I am Scots born and love Scots songs and ballads and sing many of them. I have a particular love of the songs of Robert Burns.

I have loathed The Flower of Scotland since I first heard it in a folk club in Edinburgh sung by The Corries not long after it was written and long before it was as well known and widely sung as it is today. It seemed - and still seems - totally trite, sentimental drivel with no literary merit in the words along with pathetic macho posturing which does not represent the type of people that my Scots friends and relatives are.
As a potential national anthem it is a failure. What would you think of a country that defines itself not in its many achievements and great minds but by having the only person mentioned in the song as a centuries dead foreign king?
I was fortunate to be a friend of the man that I regard as Scotland's greatest songwriter of the 20th century, the late Michael Marra. I know that Michael hated the song as much as I did and was inspired to write an ALTERNATIVE NATIONAL ANTHEM which is to my mind is far better and more true to life as well as being hilariously funny.