by Sam's Cross Tue Aug 29, 2006 7:03 pm
The Black and Tan
I was born in Darlington in 1896
Spewed into a tenement in the shadow of the pits
There I watched my father cough his life into his stout
Waiting out his purgatory knowing no way out
When I heard of the Great War I knew it was my chance
I'd spend a fine vacation in the poppy fields of France
I found myself screaming in the swamp that was the Somme
Buried to my neck in what was left of my friend Tom
chorus
So if there is a God above He's been a bitch to me
But I'm the meanest bastard that He will ever see
And if after I'm dead and gone I find myself in hell
I know that it won't worry me I know it all to well
The shells still fell inside my head back in Harrowgate Hill
And no matter how much I drank I could not drink my fill
Until I heard a call to face a "rough and dangerous task"
For ten shillings a day I'd have knelt and kissed his arse
So I joined that pack of dogs they call the Black and Tans
Shooting at the bogmen in the west of Ireland
We burned down Balbiggan, burned it to the ground
And had our little ways with the lassies that we found
chorus
In November in Kilmichael MacGowan shot me down
And everything went quiet, I never heard a sound
Just another wasted life wrapped around a gun
Crying soft into the mud, calling for me mum.
chorus
So I wrote that song. Yet somehow I wasn't born in 1896. I've never been in a war, I would never call anyone a "bogman", I'm still alive, I deplore pretty much everything done by The Black and Tans. Why did I write a song that is about bad things, from the point of view of a bad person that uses at least one slur?
The reason is that I am interested in the stories of people, particularly people that other people dismiss. It would be hard to find anything written that is sympathetic to The Black and Tans, but all people are people. Everyone has a story that to them justifies, or explains, or is the basis for why they do things. Why would someone go to a foreign land, rape, kill, plunder and maim? It happens so much, and with so many people that there must be human reasons for it.
Restricting your writing to inoffensive subjects is, to me, akin to saying that Al-Qaeda are trying to blow people up because they "Hate our freedom". It actually makes the world a less thoughtful place. A place less inclined to sympathy, a place less inclined to understanding others. A cheaper, poorer, less interesting place.
[color=darkred]The Black and Tan
I was born in Darlington in 1896
Spewed into a tenement in the shadow of the pits
There I watched my father cough his life into his stout
Waiting out his purgatory knowing no way out
When I heard of the Great War I knew it was my chance
I'd spend a fine vacation in the poppy fields of France
I found myself screaming in the swamp that was the Somme
Buried to my neck in what was left of my friend Tom
chorus
So if there is a God above He's been a bitch to me
But I'm the meanest bastard that He will ever see
And if after I'm dead and gone I find myself in hell
I know that it won't worry me I know it all to well
The shells still fell inside my head back in Harrowgate Hill
And no matter how much I drank I could not drink my fill
Until I heard a call to face a "rough and dangerous task"
For ten shillings a day I'd have knelt and kissed his arse
So I joined that pack of dogs they call the Black and Tans
Shooting at the bogmen in the west of Ireland
We burned down Balbiggan, burned it to the ground
And had our little ways with the lassies that we found
chorus
In November in Kilmichael MacGowan shot me down
And everything went quiet, I never heard a sound
Just another wasted life wrapped around a gun
Crying soft into the mud, calling for me mum.
chorus[/color]
So I wrote that song. Yet somehow I wasn't born in 1896. I've never been in a war, I would never call anyone a "bogman", I'm still alive, I deplore pretty much everything done by The Black and Tans. Why did I write a song that is about bad things, from the point of view of a bad person that uses at least one slur?
The reason is that I am interested in the stories of people, particularly people that other people dismiss. It would be hard to find anything written that is sympathetic to The Black and Tans, but all people are people. Everyone has a story that to them justifies, or explains, or is the basis for why they do things. Why would someone go to a foreign land, rape, kill, plunder and maim? It happens so much, and with so many people that there must be human reasons for it.
Restricting your writing to inoffensive subjects is, to me, akin to saying that Al-Qaeda are trying to blow people up because they "Hate our freedom". It actually makes the world a less thoughtful place. A place less inclined to sympathy, a place less inclined to understanding others. A cheaper, poorer, less interesting place.
