Same Shoes – Roy Harper lyrics – A song about James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Cuba!

Posted on by Opher

I actually was asked to sing backing vocals on this track – well almost. We were in the recording studio in Lincolnshire – Darren, Bob and me. Roy wanted us to sing Same Shoes. We all had a go. He wanted us to do it our own way. I did mine. Unfortunately it was not good and was instantly scrubbed. I never made it on to the record! But at least I had a go!

The song starts with verses about fifties icons James Dean and Marilyn Monroe. The last verse stems from Roy’s experience in Cuba in the mid-sixties. It highlights the tension of the human rights aspects of Castro’s rule. Opposition was severely repressed. People could not talk freely. When asked about the effects of the revolution the shoe-shiner simply replied ‘Same Shoes’.

Same Shoes – Roy Harper

I see pictures of the porsche
Smashed and twisted out of shape
Hanging in offices
To match up with the drape
And posters of him
In boutiques where they couldn’t know
The styles they’re in
Belong to him
And he died thirty years ago
Same shoes
She became the way to look
They thought that they could freeze
While a hundred million men
Had fantasies
And without a word said
And non to be understood
Those nervous laughs
In photographs
Have captured loneliness for good
But how could she refuse
The girl who pouted scarlet lips
And stood for high-heel shoes
Same shoes
I once was in Havana
With dollars in my pants
Where I met an old man
Who was cleaning shoes for cents
I said “Can I ask
How it is, how you’re getting on?
It must be strange
In all this change
And how’s the revolution?”
He said
“Same shoes

Castro dead – It is somehow fitting.

Posted on by Opher

Following the visits of the Rolling Stones and President Obama it seems fitting that Fidel Castro should bow out. It is the end of an era.

Fidel was a benevolent dictator. There were lots of good things about him and some bad.

He ran a left-wing, one-party State that was opposed by the USA who tried everything in their power to bring him down. They applied a stringent (and illegal?) trade embargo and attempted to undermine and disrupt his administration in much the same way that they had done in Chile, Argentina and Brazil. Unlike with those countries they did not succeed. Castro survived invasion and 8 assassination attempts.

On the positive side, despite the isolation, he ran a successful economy. He did not flout his position and live in luxury like a billionaire creaming off all the wealth. He lived modestly. The country had a superb health and education system and practiced equality. There was none of this huge differences between the poor and wealthy that you get in capitalist countries.

On the negative side he was a dictator running a one-party State. It was a repressive regime that stifled debate, imprisoned and beat opponents and publically humiliated people. It’s record on human rights was not good.

One wonders what that society might have been like if it had not been so opposed and undermined by America? America’s paranoia of communism and its economic empiricism has created a huge amount of instability and war. South America has had to endure vicious dictatorships and military juntas, with millions killed, tortured and disappeared, as direct results of CIA action. Perhaps Cuba had to repress human rights in order to survive?

Fidel Castro is gone. The Stones played to rapturous crowds. Obama has opened up a new chapter and heralded a new relationship. The hope is that Cuba will prosper – all that is good will continue and all that was bad will change to create a prosperous, happy country.

The fear is that American capitalism will move in and Cuba become another branch of Disneyland.

Farewell Fidel!