Chicken Man (theme tune)

"Chicken Man"
Instrumental
Recorded	1975
Studio	Munich, Germany
Genre	Theme tune
Length	2:02
Composer(s)	Alan Hawkshaw

"Chicken Man" is a tune composed in 1975 by Alan Hawkshaw used in two popular British TV series since the 1970s.

Background

It was recorded in Munich as part of the Themes International music library. Hawkshaw composed the tune in less than an hour, claiming he "didn't really know what [he] was doing" and that "he just wanted to do something quirky".

TV theme tune

It became known as the theme to the long-running children's series Grange Hill. In its original version it was used as the main title music from 1978 to 1987, and was replaced by a re-recorded version from 1988 to 1989. After being replaced by a completely different theme tune, it made a reappearance in the final series of Grange Hill in 2008. An entirely different arrangement of "Chicken Man" was also used as the theme to early series of the British quiz show Give Us a Clue, despite the fact that it was already being used on Grange Hill. It lasted as the theme tune from 1979 until 1981, when a new producer/director commissioned an entirely new theme tune.

Other uses

Since then, the tune has been used as a jingle for the El Árbol supermarket chain in Spain throughout 2010, on UK adverts for Paddy Power bookmakers in 2013 and McVitie's DeliChoc in 2015 and as the musical bed for the feature "Homework Sucks" on Simon Mayo's BBC Radio 2 show in the UK. It was also sampled by Welsh hip hop group Goldie Lookin Chain on the song "Charmschool" from their 2005 album, Safe as Fuck. The full piece of music is 2 minutes 2 seconds in duration. It was featured in episode 2 of season 3 of the TV series The League of Gentlemen.