While waiting in line to cross the border back into Canada at the Port Huron, MI./Sarnia, ON., crossing, a vehicle close by was playing folk music. One of the songs, sung by a female, was about Newcastle and the Tyne. I had never heard the song before but it did prompt me to start this thread. So, what songs or poems have been written about your city?
Your city in poetry and song
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well theres plenty of referencs to sheffield in the Arctic monkeys songs, and also a few by reverend and the makers
Sea shantys anyone?
Blow the man down
As I was a-walking down Paradise Street,
To me way, hey, blow the man down,
A fat Irish Bobby I chanced for to meet,
Give me some time to blow the man down.
Says he, ``You're a Black Baller from the cut of your hair;
I can tell by those high red-topped sea boots you wear.
``You've come from some ship that flies the Black Ball,
And you've robbed some poor Dutchman of his clothes, boots and
all!''
Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow him away,
Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow him to stay.
Says I, ``Oh, no, sir, you do me great wrong,
I'm a Flying Fish sailor, just home from Hong Kong!''
So I blew him right down, and I stove in his jaw;
Says he then, ``Young feller, you're breaking the law!''
So six months I did, boys, in Liverpool town,
For kicking and punching and blowing him down.
Oh, blow the man, down, bullies, blow the man down;
And a crew of hard cases from Liverpool town.
Spongebob Squarepants theme is based on this
http://www.shanties08.co.uk/
Blow the man down
As I was a-walking down Paradise Street,
To me way, hey, blow the man down,
A fat Irish Bobby I chanced for to meet,
Give me some time to blow the man down.
Says he, ``You're a Black Baller from the cut of your hair;
I can tell by those high red-topped sea boots you wear.
``You've come from some ship that flies the Black Ball,
And you've robbed some poor Dutchman of his clothes, boots and
all!''
Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow him away,
Oh, blow the man down, bullies, blow him to stay.
Says I, ``Oh, no, sir, you do me great wrong,
I'm a Flying Fish sailor, just home from Hong Kong!''
So I blew him right down, and I stove in his jaw;
Says he then, ``Young feller, you're breaking the law!''
So six months I did, boys, in Liverpool town,
For kicking and punching and blowing him down.
Oh, blow the man, down, bullies, blow the man down;
And a crew of hard cases from Liverpool town.
Spongebob Squarepants theme is based on this
http://www.shanties08.co.uk/
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Top stuff!
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most shanties go on about Liverpool. It was the magical city to sailors, catered for all of their needs like no other city!
beatles did a good few about Liverpool places, then there is the likes of Ferry cross the Mersey and Heart as big as Liverpool by the mighty Wah... the Bangles, that girl band did 'Going Down to Liverpool'
Liverpool is the setting for lots of novels too, one of the Sherlock Holmes stories is set here, then there is the Cruel Sea, Liverpool is the main setting for Herman Melvilles 'Redburn' (see above about the magical city of the sea)
What would be more interesting is to list titles etc that are about a certain city, but not created by someone from that city.. helps define that city's impact on the wider world, as we can all wax lyrical about our own burghs!
beatles did a good few about Liverpool places, then there is the likes of Ferry cross the Mersey and Heart as big as Liverpool by the mighty Wah... the Bangles, that girl band did 'Going Down to Liverpool'
Liverpool is the setting for lots of novels too, one of the Sherlock Holmes stories is set here, then there is the Cruel Sea, Liverpool is the main setting for Herman Melvilles 'Redburn' (see above about the magical city of the sea)
What would be more interesting is to list titles etc that are about a certain city, but not created by someone from that city.. helps define that city's impact on the wider world, as we can all wax lyrical about our own burghs!
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Yes; that was the first thing we did — trim the yards of that wreck! No one was killed, or even disabled, but everyone was more or less hurt. You should have seen them! Some were in rags, with black faces, like coal-heavers, like sweeps, and had bullet heads that seemed closely cropped, but were in fact singed to the skin. Others, of the watch below, awakened by being shot out from their collapsing bunks, shivered incessantly, and kept on groaning even as we went about our work. But they all worked. That crew of Liverpool hard cases had in them the right stuff. It’s my experience they always have. It is the sea that gives it — the vastness, the loneliness surrounding their dark stolid souls.
Not really about Birkenhead, but of interest nonetheless. An excerpt from Rudyard Kiplings “Soldier an’ Sailor Too”
To take your chance in the thick of a rush, with firing all about,
Is nothing so bad when you’ve cover to ’and, an’ leave an’ likin’ to shout;
But to stand an’ be still to the Birken’ead drill is a damn tough bullet to chew,
An’ they done it, the Jollies—’Er Majesty’s Jollies—soldier an’ sailor too!
Their work was done when it ’adn’t begun; they was younger nor me an’ you;
Their choice it was plain between drownin’ in ’eaps an’ bein’ mopped by the screw,
So they stood an’ was still to the Birken’ead drill,2 soldier an’ sailor too!
