The Busy Girl Buys Beauty Lyrics
The pretty girl buys style
And the simple girl buys what she's told to buy
And sees her world through the brightly lit eyes
Of the glossy romance of fashion
Where she can learn
Top tips for the gas cook
Successful secrets of a sexual kind
The daily drill for beautiful hair
And the truth about pain
What did Angela Rippon say?
What will you do when you wake up one morning
To find that God's made you plain
In a beautiful person's world?
And all those quick recipes
Have let you down
And you're 20½ and not yet engaged
Will you go look for the boy who says
I love you let's get married and have kids
The pretty girl buys style
And the simple girl buys what she's told to buy
Through the brightly lit eyes
Of the glossy romance of fashion
Where she can learn
Top tips for the gas cook
Successful secrets of a sexual kind
The daily drill for beautiful hair
In a mail order paradise
its about the culture of wommens magazines and the way they try to pigeon hole young wommen and market to them
references: Anna Ford and Angela Rippon were BBC News personalities at the time the song was written.
At the time this was written (1983), Anna Ford was at ITV, so was the big rival to the BBC’s Angela Rippon. Anna Ford was regarded more as the “sexy newsreader” vs Angela Rippon as a “serious journalist” (though Anna Ford was every bit as much of a journalist). Certainly that’s how they were portrayed in magazines and tabloid newspapers. Hence in the lyrics the focus on what Anna Ford was wearing, versus what Angela Rippon said. Ironically, one of Angela Rippon’s most famous TV appearances was notable because of what she wore: a Morecambe & Wise song-and-dance routine which showed off her long legs which until then had always been demurely hidden under a desk.