To see the lyrics, click on the name of the version you are interested in (on the left).

The song was written for a Father Ted episode called ‘A Song For Europe’. However only the music is by Neil Hannon, the lyrics being written by Graham Linehan and Arthur Mathews.

In the episode we don’t only hear the official version of the song, but we also hear it sang by Dermot Morgan and Ardal O’Hanlon. Father Ted Crilly and Father Dougal McGuire write an Eurovision song but they don’t have a proper music, just a single guitar and drum machine note. So they decide to base it on a cheesy B-side by a Norwegian band called Nin Huuguen and the Huuguen Notes and they dream of a video for the song. This is this version which has Neil’s music and vocals. The video parodies ‘That’s What Friends Are For’ by the Swarbriggs, the 1975 Irish song for the Eurovision contest.
It leads them to the Irish finals for the Eurovision contest where they challenge Dick Byrne and his song, ‘The Miracle Is Mine’, but had to play their own version of the song as they’d be accused for plagiarism. Will they win and reach the Eurovision contest?

Always requested at Divine Comedy gigs, ‘My Lovely Horse’ was played live a few times, more for fun than anything else. Among notorious live performances, we can notice the live at the Heineken Green International Music Festival in 1997, where the song was played with Ardal O’Hanlon. During the ‘An Evening With Neil Hannon’ solo tour it was played in a new form on the piano.