They dragged her down, dead, from Tobermory Too cheap to spare her one last head of steam Deep in diesel fumes embraced Rust and soot upon the face of one who was so clean They brought me here to watch her in the boneyard Just two old wrecks to spend the night alone It’s the dark inside this evil place Clouds on the moon hide her disgrace This whiskey hides my own
Chorus: It’s the last watch on the Midland The last watch alone One last night to love her The last night she’s whole
My guess is that we were young together Like her’s, my strength was young and hard as steel And like her too, I knew my ground I scarcely felt the years go round In answer to the wheel But then they quenched the fire beneath the boiler Gave me a watch and showed me out the door At sixty-four, you’re still the best One year more, and then you’re less Than dust upon the floor
So here’s to useless superannuation And us old relics of the days of steam In the morning, Lord, I would prefer When men with torches come for her Let angels come for me
Recorded by The Full English 2013 to a tune by Scan Tester (1886-1972), words collected as early as 1858
When a bumper is filled, it is vexing, no doubt, To find when you rise that the wine has run out; And sure it’s an equally unpleasant thing To be asked for a song when you’ve naught left to sing. I could sing something old, if an old one would do, But the world it is craving to have something new. But what to select for the words or the tune? I, in fact, know no more than the Man in the Moon.
Chorus: The Man in the Moon a new light on us throws, He’s a man we all talk of but nobody knows. And though a high subject, I’m getting in tune, I’ll just sing a song for the Man in the Moon.
Tis said that some people are moonstruck, we find, But the Man in the Moon must be out of his mind. But it can’t be for love for he’s quite on his own, No ladies to meet him by moonlight alone. It can’t be ambition, for rivals he’s none, At least he is only eclipsed by the sun, But when drinking, I say, he is seldom surpassed, For he always looks best when he’s seen through a glass.
The Man in the Moon he must lead a queer life, With no one around him, not even a wife, No friends to console him, no children to kiss, No chance of his joining a party like this. But he’s used to high life, for each all circles agree, That none move in such a high circle as he, And though nobles go up in their royal balloon, They’re not introduced to the Man in the Moon.
Paddy Ryan was purportedly the stage name of a Dr. R.E.W. Fisher. In 1938 he was a medical student.
Chorus: I am the man, the jovial man, that waters the workers’ beer (x2) And what do I care if it makes them ill? For it makes their minds unclear I’ve a car, a yacht, and an aeroplane, and I waters the workers’ beer
Now, when I waters the workers’ beer, I puts in strychinine Some methylated spirits, and a can of kerosene But since a brew so terribly strong would make them terribly queer So I reaches my hand for the watering can and I waters the workers’ beer
Now, a drop of beer is good for a man who is thirsty and tired and hot I sometimes have a glass myself from a very special pot But a strong and healthy working class is the thing that I most fear So I reaches my hand for the watering can and I waters the workers’ beer
Now, ladies fair, beyond compare, be you maiden or wife Spare a thought for such a man who leads such a lonely life For the water rates are frightfully high, and the meths is terribly dear And there ain’t the profit there used to be in watering the workers’ beer
Now years roll on, and I find myself once again squarely on top When workers try to shrug the yoke, I need not even call down the cops But a war on my class feels ever more near and the blade feels close to my ear So I reaches once more for the watering can and I waters the workers’ beer
Chorus: The man who puffs the big cigar Turns all he touches into stone The cash flows in from near and far When he picks up the telephone
The value of his property increases daily No one knows How much he owns and still he schemes The more he buys the more it seems There is no limit to his dreams And as the market booms His empire grows
Susie: A stripper in a Soho Club She works long hours but not for love And when men she her body they go crazy But she just smiles in her heart And keeps herself a soul apart In her room at night she dreams alone For Susie loves the man who flies the high trapeze He’s flying now a thousand miles away But she knows one day she’ll meet him as she always used to do By the statue of Eros On a bright summers day
Chorus
And Eros too belongs to him And all the land from miles around He buys the men who clear the way Who draw the plans to make it pay He has no time for yesterday His deals are shrewd and his invesments sound
