Its why people dont go to folk clubs....

Subject: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: SunrayFC
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 12:41 PM

I wasnt quite prepared for the customary floor-singer.....doing Wild Rover. "

Beam me up Scotty".

All the dreadful cliches seemed to line up like dominoes.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,kenny
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 02:27 PM

Just curious - how many were in the audience, and how many objected ? Was it the song at fault, or the presentation ? Did they join in the chorus ?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 02:37 PM

I thought I'd explained why people don't go to folk clubs any more. It's sex. There isn't any. Back in the 60s there was.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Auldtimer
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 03:02 PM

I must own up. There was still a fair smattering of S*X in the seventies when I started going to folk clubs. Festivals? they were just weekend long parties. Ah .... the old days, where did it all go wrong.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 03:16 PM

I like the Wild Rover, in fact - I've been one for many a year..

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: stallion
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 03:24 PM

I remember it well!

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Stuart Reed
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 03:30 PM

Better to go to a folk club than not all...

If you think your singer has potential encourage her / him and maybe suggest some other songs.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Stan
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 04:05 PM

I stopped going to folk clubs when I discovered sessions. !0 minutes spotlight or a night of no pressure playing every tune you recognise. For me there was no competition.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 04:47 PM

sessions, schmessions, folk clubs, schmolk club.....very similar sorts of places, aren't they?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 05:23 PM

Ah yes; the sex.
Can someone remind me what that means?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Dead Horse
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 05:24 PM

I had sex in a folk club just recently.
I sang "Wild Rover" - that f*cked 'em :-)

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Banjiman
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 05:38 PM

"I had sex in a folk club just recently.
I sang "Wild Rover" - that f*cked 'em :-) "

Where's the "like" button on here?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: johncharles
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 06:47 PM

sex is for keeping coil in

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Leadfingers
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 07:42 PM

The Wild Rover is STILL a Traditional Folk Song , so whats the problem ? Badly Sung ? Out of tune Guitar ? Or just stupid prejudice ?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 07:49 PM

People who don't go to folk clubs vastly outnumber those who do. Most don't go because they have no idea what a folk club is. The others go because they do. The undecided who also don't go know little about either.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 08:00 PM

Bruce - your reasoning brings clarity to the situation.

And clarity begins at home.

And home is where the heart is.

Ergo the heart is where clarity begins.

On the other hand - Give me a home where the buffalo roam

And you'll have a home where the buffalo roam, where clarity begins and the heart is.....

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 08:02 PM

I haven't been to a folk club for about 17 years and I doubt that you'd you'd ever catch me in one these days. But you won't hear me knocking 'em. Had it not been for John and Cheryl and the supportive atmosphere of the Tree Inn folk club (near Bude) in the early '90s I would never have got started and would have been missing out on a ton of fun all these years.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 08:20 PM

I've not been to a folk club tonight, but I went to one the night before, the night before that, the night before that and the night before that.

Why are you trying to avoid me, Steve?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 08:24 PM

That word "Big".

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 08:30 PM

The last interchange between Steve and Al is the first time I have understood British humour.

Not bad.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 09:02 PM

"Give me a home where the buffalo roam" and I will steer (LOL) well clear of all that buffalo S H I T.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Jul 12 - 09:14 PM

The original line was

Give me a home where the buffalo roam and I'll show you a house full of shit

At least it was when I heard it back in the late 1960s. It likely has roots that predate that.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 03:43 AM

I haven't heard 'The Wild Rover' for years ... and I don't miss it!

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Acorn4
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 04:15 AM

Didn't the Anchor at Sidmouth impose a £10 fine for singing Wild Rover?

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Don Wise
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 04:17 AM

The Aran sweaters,the pewter tankards, THAT version of The Wild Rover..........??

Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!

Don

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 04:53 AM

But now I'm returning~~~~

BEWARE

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,CrazyEddie
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 05:06 AM

"Give me a home where the buffalo roam and I'll show you a house full of shit"

I haven't heard that one since Granny burnt her arse whilst riding the range...



