'Murder On The Dancefloor' Nearly Had Lyrics 'Hit The Hague! Then Hit The Bong!'

Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s 2001 hit, Murder On The Dancefloor, could have contained the line, “Hit the Hague! Then hit the bong!”, but how? It was once a scrapped demo from You Get What You Give hitmakers New Radicals.

In a new, rare interview with former vocalist and songwriter for the New Radicals, Gregg Alexander, in The Guardian, he shared a snippet of the demo and left a voice message that you can listen to here.

Adding that he’s an “artist at heart” and by moonlighting, he produced records for The Strokes and Tina Turner; Alexander discussed the 90s “rough cassette” of Murder On The Dancefloor.

Then, Alexander brought up the New Radicals’ “dance-murder metaphors”, including “hit The Hague! Then hit the bong!”

Discussing Ellis-Bextor’s recent resurgence thanks to a needle drop of Murder On The Dancefloor in the popular film Saltburn, Alexander continued, “As well as Sophie also awesomely retweeting Murder covers – my bandmate Danielle [Brisebois] and I thought why not share a snippet of that cassette ruff track we sent Sophie containing New Radicals’ nearly ‘lost hit’?

“A song which may have gone unheard, and the world never known, were it not for Sophie’s belief in the song and her pop brilliance! Enjoy – and eternal thank you from New Radicals to Sophie Ellis-Bextor!”

Elsewhere in the interview, Alexander admitted that he almost “flipped a coin” between New Radicals releasing Murder On The Dancefloor and You Get What You Give.

He explained, “The record company wanted something urgently, and I didn’t have the time or the budget to finish both. I felt like Murder was a monster, but You Get What You Give was a masterpiece. It was everything I’d always wanted to say inside five minutes.”

Released over two decades ago, Murder On The Dancefloor recently made a stunning comeback, climbing back to the top of the charts, thanks to its iconic use in the film Saltburn. The catchy melody and vocals have turned the song into a viral sensation, amassing millions of streams and topping Spotify's Viral 50 chart in the US.

Addressing her resurgence on the UK charts, Ellis-Bextor told BBC, “It actually feels really magical. And if I'm honest, I don't think I've completely processed it, really. It’s extraordinary… for new people to be discovering it, for it to be making new memories with people is kind of beautiful.”

You can check out Aussie indie rock group Royel Otis’s version of Murder On The Dancefloor here.