Roy has never been one for producing a short snappy Pop song. Most of his early albums feature an epic song that is far-reaching and has a scope sufficient to cover the gamut of society, the universe and history.
We have been regaled with the poetic visions of McGoohan’s Blues, I Hate the Whiteman, The Lord’s Prayer, The Game, Me and My Woman, Work of Heart and Burn The World.
Each one of those songs is packed with more controversy, venom, social commentary and poetic vision that most of the world’s top singer-songwriters have managed in an entire career.
These are epic songs with a scope that is encompassing, intelligent, perceptive and thought provoking. There is nothing easy-listening about anything Roy does. He doesn’t duck issues or court popularity.
If he feels it then he writes it. You need to have your brain engaged to tackle a song like the twenty odd minutes of concentrated polemic that is One of Those Days in England. It is a song about life, history, the future and the world we are building. Not many people would ever dare attempt such a challenging scope. It’s complexity is daunting. Yet it is not opaque because of that. The variation, melody and drive make it accessible and enjoyable.
Roy is an artist in both music and words and the result is extraordinary.
Not many people come close.
One of Those Days in England pt. 2-10
Every Wednesday morning, at about the hour of ten
I give the queen my autograph, she gives me the yen
The man behind the counter smiles, the door man bows again
Just another day down on the dole queue
But the government must love me ’cause they keep me out of work
They must be saving me for something special
Maybe it’s the job of rolling spliffs for Captain Kirk
Or giving Miss Lovelace a pubic hairdo.
One of those days in England with a sword in every pond
And birds in every garden in the land
One of those days in England when the passion never ends
A slowly moving season by the fire of my friends.
And though the time fast slips away, it’s long enough to laugh and play
Around the fireside making hay, dreaming of tomorrow, you know there’s no today.
One of those days in England with the willow hanging on
I dreamt I met an old man down the road
Whispering the mysteries of patterns up ahead
And stirring past reflections with the sword of lightning said,
Alfred had me made from Albion’s everglade
And I made him to lie with me whence all my troubles fade
You may have read the signs, beware of strange designs
For though the victors write the books, the loser speaks the lines
So let’s now both be gone, ’tis far to Avalon
And though we go our different ways, I’ll see you there anon.
And so I got on board the bird of aeons and I rode
But everytime I met a prince, a fork came down the road
I kept on thinking that I’d stop once everybody showed
Gathered in the myths of our reflection.
But stopping ain’t that possible this far into control
This far beyond the non imagination
No more than I can shed the moving forces of my soul
The time lords of the slowly revolution.
You and me, mother, we’re gonna raise a ship full of kids and slowly lose them
Why does it matter where they’ve all gone, we don’t even have the power to choose them
You and me, father, we’re gonna colonise all of the stars with lots of our madness
Shooting through space with sons on our hips and guns on our lips to play snakes and ladders.
Oh heavens above, I’m coming with love all over, over you.
You and me, sister, we’re gonna plant a bomb in a street to change law and order
And when we’ve killed all who resisted the call, we’ll discover a brand new wall at the border
You and me, brother, wrapped up in silence, brooding for better breathing spaces
Seeing ideals, we were one time a part of rip us apart in our holiest places.
Oh heavens above, I’m coming with love all over, all over you.
Sitting out there with this silvery hair and your thundery look when you really don’t care, but I love you
Dolly blue rivers, foreverness givers, I’ll go without knowing and know without going above you
Stood on the ship in a dream at third slip with Britannica’s tallons on Albion’s grip, do you need me ?
Looking for you when it’s catch 22 and you’ve never been here but it’s always been blue up above me, up above me.
Oh Mrs. Space took her man to the human race
And together they humped over the edge
Nine months later, they were sharing a brand new face
The latest thin end of the wedge.
And baby grew, grew into a space cadet
Legend lives, he screamed under his breath
I’m in the queue, in the queue for the hell of it
Some place inbetween life and death.
Oh Mrs. Space, I love you, with your come home early eye
Don’t ever come between us ’cause times don’t change, they fly.
And it don’t seem long since my life was an endless stream
The future fled into time without trace
I see the end now but I’ve fallen in love again
With a girl who can travel in space.
Oh Mrs. Space, you lead me a wild goose chase
Inbetween, inbetween every line
Well hell, girl, I don’t even know your face
‘Cause you see you’ve been sitting on mine.
Oh Mrs. Space, I love you, with your come home early eye
Don’t ever come between us ’cause times don’t change they fly.
Slowly slipping into history feel us go
With these times another age could never know
See the photos black and white and quaintly dressed
Stood in queues of people smiling, sorely pressed.
Your silent room is the collection of your ways
Every shelf is built of all those different days
And those much younger cannot understand by half
The wireless living room, the faces ’round the hearth.
The ration books of Matthews out there on the wing
The corner shop that sold us almost everything
The farthing in the change, the sirens and the planes
Puffing billies, shunting eras down the lane, down the lane.
You know we’ll soon be gone from here, year upon light year
We’ll take the stories with us there, the memories are dear.
One of those days in England, mum was rustling up the grub
And dad was off out propping up the pub
One of those days in England that you just could not forget
From the mists of secret morning to the golden red sunset.