Susie: The men who view her want her for themselves But Susie just ignores Their looks She knows they can not buy this lady She walks the world in a see-through dress Self contained self possessed And in her heart a secret that is hers A message from the man who flies the high trapeze A message from a thousand miles away Telling her to meet him as she always used to do By the statue of Eros On mid summers day
Chorus
Now all round’ Eros towers rise And concrete slabs that black the sun And carefully he calculates The profit he expects to make From each square foot of his estate That’s a bumper crop when all is said and done
Susie: Why are you looking so afraid You know he’ll keep the vow he made The time has come and gone It won’t be easy To find him in this concrete maze Walls and railings bar the way As if she’s lost in space she wanders on Looking for the man who flies the high trapeze But he could be a thousand miles away And cut off by the traffic in the distance out of reach The statue of Eros And its mid summers day
Chorus
His country mansion tutor style Has priceless pictures on the walls And he picks up the phone And starts to turn the wheels A scheme to market Instant cures for broken hearts That could yield handsome dividends for all
Blue Dolphin was designed by the famous naval architect William Roue, designer of the famous racing schooner Bluenose. Sometimes called a sister ship to Bluenose, Blue Dolphin was in fact considerably smaller but reflected the overall style of Bluenose. Blue Dolphin was built for Stephen Henry Velie Jr of Kansas City, Missouri. Rogers wrote the song based on his contact with Bruce Kemp and Kemp's experiences trying to raise and restore Blue Dolphin. A few weeks after writing the song "Man with Blue Dolphin" Rogers died
It was just like him. He had to pick A boat gone from dowdy to derelict In half a dozen years Of searching for an owner She may have left her heart in the harbour mud But she really caught his at the flood And he wonders how she knew That she was waiting for a loner
Blue Dolphin, built by the Rhuland men She’s lying on the bottom again With only him to care That Bluenose had a sister He lost the house and he sold the car His wife walked out so he hit the bars And hit up every friend To raise the Blue Dolphin
Chorus: And even afloat she’s a hole in the water Where his money goes Every dollar goes And it’s driving him crazy He pounds his fists white on the dock in the night And cries, “I’m gonna win!” And licks the blood away And he’s gonna raise the Dolphin
Blue Dolphin’s lying like a wounded whale She’s hungry for a scrap of a sail To get her underway Back to salt water Now there’s a man lying spent in the winter sun He wonders what the hell he has done And who would ever pay To save his schooner daughter
Every day we walk the harbour she would look out on the sea And as the boats would come and go she’d turn and say to me “Oh, let’s go out on the water this city I have seen The streets are loud and dirty, but the ocean’s clear and clean.”
Chorus: Oh the price we pay for living in a city by the sea Just to know we could escape if we were brave enough to leave A boat could take us anywhere we’d ever want to go When that coastline disappears, a boat’s the only home we’ll know
There’s a job out on the water aboard the Margaret Keene Three months of barely any pay for a world we’ve never seen Oh we’ll go to sea all summer come fall return to land I’ll marry her the day we dock and never part again
We stepped aboard that fishing boat one rainy morn in June We met the captain, met the crew, and set to leave at noon Oh, we sailed out from the harbour with skies so dark and grey But far from shore- the sun did soar and smile and she did say
Every day we’d cast the lines out at night we’d sleep alone Stripers never stood a chance with twenty lines in tow Oh the captain worked us harder than we’d ever worked before But each night as she was sleeping I was thinkin’ of the shore
One night as we lay sleeping the storm had found our course The Keene took water o’er the sides the waves they came in force We awoke and tied our lifelines I prayed the seas would tame I’ve never seen her smile so wide as in the wind and rain
As the summer ended, the Keene returned to land And in my coat I had a ring to put upon her hand Oh, but when I turned and saw her staring back at me I knew she’d never come to shore, nor I return to sea
"Like 'Forty-Five Years' and 'Barrett's Privateers', this song has become very much a trade mark for us. It is as close as I'll ever come to a 'song of inspiration.' It also marked what I assure you is only a temporary end to the 'Maritime Seres' of songs. May you always 'rise again'."