The troop ship HMS Birkenhead sank in shark infested waters off the coast of south africa. The troops were paraded on the deck of the sinking ship, and ordered to stand still, which they did, to allow women and children to get in the life boats. Hence the "Birkenhead Drill".
To take your chance in the thick of a rush, with firing all about,
Is nothing so bad when you’ve cover to ’and, an’ leave an’ likin’ to shout;
But to stand an’ be still to the Birken’ead drill is a damn tough bullet to chew,
An’ they done it, the Jollies—’Er Majesty’s Jollies—soldier an’ sailor too!
Their work was done when it ’adn’t begun; they was younger nor me an’ you;
Their choice it was plain between drownin’ in ’eaps an’ bein’ mopped by the screw,
So they stood an’ was still to the Birken’ead drill,2 soldier an’ sailor too!
The troop ship HMS Birkenhead sank in shark infested waters off the coast of south africa. The troops were paraded on the deck of the sinking ship, and ordered to stand still, which they did, to allow women and children to get in the life boats. Hence the "Birkenhead Drill".
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Avril Lavigne - I wish I was back in Liverpool lyrics
Chorus:
I wish I was back in Liverpool
Liverpool town where I was born
Where there ain't no trees, no scented greens
No fields of waving corn
But there's lots of girls with peroxide pearls
And the Black and Tan flows free
There's six in a bed by the old pier head
And it's Liverpool town for me
'tIs seven long years since I wandered away
To sail the wide world o'er
Me very first trip on an old steamship
That was bound for Baltimore
I was seven days sick and I just couldn't stick
That bubbling up and down
So I told them Jack you'd better turn back
For dear old Liverpool town
Chorus,
We dug the Mersey tunnel, boys, way back in '33
Dug a hole in the ground until we found
An old cold wall ye see
Then the foreman cried:
'Come on outside the roof is falling down'
Well I'm telling you Jack, we all swam back
To dear old Liverpool town
Chorus,
Well, there's every race and colour of face
There's every kind of name
But the pigeons on the pier head they treat you all the same
And if you walk above to Parliament Street
You'd see faces black and brown
And I have also seen the orange and green
In dear old Liverpool town
I don't know why she's supposedly sung this,seems a bit strange.
Chorus:
I wish I was back in Liverpool
Liverpool town where I was born
Where there ain't no trees, no scented greens
No fields of waving corn
But there's lots of girls with peroxide pearls
And the Black and Tan flows free
There's six in a bed by the old pier head
And it's Liverpool town for me
'tIs seven long years since I wandered away
To sail the wide world o'er
Me very first trip on an old steamship
That was bound for Baltimore
I was seven days sick and I just couldn't stick
That bubbling up and down
So I told them Jack you'd better turn back
For dear old Liverpool town
Chorus,
We dug the Mersey tunnel, boys, way back in '33
Dug a hole in the ground until we found
An old cold wall ye see
Then the foreman cried:
'Come on outside the roof is falling down'
Well I'm telling you Jack, we all swam back
To dear old Liverpool town
Chorus,
Well, there's every race and colour of face
There's every kind of name
But the pigeons on the pier head they treat you all the same
And if you walk above to Parliament Street
You'd see faces black and brown
And I have also seen the orange and green
In dear old Liverpool town
I don't know why she's supposedly sung this,seems a bit strange.
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20,852 Posts
Yes she must have covered it for some unknown reason?
Are you a Rangers supporter? Weren't they gushing all over Manchester last week?:lol:
:lol:
The sun beams bright on Rio,
And likewise Lima Town,
For over all the south'ron seas
The dawn shines like a crown.
But I'd rather be in Liverpool
An' listenin' to the rain
As it rattles on the windows
In cosy Crooked Lane.
Farewell, farewell Fernandes,
An' Andes' burning rock,
My heart it goes where Mersey flows
Down by the Wapping Dock.
So it's rolling home to Liverpool
Across the heaving main,
to sing beside my ingle nook
In cosy Crooked Lane.
And likewise Lima Town,
For over all the south'ron seas
The dawn shines like a crown.
But I'd rather be in Liverpool
An' listenin' to the rain
As it rattles on the windows
In cosy Crooked Lane.
Farewell, farewell Fernandes,
An' Andes' burning rock,
My heart it goes where Mersey flows
Down by the Wapping Dock.
So it's rolling home to Liverpool
Across the heaving main,
to sing beside my ingle nook
In cosy Crooked Lane.
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4,129 Posts
It's not poetry or song but Sheffield is famously quouted as - 'Sheffield is probably the ugliest town in the world' in George Orwell's, Road to Wigan Pier.
Oh, it's mentioned in 'This Is England' by The Clash - 'This knife of Sheffield Steel, this is how we feel'.
Oh, it's mentioned in 'This Is England' by The Clash - 'This knife of Sheffield Steel, this is how we feel'.
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