JJ Bull’s unofficial Scotland World Cup anthem has found a new audience just as football fans wait for the 2026 World Cup to kick off on Thursday June 11. The Very Unofficial Scotland World Cup Song is back in circulation, and Bull says the reaction has given the parody electro track a fresh boost.
The song lands like a joke that knows exactly how to play straight. Built on a pulsing minimal electro beat that slowly tips into a euphoric dance-punk wig-out, it takes in Scotland’s old failures and the awkwardness of the tournament being in the US, while still finding room to praise Kenny McLean, Kieran Tiernay and Scott McTominay. For listeners searching for a new World Cup Song before the tournament begins, Bull’s track is arriving at the right moment.
Bull said the idea did not feel like something he constructed line by line. “I know this sounds weird but the entire thing just downloaded into my head from somewhere,” he said of the song’s inspiration. “It’s like I didn’t write it. The words, everything, were already written for me!”
That sense of instant arrival sits uneasily beside the song’s obvious influences. Bull said it may sound like LCD Soundsystem, but he also said he is “ripping them all off” along with several other bands, a confession that gives the track its edge. He also said meeting James Murphy years ago left a mark. Bull said he bumped into him after a Barrowlands LCD Soundsystem gig about 15 years ago, and that he later met Murphy again at Subclub Glasgow, where he gave him a hug and a CD of his own music.
The song’s new life on streaming has also pushed Bull back into the conversation as a musician with a football writer’s ear for timing. He moved to London 13 years ago to pursue TV work, later became a football journalist for The Telegraph and now provides analysis on YouTube via The Athletic. Alongside that, he has released several EPs and albums of Frightened Rabbit-inspired solo material and now livestreams shows where he makes up songs on the spot. He is also due to join Goldie Lookin’ Chain on tour in September.
Scotland has had its share of football songs before, from Belle & Sebastian’s It Only Takes One Lion to We’re Made In Scotland From Girders by Susan Boyle, Franz Ferdinand and Irn Bru, but Bull’s version feels made for the internet age: half parody, half accidental anthem, and fully aware of how thin the line is between a cult singalong and a song people play because they cannot stop humming it. Bull said he is hoping only that people enjoy it and most do not hate it, while adding that if Murphy ever heard it, he might think the next wave is arriving behind him — but not this one.
