Category: songs

 

 

Grumpy Princess: No Means No (But so do other things too!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0qGqYZDqf4

Isn’t language wonderful, there are so many words There’s synonyms and antonyms, metaphors and verbs With language there are so many ways to convey the very same thought But somehow when it comes to women and sex, comprehend words some men cannot Chorus: No means no, but so do other things too Like not right now and I don’t want to I don’t think so, this doesn’t feel right It’s not gonna happen tonight Now you may have noticed that none of those phrases actually contained the word “no” But you knew what they meant, didn’t you? It’s easy, don’t you know You don’t have to have superpowers, you don’t have to read her thoughts You just have to give a shit about what she really wants Not everyone wants to have sex with you, it sounds crazy, but it’s true Even if you’re famous, or really hot, or have lots of money, or happen to be their boss “What if she was nice to me?” “What if she didn’t say ‘no’?” “What if she made a horrified face, and said ‘I should probably go’?” After last chorus: So don’t try to make it happen tonight ‘Cause if you do that’s sexual assault

 

 

Sheldon Posen 1996

 

Finest Kind wrote “About the recent calamitous demise of the 500-year-old Newfoundland cod fishery. The song is modelled on Coal Not Dole, Kay Sutcliffe’s lament for the coal mining industry in Great Britain, as sung by Coope, Boyes, and Simpson. A reach is a sea inlet or channel. A stage was the shed where in former times inshore cod fishermen landed, split, washed, and salted their catch. A flake was a rough pole-and-bough platform on which salt cod was dried in sun and wind before being exported.”

Finest Kind: https://ianrobb1.bandcamp.com/track/no-more-fish-no-fishermen

https://ianrobb1.bandcamp.com/track/no-more-fish-no-fishermen

Out along the harbour reach Boats stand dried up on the beach Ghost-like in the early dawn Empty, now the fish are gone. What will become of people now? Try to build a life somehow Hard, hard times are back again No more fish, no fishermen. No more shoppers in the stores Since the fish plant closed its doors Men who walked a trawler’s decks Now line up for welfare cheques. There’s big “For Sale” signs everywhere Pockets empty, cupboards bare See it on the news at ten No more fish, no fishermen. Once from Ship Cove to Cape Race Port aux Basques to Harbour Grace Newfoundlanders fished for cod Owing merchants, trusting God. They filled their dories twice a day They fished their poor sweet lives away They could not imagine then No more fish, no fishermen. Back before the Second War We could catch our fish inshore Boats were small and gear was rough We caught fish, but left enough. And now there’s no more fish because The trawler fleets took all there was We could see it coming then No more fish, no fishermen. Farewell now to stage and flake Get out for the children’s sake Leave all friends and kin behind Take whatever job you find. There’s some that say things aren’t so black They say the fish will all come back Who’ll be here to catch them then? No more fish, no fishermen.

 

 

Robert Burns 

 

Ceolbeg: The Nodding Song / Gide’en Tae Ye Kimmer / The Skye Bridge Dance

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxj9ObCJmHg

Gudeen to you kimmer And how do you do? Hiccup, quo’ kimmer, The better that I’m fou. Chorus: We’re a’ noddin, nid nid nodding, We’re a’ nodding at our house at hame, We’re a’ noddin, nid nid nodding, We’re a’ nodding at our house at hame. Kate sits i’ the neuk, Suppin hen-broo; Deil tak Kate An’ she be na noddin too! How’s a’ wi’ you, kimmer And how do ye fare? A pint o’ the best o’t, And twa pints mair. How’s a’ wi’ you, kimmer, And how do ye thrive; How mony bairns hae ye? Quo’ kimmer, I hae five. Are they a’ Johny’s? Eh! atweel no: Twa o’ them were gotten When Johny was awa. Cats like milk And dogs like broo; Lads like lasses weel, And lasses lads too.

 

 

trad 

 

Bert Lloyd wrote in 1958: “In the nineteenth century, this popular street ballad was issued over and over again on broadsheets. An older song, The Green Bed, describing the adventures of a sailor in an uncharitable boarding house, seems to be the parent of Wild Rover.” Shortly thereafter, Peggy Seeger & Ewan MacColl collected it from Sam Larner, and from their book, Luke Kelly of the Dubliners learned it. The Dubliners’ version is close to what I’ve heard sung today, and you can hear the lineage from recordings of Larner, but Larner’s version sounds a little more distant from the familiar setting.

The Dubliners: The Wild Rover

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDgyPD-HCsw

I’ve been a wild rover for many’s the year and I’ve spent all my money on whiskey and beer. But now I’m returning with gold in great store and I never will play the wild rover no more Chorus And it’s no, nay, never, no, nay, never, no more will I play the wild rover no, never, no more I went into an ale-house I used to frequent and I told the landlady my money was spent. I asked her for credit, she answered me nay, Such “a custom like yours I can have any day I took from my pocket ten sovereigns bright and the landlady’s eyes opened wide with delight. She said I’d have whiskey and wines of the best and the words that she told me were only in jest. I’ll go home to my parents, confess what I’ve done, and I’ll ask them to pardon their prodigal son. And when they’ve caressed me as oft’ times before then I never will play the wild rover no more

 

 

Josephine Douglas 1939

 

Collected from Josephine Douglas in 1939 at the Parchman Farm Women’s Correctional Farm in Mississippi by Herbert Halpert

