Finland (song)

"Finland" is a Monty Python comedy song written and performed by Michael Palin and arranged by John Du Prez with a guitar accompaniment. It first appeared on the album Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album from 1980 and was later included on the 1989 compilation Monty Python Sings.

It purports to be a celebration of Finland, a country that is overlooked when travelling abroad as "a poor second to Belgium", despite the fact that it "has it all" with lofty mountains and tall trees and pleasures including: pony trekking, camping or "just watching TV".[1] (In reality, "mountains so lofty" are not characteristic of Finland as the Scandinavian Mountains only just touch the northwesternmost corner of the country.)

Michael Palin was filmed singing a verse from "Finland" during an episode of his 1992 travelogue series Pole to Pole during a segment in which he is shown traveling across that country. A heavily edited version of "Finland" is used as the opening song of the stage musical Spamalot (ending with a historian exasperatedly yelling "I said England!"), and it appeared in a new version as part of the "Spam Song" in Monty Python Live (Mostly).