"you need to draw lines and I really cannot see why!"
You don't need to draw lines, the lines are already there
Different types of songs rattle different boxes
You have no more right to tell me I shouldn't think about my songs any more than I have to tell you you should
As far as I'm concerned, our folk songs are inseparable from the social history and information they carry
If I wanted to know the details of The Battle of Trafalgar I would go to the Naval Records or the detailed research
If I wanted to know how it felt for a farmworker to be torn up from his roots, pressed into the Navy and stuck into the middle of a lethal battle I would go to the folk songs - that's why they were made
Same with the Transportation songs - a transportation ballad can tell me far more in a few minutes than a learned book on the enclosure can tell me in 300 pages
Our songs are full of this sort of information - from social misalliance to enforced marriages arranged to further the aims of families rather than the feelings of the people effected   
These are interesting songs if you're interested in that sort of thing
If you're not then I suggest you're looking in the wrong place
Jim Carroll