Jeff Warner & Jeff Davis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyJ1v_pkrQM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyJ1v_pkrQM

Chorus: I’m sittin’ by the river on the levee, Waiting ’til the steamboat come down, Them cotton bales are rolling mighty heavy, Miles and miles around. I thought I heard the steamboat when she landed, Landed on the levee below, I’m sittin’ by the river on the levee, Waiting ’til the steamboat come down. Noah, Noah, what a foolish man, Built the ark on the sandy land. I said, who built the ark? Brother Noah, Noah! Who built the ark? Brother Noah, Noah! Brother Noah built the ark! Matthew stood by the Red Sea shore, Smotin’ at the water with a two-by-four. I said, who built the ark? … Matthew, Martha, Luke and John, All them sinners is a-dead and gone. I said, who built the ark? … Matthew, Martha sitting in the shade, Thinking about the money that I ain’t made. I said, who built the ark? …

 

 

Stan Rogers 1981

 

“At a concert in Calgary, we performed this song, and when we finished, there were a few seconds of silence, in which I clearly heard someone say ‘My God, he’s written a new national anthem!’ Not quite what I had in mind, but not too far off, either.”

Stan Rogers: Northwest Passage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9-ZGfidpow

Chorus Ah, for just one time I would take the Northwest Passage To find the hand of Franklin reaching for the Beaufort Sea; Tracing one warm line through a land so wide and savage And make a Northwest Passage to the sea. Westward from the Davis Strait ’tis there ’twas said to lie The sea route to the Orient for which so many died; Seeking gold and glory, leaving weathered, broken bones And a long-forgotten lonely cairn of stones. Three centuries thereafter, I take passage overland In the footsteps of brave Kelso, where his “sea of flowers” began Watching cities rise before me, then behind me sink again This tardiest explorer, driving hard across the plain. And through the night, behind the wheel, the mileage clicking west I think upon Mackenzie, David Thompson and the rest Who cracked the mountain ramparts and did show a path for me To race the roaring Fraser to the sea. How then am I so different from the first men through this way? Like them, I left a settled life, I threw it all away. To seek a Northwest Passage at the call of many men To find there but the road back home again.

 

 

trad 

 

Bob Walser: 2011 Chicago Maritime Festival – All Hands led by Bob Walser – Nothin’ But a Humbug

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WywFVsQ9hJU

Chorus: You’re nothin’ but a humbug. So they say, so they say. You’re nothin’ but a humbug. That’s all I know! Catfish grow on a huckleberry vine. (so they say, so they say) Catfish grow on a huckleberry vine. (and that’s all I know) Never seen the like since I been born, Sailor on the fife rail crackin’ out corn. One day the blackbird said to the crow Why do you love your farmer so? That’s my trade since Adam was born Scratchin’ and a diggin’ up the farmers corn. Said the blackbird to the crow Don’t tell those pretty girls all I know.

 

 

Jean Ritchie 1977

 

Ritchie said “I’ve written some healing songs too. One is called Now is the Cool of the Day, which is my favorite of my written songs right now.”

Jean Ritchie: Now Is the Cool of the Day

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vv46mxx0OS0

My Lord, he said unto me Do you like my garden so fair You may live in this garden if you’ll keep the grasses green And I’ll return in the cool of the day CHORUS: Now is the cool of the day Now is the cool of the day This earth is a garden, the garden of my Lord And he walks in his garden In the cool of the day Then my Lord, he said unto me Do you like my pastures so green You may live in this garden if you will feed my sheep And I’ll return in the cool of the day Then my Lord, he said unto me Do you like my garden so free You may live in this garden if you’ll keep the people free And I’ll return in the cool of the day

 

 

Nancy Kerr 2014

 

Shortly after she released it, a preeminent online cricket website was describing a boring fourth day of a long cricket match and said: “as Nancy Kerr said in ‘Now is the Time’, ‘Now is that blessed moment'”. She has no idea who the writer was. Kerr jokes that was her peak, being quoted on this cricket website.

Nancy Kerr: https://nancykerr.bandcamp.com/track/now-is-the-time

https://nancykerr.bandcamp.com/track/now-is-the-time

Chorus: Now is the time, now is that blessed moment Now is the breath of life sent in turn to weather a gathering rhyme Be bold and kind, farewell my old discontent Just ask the heavens’ consent to burn and turn cold days to fine City of souls blown by the breath of old lovers Where death’s cold dances hold prisoners so very unkind Farewell, we sing, dressed in the leavings of others For guests shall plenty bring and turn cold days to fine Happy and poor, is that more foolishness, talking? Will walking Peace’s path preserve your hearth in flame? Scant seed in store brings feathered visitors flocking To sing shall comfort bring, for souls are made the same Sinners, arise and turn your eyes to the waters For nature’s mortal pool shall bathe all fools in brine Be not denied when all sure-footedness falters For earth’s uncertainties have turned our fields to wine

 

 

trad 

 

Lady Maisery says their tune, basically the one I know, was collected from a Sam P. Bayard of Pennsylvania and included in Lomax 1934. Sandy & Caroline Paton say their version recorded 1966 on “Songs of Beech Mountain, North Carolina” was collected from a Mrs. Buna Hicks, who said that the song was regularly used to end religious services, or “camp meetings”, in her area, years ago, and that her mother was always asked to sing it.ÿ

Fathers, now our meeting is over Fathers we must part If I never see you anymore I love you in my heart And we’ll stand on the shore (X3) And be safe forever more