On 26 January 2014, Darren Burnett defeated Mervyn King to win the World Indoor Bowls Championships, but the internet remembers that day for a different reason. On pre-match entertainment duties was Shaun Williamson, best known for playing Barry Evans in EastEnders (and “Barry from EastEnders” in the Ricky Gervais series Extras). His performance of Labi Siffre’s (Something Inside) So Strong – with its passionately delivered refrain “we’re gonna do it anyway” – has been immortalised in internet meme culture as the ultimate example of committing to a bit.
The whole bowls scene is deliciously awkward: Williamson belts out Siffre’s anthem to a crowd equal parts bored and baffled, and some seem to get up to leave. (They weren’t walking out, Williamson’s team insists; they were taking advantage of their allotted comfort break before the final.) Nine years later, an altogether more enthusiastic crowd waits patiently for Barrioke, Willliamson’s karaoke show, on a Friday night at Southend-on-Sea’s music pub Chinnerys. An hour later, the room is bouncing along to Chelsea Dagger and Chesney Hawkes as audience members join him on the mic, and remember the hard way that So Strong finishes with a key change.
