Jon Hare/Markus Klein/Andrew Barnabas/Richard Joseph Specialist

Jon Hare, Richard Joseph

3:28

08/02/2008

47. in the year 2008
605. in all-time charts

76%

War has never been so much fun…

…was originally written by Jon Hare and arranged by Richard Joseph in 1993 for the release of Cannon Fodder on the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST, at the time it was hailed as being the first computer game sound track to have proper vocals, thanks largely to the pioneering recording and production techniques of Richard Joseph.

In 2006 Richard, ever the music collector, introduced Jon to a stringed oriental instrument called the saz, and in November 2006, following the rerecording of Richard and Jon's other well known track "Goalscoringsuperstarhero" for Sensible Soccer 2006 Richard discussed with Jon the possibility of rerecording "War has never been so much fun" using the saz, wish had now become Jon's favourite new instrument.

Eventually in February 2007 Jon called up Richard to discuss with him this idea in more detail, but unfortunately during this call Jon learned that his friend, who had moved to france the previous year, was now seriously ill in hospital, suffering from paralysis of his legs and having being diagnosed with very advanced lung cancer. Richard died just one month later.

Later on in 2007 Markus Klein approached Jon suggesting a rerecording of War has never been so much fun would be a fitting tribute to the great man. Jon agreed and also mentioned to Markus the saz version that Richard himself had suggested the previous year. Inspired by the saz, Richard's spirit, Markus's new back beat and the aftermath of the Gulf War Jon then collaborated with Andrew Barnabas, a fellow old school Amiga games composer and friend of Richard to record this new version of Hare & Joseph's greatest track together.

Markus then took all the ingredients and mixed them up together with the odd sample from the original and Abracadabra a new, more middle eastern version of the classic song was born…..