the tide of constant ridicule that has long dogged them by ‘firing’ frontman Chad Kroeger, and letting his mediocre bassist brother Mike take over.

Would the world listen to Nickelback with fresh ears, forgetting the 23 years of torturous, multi-million-selling MOR dross they’ve inflicted up on the world? Would music fans from Perth to Portlaoise suddenly perk up their ears, in excited anticipation of a brand new Nickelback with a brand new sound?

Would they feck. With or without Chad, this is still Nickelback, a band whose music will always take you to another place. That place being somewhere far away from where Nickelback’s music is playing.

Well, ditto Mungavin. It’s still his band down at St Patrick’s. And they’re still making crappy, offensive music.