Lyr Req: We Are Safe (Jim Woodland)

Subject: Can anyone help me find this song?
From: Faye Roche
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 11:01 AM

I heard a floor singer sing a song the other day. I meant to ask him what it was called but he left before I had the chance. I didn't catch his name and he was not known to the club, which was out of my usual area so I won't have the chance to go back there for a while.

The song began: "The street is lit from end to end" and the chorus contained the line "We are safe".

Sorry, that's not much to go on, but my memory is not that great. It was a powerful song and I'd like to know who wrote it and if it's been recorded by anyone.

Thanks for reading.

Subject: RE: Can anyone help me find this song?
From: Abdul The Bul Bul
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 12:28 PM

Where did you hear it Faye? It may be that the singer was singing one of his own songs, not widely known.
These queries usually get sorted straight away on mudcat but I see no one is helping yet.

Al

Subject: RE: Can anyone help me find this song?
From: breezy
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 04:14 PM

ring the club organiser ?

Subject: RE: Can anyone help me find this song?
From: artbrooks
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 04:21 PM

Could a mod adjust the thread title?

Subject: RE: help me find this song?- street is lit/we are safe
From: Joe Offer
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 04:54 PM

Yeah, I was trying to think of a more specific title, Art. Maybe this will do.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: mg
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 05:08 PM

Does it refer to WWII bombings perhaps? mg

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Faye Roche
Date: 19 Feb 09 - 08:24 AM

Thanks for all your helpful suggestions.

The club (whose name I won't mention) was a fairly dire place where I stopped off on my way through London. I left before the end as the audience were making more noise than the performers (why do people pay to go to a music venue just so they can chat to their mates? They can do that for nothing in any pub and without the live music to distract them!)

Back to the point. The singer was not known to the organiser as he was at the club for the first (and probably, like me, last time.) I think it must have been a self-written song.

So, whoever you are, if you read this, I don't want to steal your material, I'd just like a recording of the song, if it exists. It was about the spread of the surveillance society and the growth of the underclass and was very moving, if harrowing. I'm sorry that it was also wasted on your "audience".

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Brian Peters
Date: 14 May 09 - 11:33 AM

This would be 'We Are Safe' by Jim Woodland, which appeared on a 1980s LP called 'Ghosts'. Jim has written some excellent and hard-hitting songs, some of which are in the repertoire of partner Janet Russell. He used to be a Salami Brother but isn't seen too often on the folk scene these days, which is a pity for all of us.

I thought the song was about nuclear waste - or weapons.

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: oldhippie
Date: 14 May 09 - 08:48 PM

Can you post the lyrics?

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Brian Peters
Date: 15 May 09 - 05:27 AM

I'll try to get a message to Jim.

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Leadfingers
Date: 15 May 09 - 08:35 AM

I dont know a lot about Jim Woodland , except that he is one of the few people (In my not so humble opinion) who have fitted words to a 'Good' tune and made it work !
The words Jim fitted to 'South Wind' make it a good song , not just agood tune .

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Brian Peters
Date: 15 May 09 - 09:18 AM

One of my favourite musical memories is the Sunday afternoon concert at Holmfirth Festival about twenty years ago, when Jim Woodland and Peadar Long (who is also on the 'Ghosts' album) played the Sunday afternoon concert. The previous acts had been of the laid-back variety, a soporific atmosphere prevailed, and the audience was quietly dropping off. The duo hit the stage, Jim in suit and tie, toting a Rickenbacker, and Peader with leather jacket (collar turned up) dark glasses and tenor sax. They ripped into (I think) 'Don't Jump' at high volume, and the audience jumped off its collective chair. One of the most 'in yer face' performances I've ever seen. Brilliant.

Subject: Lyr Add: WE ARE SAFE (Jim Woodland)
From: GUEST,Janet Russell and Jim Woodland
Date: 25 May 09 - 09:01 AM

Glad you're interested in the song. It was written in the "Protect and Survive days" of the cold war. We were being asked to accept the build up of nuclear arms. Jim used to perform it with the Fabulous Salami Brothers, with Richie Taylor juggling carboard nuclear warheads, and dropping one occasionally, at which point the song would stop whilst he gingerly picked it up and started juggling them again. Then the song picked up where it left off. Here are the lyrics:

The street is lit from end to end
Twenty four hours a day.
There's soldiers standing at both ends
Just in case.
Atomic sunshine atomic rain
They say there is no waste at all.
But late at night I've heard the trains
Sneak by behind a wall.
And they say
'We are safe we are defended.'
How does it feel to be so secure?
'We are safe we are defended.'
These days you can never be too sure.

From time to time the searchlights shine
Right into the room.
And barbed-wire shadows hang like lines
Of music across the room.
And they say
'We are safe we are defended.'
How does it feel to be so secure?
'We are safe we are defended.'
These days you can never be too sure.

The street is lit from end to end
Twenty four hours a day.
But now the darkness never ends
It just looks like the day
And they say
'We are safe we are defended.'
How does it feel to be so secure?
'We are safe we are defended.'
These days you can never be too sure.
'We are safe we are defended.'
How does it feel to be so secure?
'We are safe we are defended.'
But these days...
I don't really feel so sure.

Subject: RE: find song-street is lit end to end/we are safe
From: Peace
Date: 25 May 09 - 09:10 PM

LYRIC ADD in the post Above.