Pro-Labor Party stans are running a social media campaign to get a song by an Australian band that samples a Dan Andrews press conference into the Hottest 100.
Towards the start of the pandemic, Australian electronic band Mashd N Kutcher released a track that sampled the Victorian Premier saying “get on the beers” at a press conference. It went a bit viral, including footage of it being played a festival in WA.
But the ironic use of Andrews’ warning to avoid unnecessary gatherings during the early parts of the pandemic took on a notably partisan tone when it was adopted as an anthem for Dan Andrews mega fans online.
After the #IStandWithDan crew pushed for the song to hit #1 on the iTunes charts, they set their eyes on a new goal: getting into the ABC’s youth broadcaster’s annual music competition, the Triple J Hottest 100.
In December, some of the biggest pro-Dan Andrews Twitter influencers in the space began to mobilise their fans to vote it in.
One notoriously pro-Labor Twitter account is @PRGuy17, an anonymous user who emerged during the pandemic. He has a knack for making pro-Dan and anti-Liberal hashtags to trend on Twitter and has spread fake news in the past.
The user — who’s Twitter bio currently reads “MAKE IT NO. 1 in the #Hottest100: Mashd N Kutcher – Get on The Beers (feat. Dan Andrews): http://hottest100.abc.net.au” — began campaigning for it in early December to his 15,000 followers.
“IMPORTANT: Calling on ALL Australians to vote for ‘Mashd N Kutcher – Get on the Beers’ in the Triple J #Hottest100. It’s the song we spent all 2020 waiting for. PLEASE VOTE AND SHARE – That’s what’s most important and that’s #WhatMustBeDone,” he tweeted.
???? THAT’S WHAT’S MOST IMPORTANT AND THAT’S WHAT MUST BE DONE ????: Vote for @mashdnkutcher – #GetOnTheBeers in Triple J #Hottest100. Link: https://t.co/UQIaKdL4UB pic.twitter.com/6ybDG0lMq1
— PRGuy (@PRGuy17) December 7, 2020
Since then, his tweets about this have spread widely.
Other users have joined in the campaigning using similar hashtags, one even sharing a screenshot of being blocked by former Victorian Liberal Michael Guy as motivation for voting for the song.
It appears that momentum has gathered behind the song. On the Hottest 100 prediction site 100 Warm Tunas, the song’s projected place in the competition has jumped from in the 70s during mid-December (after the campaign had started) to 16 today.
The website works by scanning hashtags on social media platforms to find posts with people’s votes and uses that to model who will win. It’s become less reliable over the years since Triple J tried to thwart the system.
But while the exact placing is unlikely to be accurate, it can provide insight into how voting patterns are changing.
Even knowing that, there’s no way to know who would have voted for the with that motivation. Clearly, plenty of people just like the song. Plus, the band is campaigning — as bands often do — and they’ve received the votes and endorsements of other bands too.
(Interestingly, their non-partisan posts calling for people to vote in the Hottest 100 have drawn the ire of anti-Dan fans too.)
There would also have to be quite a few votes corralled to have any real influence, given that millions of people have already voted according to triple j.
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter!
If the song does place, both fans of the song and of Andrews are sure to claim credit. There’s no way to know who was responsible, but let’s not think about it too much.
The potential placing of this stone cold banger by Mashd N Kutcher into the Hottest 100 shouldn’t be diminished by the fact it is political (because everything is political, but let’s not get carried away like a first year philosophy uni student).
What it does show is: no matter the platform, stans — be they BTS Army or #IStandWithDan fans — will try to mobilise to seize an opportunity to promote their cause. And if they’re willing to do it for this, imagine what they’ll do for something that actually matters.
Voting closed for the Hottest 100 today, with the countdown set to start at midday on Saturday 23 January.