She went down last October in a pouring driving rain. The skipper, he’d been drinking and the Mate, he felt no pain. Too close to Three Mile Rock, and she was dealt her mortal blow, And the Mary Ellen Carter settled low. There were just us five aboard her when she finally was awash. We’d worked like hell to save her, all heedless of the cost. And the groan she gave as she went down, it caused us to proclaim That the Mary Ellen Carter would rise again.
Chorus: Rise again, rise again, that her name not be lost To the knowledge of men. Those who loved her best and were with her till the end Will make the Mary Ellen Carter rise again.
Well, the owners wrote her off; not a nickel would they spend. “She gave twenty years of service, boys, then met her sorry end. But insurance paid the loss to us, so let her rest below.” Then they laughed at us and said we had to go. But we talked of her all winter, some days around the clock, She’s worth a quarter million, afloat and at the dock. And with every jar that hit the bar, we swore we would remain And make the Mary Ellen Carter rise again.
All spring, now, we’ve been with her on a barge lent by a friend. Three dives a day in hard hat suit and twice I’ve had the bends. Thank God it’s only sixty feet and the currents here are slow Or I’d never have the strength to go below. But we’ve patched her rents, stopped her vents, dogged hatch and porthole down. Put cables to her, ‘fore and aft and girded her around. Tomorrow, noon, we hit the air and then take up the strain. And make the Mary Ellen Carter Rise Again.
For we couldn’t leave her there, you see, to crumble into scale. She’d saved our lives so many times, living through the gale And the laughing, drunken rats who left her to a sorry grave They won’t be laughing in another day And you, to whom adversity has dealt the final blow With smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go Turn to, and put out all your strength of arm and heart and brain And like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.
Final Chorus: Rise again, rise again – though your heart it be broken And life about to end No matter what you’ve lost, be it a home, a love, a friend. Like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.
In Bristol, just before the war, the tankers loomed along the shore And I would hang about the door of a shop down by the quay It was there, when I was just a lad, I took the trade I’ve always had And where the hand of my first master made its mark on me
Chorus: The Union Jack, the rose and crown, the mermaid and the swallow A dagger and an anchor, and a cock upon the knee
And when the bombers droned above we inked the names of the girls they loved In hearts, upon the hearts of oak who’d soon put out to sea
I was a little older when the war was over, even then The Navy still had need of men and so I signed aboard In engine rooms, and on the grates I plied my trade among my mates Gave them the mark they wanted most for what they could afford
Chorus
And down there, in the oily dark on arms and backs I left my mark Forever etched in indigo on sailor boys at sea
And then one day I came to land, across the western ocean I shipped out of Halifax, and sailed the inland seas And sometimes when I’d step ashore I used to take the notion That I was not as young a man as once I used to be.
Chorus
From the awning of my pitch the seaway’s like a muddy ditch As from this country fair I watch ships gliding towards the sea
And now the canvas I sail under promises a “World of Wonder” Step right up, I’ll make my mark at a price that you can pay In the dying days of August, captain in a sea of sawdust But the fancies of a sailor’s life are out of style today
Chorus
But where my shirt sleeve meets my skin I see a map of where I’ve been And where the hand of my first master made its mark on me
Chorus: God bless the merry little hop That brings us all good cheer For without the merry little hop We would never know strong beer We would never know strong beer
Here’s praise indeed for the barley malt From which fine whiskies come And praise indeed for the sugar in the cane From which does come brown rum And praise indeed for juniper With its berry black as sin For without the juniper tree We’d not know fiery gin.
Here’s praise indeed for the golden grape That hangs upon the vine For without the golden grape We’d not know brandy wine And praise indeed for the apples on the bow That in the autumn grow For without the apples on the bow Sweet cider we’d not know.
And so we raise our glasses high To admire that amber glow There’s not a brewer throughout the land Who’d not have us to know That the ale he brews is honest and true The finest and the best But without the merry little hop It would never pass the test
And now we’ll put our glasses down All empty to the dreg We’ll call on the landlord good and loud To tap another keg And as we watch the liquid flow And admire that glorious sound We’ll raise our glasses one more time And sing another round