All together now:

I'll go to the session, take me shotgun along
And I'll shoot the next bastard who asks for that song.
And the hangman will say, as I drop through the floor
Now you never will hear the Wild Rover no more.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,FloraG
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 05:29 AM

You can't do an irish ( ish ) pub without singing the Wild rover. Its a tune that lots of people know - and people like what they know. The germans do ' An der Nord see Custe' to it.
We did Dirty old town, wild rover, and grandfathers clock last saturday night as well as some more traditional stuff, and 50s rock and roll, to a mixed audience of morris and neighbours at a garden party, and were paid more than we had negotiated. Right tunes for the right audience, me thinks.
Anyway - who says people don't go to folk clubs. The good people of dartford do. Some even book the same seat at the same table every week. It has a main guest each week and is usually busy.
FloraG.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: SteveMansfield
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 05:32 AM

I've sung The Wild Rover for many a year
It's a song people want when they've had too much beer
But now I'm resolv - ed
That song's a real bore
And I never will sing The Wild Rover no more

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 05:50 AM

Bruce is right - it's nothing to do with why people do or don't go to folk clubs.

As for the Wild Rover, there's often a little, superior-than-thou social snobbery in musical circles. Like those guitar shops with notices on the wall saying, "No 'Smoke On The Water'". (I managed to get one like this put on the wall just for me in the old original Guitar Junction shop in Worthing - "No 'Apache'" - as I used to play it on purpose in different styles to annoy dear old Dave Crozier).

If some singer or other wants to sing "The Wild Rover" then let him/her. I too have my dislikes but I have to listen to them in patience. I can't, for example, stand Eric Bogle's "And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda", which was churned out recently, with appropriate grimaces and closed eyes, at a recent singaround. The song - to me, I emphasise - now seems maudlin and pointless. I heard Eric B sing this at the Laughing Fish in Isfield when he first came to the UK (1982?), and didn't care for it then.

But then I don't care for 'protest' songs or songs with social significance. I like cheap, light-hearted drivel from the 1920s and 1930s. You know - stuff with no meaning whatever. Tosh.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Blandiver
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:22 AM

I like cheap, light-hearted drivel from the 1920s and 1930s. You know - stuff with no meaning whatever. Tosh.

Hear Hear! It's the very essence of Trad Folk Song too. Little wee tales that just are what they are without bashing you over the head with bleedin' messages. Even the very bleakest of ballads are entirely without point or purpose - they exist purely to entertain the listener (even though I often feel like offering out help-line numbers afterwards, like the BBC do after a particularly rum episode of EastEnders - but after The Band Played Waltzing Matilda I'm usually ringing The Samaritans anyway). For sure, I like my music bleak, dark, experimental, droning, unrelenting, harsh, unforgiving, mimimal and wyrd as feck (i.e. Utterly Human) but there's no message, much less meaning behind any of it.

Of course, like all Great Art, we can attach our own meanings to things, indeed such personal significances & assiociations are inevitable & enrich our entire relationship with the music as a whole, but as soon as someone Prescribes what that association is by Writing Something Deep & Meaningful, then I'm out of there. Like the times I saw Ewan MaColl - expecting the master singer of traditional ballads & getting the puny political idealogue instead. I can't listen to Dylan, Billy Bragg or much of Robert Wyatt for the same reason. But when you listen to Dudu Pukwana, Johnny Mbizo Dyani, Abdullah Ibrahim, Kippie Moeketsi, you're hearing the politics of human beauty & experience loud & clear in jubilant affirmation.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:23 AM

What, Will? Even when it's me singing TBPWM!

~M~

See my youtube channel: guaranteed no grimaces or closed eyes...

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Girl Friday
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:34 AM

They always swear that they'll play the wild rover no never no more... yet the next time you see them..... De ja vue.

We prefer to sing our parody "Wild Rabbit"

The other song that gets reviled is "Fields of Athenry".

We parodied that too "Thieves of Peckan Rye."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K06Wiwg1ATY

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:43 AM

You could have said Woody Guthrie too, Blandiver. Simple songs about ordinary people's experiences delivered without hectoring or bitterness, but never (not ironically I suggest) setting out to clout you over the head with a "message".

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:47 AM

What, Will? Even when it's me singing TBPWM!

Michael, anything you do is a pleasure - because you are a Nashnul Treshure. :-)

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 06:49 AM

Aw shucks, Will...!

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:06 AM

Regarding grimaces and closed eyes - well... we all do it from time to time. At least I've managed to stop my tongue from waving from side to side when I'm engrossed in playing. What I was really referring to was the heartfelt 'sincerity' that some people put into singing stuff of which they have probably had no personal experience. As George Burns said, "Sincerity - if you can fake that, you've got it made."

To be fair, I'm sure that the singer I heard recently was doing his best as he saw it. But whenever I've heard a song of this sort in a folk club I've always asked myself, "Why?" Here you are, singing of the tragedy of war, how pointless it is, and how it kills people and maims people physically and psychologically - to a room full of people who know this anyway. "War is hell." No shit, Sherlock, I'd never have guessed that.

