A question for all those of my friends who AREN'T from Italy, America, Australia or Britain

[fpb]

One doesn't, in general, think of popular music as a vehicle for patriotism. But apart from the USA, where nobody is ashamed of waving the flag, there have been beautiful patriotic songs from Australia -

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- and, more surprisingly, from Italy:

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I reckon that part of the reason why this is so surprising is the central position of Britain in modern and

Comments

[filialucis]

I believe that this fits your criteria. It's about twenty years old at this point, but has been described as Austria's "secret national anthem" and the country's answer to Waltzing Matilda. Don't ask me to transcribe the words because I can't even make them out about 30% of the time, but the tenor of the lyrics is wry and a little noir, possibly for reasons of national character and possibly for the same reason that you suspect Germany isn't "up to it yet"... but what is significant is that the notion of taking pride in one's country occurs in them. Something that is rarely enough articulated in a culture that still collectively feels uneasy about whether it can afford the luxury of patriotism.

[fpb]

It's also a very nice bit of music, which is another thing that means something.

[fpb]

Ah, yes, and the two Italian songs are also both about twenty years old - but Viva l'Italia in particular is more popular than ever. They were written in the shadow of the horrors of mafia and terrorist violence in the seventies, with a growing sense that we were all in the same boat and that there was something worth saving about Italy and freedom; and it has come back to popularity because of the increasingly degenerate Berlusconi-Bossi "leadership".