And though the time fast slips away, it’s long enough to laugh and play
Around the fireside making hay, dreaming of tomorrow, oh you know there’s no today.
Oh you know there’s no today
No, you know, today.
Coincidentally I’ve been in the North West recently… Liverpool and Manchester, where one of my daughters is doing post-grad work, and I was struck by how much those cities have changed since the last time I was there. The city centres have been ‘comprehensively redeveloped’ I believe that’s what they call it. Everything looks so different, another world. Have I really been away that long? In the mornings everyone seemed to have either a mug of coffee in their hands, or a phone. I visited the People’s Museum in Manchester and wondered where all the people had gone. Salford Quays used to have lots of them, row opon row of red-brick houses back-to-back… vanished. Whatever happened to England? One can look, almost in awe, at the changes to the centre landscapes of Liverpool and Manchester… but the urban ‘solutions’ and models applied aren’t particularly Green, are they? Where are the trees, the gardens, the flowers? Nature’s almost vanished under steel, glass and concrete. The scale is huge and something Mussolini would have nodded at and approved of.
So, wandering around I was thinking about that epic song ‘One for those days in England and wondering why no one else wrote that kind of stuff, then, or now? Maybe the present consumes all our time and energy to such an extent that history or the past is rudely shoved aside?
Anyway, I think that the silence in relation to the court case is probably a good sign. It’s now been a couple of months since the judge set the dealine for the CPS to come back and ask for a retrial. It looks like they’ve given up and just want to drage things out before announcing their failure to get a conviction and how embarrassing that is for the CPS, hoping that the spotlight won’t fall on them and the problematic nature of bringing a prosecution against Harper based on such a transparently thin body of ‘evidence’ that any crime took place in the first place. I think, if they still believed they had a strong enough case they would have continued with it, rather than just let it fade away.
We’ve been over to Liverpool as well. The centre is ‘done up’ but the huge council estates still exist around the periphery.
Redevelopment is an opportunity. I agree with you – the green is sadly missing.
As for Roy – I think it is a wait and hope game. The legal system likes to drag things out.
One could have done it so differently, the redevelopment. It’s all so gargantuan in scale. People look like ants wandering around, busy, busy, busy. Giant institutions have taken over so much space and tower over people. It’s almost symbolic and a reflection of power relationships in the economy and society. Did ordinary people have any direct imput or say in how these great
cities were changed so radically? It all seems to have been imposed from above with barely a murmur of dissent.
While I was watching the telly in Manchester there was a bizarre report on the Toxteth area where there are literally streets of empty, boarded-up, Victorian terraced houses. These houses were built to last. Anyway, one can now have them for free, if one does them up. It’s cheaper than pulling down street after street! It seems strange.
I think our political system does not favour long term planning. It’s all about votes and redevelopment has to be eye-catching, cosmetic and iconic – because that’s what calls attention to it.
Politics is all froth and mirrors.
England is and always will be my home. I am old enough (just) to remember dolly tubs, galvanised buckets under the Belfast sink and football where the ball would leave you with concussion if headed when wet. It was and remains a magical isle….if you are prepared to open your eyes to its rich heritage. I will never be ashamed unless we few lose the thread of its beauty ( visual, cultural, historical.) As for the CPS, they seem so threatened by more Savillesque revelations they are prepared to prosecute any celebrity (major or minor) to curry favour from any media frenzy and misjudged moral indignation. That includes failing to assess witness credibility or evidential strength. I lack confidence in the CPS to pursue justice at the best of times, and cringe at their febrile attempts to do so when they may get any kudos from a “celebrity trial. Epic fail?
The justice system is not about justice; it is about law. It is pedantic, out of the Dark Ages, a pageant and does not do what it is supposed to. It is capricious and arbitrary. How can anyone have faith in it?
Justice is a dish that is seldom served these days, so pageantry merely heralds in fools. Hope springs eternal though.
Hope is the reason for this blog, my whole life in education and my books. We can make things better!!
Posted on Stormcock Community page 14th April from incourt.co.uk:
06/02/2015 Fri, Trial (Part Heard) – Hearing finished for ROY HARPER – 16:04 at Court: 1
26/03/2015 Thu, For Mention (All Parties to Attend) – Resume – 13:50 at Court: 1
26/03/2015 Thu, For Mention (All Parties to Attend) – Case Started – 13:58 at Court: 1
26/03/2015 Thu, For Mention (All Parties to Attend) – Hearing finished for ROY HARPER – 14:28 at Court: 1
If you look up “For Mention (All Parties to Attend)”, it usually involves procedural matters surrounding legal case. Someone else explained it thus:
“The hearing provides an opportunity for the defendant to plead guilty; if he does so, sentence can be passed immediately (although, in many cases, sentencing would be adjourned for the preparation of reports).
If the defendant does not plead guilty, a date is set for a trial. (In practice, an exact date might not be given as [a] the lawyers on either side might require more time to prepare and [b] cases are often only added to the ‘warned list’ which specifies a range of dates when the trial might start at very short notice).”
I may be wrong, but all this suggests to me that a re-trial is in the offing.
Another couple of years of purgatory I guess.
That fits with my understanding.