The horrors of Gallipoli as described in the song can, of course, be understood as a metaphor for all war. Fair enough, but if you really want to protest at what a modern government does in its warmongering, get yourself in amongst the people that make these decisions and sing it at them. No use preaching to the converted. When I was about 8 years of age, just before my grandfather died (my mother's father), he described to me what it was like to be an RAMC orderly in 1915 (at the age of 45), picking up the dead and wounded at Anzac Cove. He described it in a very matter-of-fact way and, though I was quite young (this was 1942), I remember what he said very well - and to this day. Makes ATBPWM seem very second-hand to me.

I'd rather hear Ian Dury singing "Jack Shit George" - you can draw your own inferences from that song.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:09 AM

Also, it is very long.
It can deaden a singaround.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Banjiman
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:23 AM

I quite like ATBPWM and I really like really old really long trad ballads.

But I like to see any of them done well........ with life, passion and genuine emotion. This can mean closing your eyes and grimacing if this is required to get the guts of the story across.

I like music with a message ....... the more political the better. As for the old ballads/songs being about nothing important, I think that is b*ll*x. They were written/ conceived about subjects that were important to the people at the time...... and often with a moralor political message. If you choose to hear it.

Horses (not again!) for courses.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: johncharles
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:28 AM

Stay on the line Banjiman I am sure you will soon be given a lengthy explanation as to why you are wrong.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:30 AM

with life, passion and genuine emotion

Life I can understand. Passion I can understand. I do wonder about the "genuine emotion", though. I think if you've written a song about your own personal experiences or beliefs, or if you've personally experienced them in other songs, then genuine emotion? - fair enough. I also understand the possibility of empathy.

I could probably sing an old ballad (short one for me, though) with life and gusto, but it would necessarily be as an impartial narrator. If there was "emotion", it would be that of an actor, and I'm no actor.

Just me being an old nit-picker, Banjiman - enjoy your ballads and political songs!

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:32 AM

PS: johncharles - there's no right and wrong - just personal taste. :-)

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Banjiman
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:38 AM

Will Fly ...... I'm sure there is documented evidence of you admitting to liking a really long/ really old/ sung with emotion/ grimaces/ closed eyes ballad etc on here somewhere :-)

I remember as it was one by my (much) better half.

But you did state that this was an exception.

I really like bits of fluff sometimes as well..... especially Old Time Tunes and Songs. Again...... done well is the important thing to me (and well doesn't always mean note perfect).

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: johncharles
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:47 AM

Will I know that, but reading some posts one might think this was not the case.
Singing in local pubs we are often asked for the wild rover. We usually do our Reggae version.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:47 AM

I'm sure there is documented evidence of you admitting to liking a really long/ really old/ sung with emotion/ grimaces/ closed eyes ballad etc on here somewhere :-) I remember as it was one by my (much) better half.

Ah, well... the memsahibs... God bless them... :-)

I must confess that, in moments of idleness, I like to pull the pig's tail to see if it squeals. I'm a Bad Lot, really.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:54 AM

"I must confess that, in moments of idleness, I like to pull the pig's tail to see if it squeals. I'm a Bad Lot, really. "

..... and that probably sounds better than some versions of Wild Rover I've heard :-)

I quite like Wild Rover really, especially the bang your table bit. But I can't remember the last time I heard it in a folk club.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,Banjiman
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 07:55 AM

Me above.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 08:03 AM

We usually do our Reggae version.

I'm up for that!

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,George Henderson
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 08:24 AM

My opinion for what its worth. The wild rover and other songs which were sung by so many people and made so popular back in the 50's and 60's have caused a lot pf people to consider them as "done to death" or hackneyed.

But I have to remind myself that when I started out on my journey through folk it was songs such as this which attracted me and many others to the folk movement. Through entering a folk club I became aware of the contributory natue of choruses which formed a base from which I moved forward. I, slowly at first, became interested in other forms of trad singing such as harmony, ballads and shanties together with forebitters. Had it not been for the Wild Rover I don't think I would have followed the road I did.

I would never be upset in hearing it but would try to encourage singers to look at diferent styles as well.

Subject: RE: Its why people dont go to folk clubs....
From: GUEST,joe
Date: 18 Jul 12 - 08:56 AM

Tell you what, if I had a quid for each time I've sung a 12-bar blues in a folk club I'd be a millionaire.And it is impossible to sing blues without being emotionally affected by it.Try it.