The Working Class playlist

Subject: The Working Class help
From: Sarah the flute
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 07:44 AM

I have written a contribution about school libraries to a new book about to be published by
Independent Thinking about the influence education has had on the working class and related topics of self esteem and resilience. Alongside this they have produced a Spotify playlist and we have as a group all suggested tracks. Go to Spotify and search for Working Class playlist. There is a big mix of music of all genres but it would be nice to increase the folk content a bit.

If anyone has any ideas for inclusion please add them to this thread but please check the Spotify list first so we don't duplicate.

The song needs to be on Spotify so don't include anything not there but if you think there is a better version than the one included that is OK as some folk tracks were selected by non folkies!!!

Please keep to the theme of working class and ideally demonstrating resilience

I will pass suggestions to the boss and hopefully he will include

Thanks in advance

Sarah

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 08:28 AM

Peg and Awl- Danu

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 08:39 AM

How Can a Poor Man Stand Such Times and Live- both Blind Alfred Reed and New Lost City Ramblers have excellent versions on Spotify.

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 08:50 AM

Cumberland Blues- Grateful Dead
Easy Wind- Grateful Dead
Pastures of Plenty- Solas (The Woody Guthrie song)
Gum Tree Canoe- John Hartford
Boll Weevil- Old Crow Medicine Show
Mississippi Boll Weevil Blues- Charley Patton
Navigator- The Pogues

Good luck with this project, seems worthwhile and I'm digging the playlist.

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 08:57 AM

Coal Mining Woman- I like Cathy Fink's version

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 08:57 AM

The Spotify list.
http://open.spotify.com/user/bigigroup/playlist/0nrIQVfY2ECMke3atYsCYN

If you open it in the browser you'll see the first 30(?) tracks.
In Spotify you can see all the tracks (~500) and sort with the bar menu up in the top right corner, or filter, scroll up to top left.

afaik it isn't possible to copy and paste the list.

~~~~~~~~~~~
To make it easier on whoever is adding the tracks from suggestions here...
I'd say please put the suggestion in the form
Track name artist
Separated by a , or / NOT a dash -
e.g.
911 Is A Joke ,  Public Enemy

'-' and words like 'by' get in the way of a Spotify search.

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 09:09 AM

PS
Some dashes like the ones above Easy Wind- Grateful Dead
seem to be OK, others are not.

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 09:19 AM

Spike Driver's Blues- Mississippi John Hurt
Working Man's Blues- Merle Haggard
Semi Crazy- Junior Brown
Joe the Singing Janitor- Junior Brown
Highway Patrol- by Junior Brown
Truck Driving Man- Lots of versions on Spot, I like Buck Owen's
Six Days on the Road- Dave Dudley (also a good version by The Flying Burrito Brothers)
Tamp 'em up Solid- by Ry Cooder

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 09:20 AM

gotcha

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 09:23 AM

'Coal Not Dole' by Kay Sutcliffe, good recording by The Watersons.

Dave H

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 09:54 AM

This is fun.
Here is a spotify list of the ones above
The Working Class - mudcat 2017 (headey)

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 10:31 AM

Coal Miner's Daughter
James Larkin by Donagh MacDonagh
Doffing Mistress
Working Man (the Dubliners sing this)

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Sarah the flute
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 10:32 AM

Thanks for all the suggestions so far! This will keep him busy but thanks too FreddyHeadey for doing a Spotify

Off to do a gig now but will keep this running a while before I compile and send to ITL

Cheers

Sarah

Glad you two are enjoying the challenge!

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 10:38 AM

Working Class Hero, of course

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 10:47 AM

A Miner's Life.

There is a song to the tune of Red Flag that goes,
"The working class can kiss...."
I forget the rest.

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 10:48 AM

(My link 25 Feb 17 - 09:54 AM

There might be some bug with Spotify. The setting is showing as private and won't change to public.)

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 12:14 PM

Keith;

"The working class can kiss my ass,
I've got the foreman's job at last."

Learned it in 1972 or 3 at the 1st IWW General Convention I attended.

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: RTim
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 02:43 PM

"It all makes work for the working man to do."

The Gas Man Cometh - Flanders and Swann - YouTube

Tim Radford

Subject: RE: The Working Class
From: Snuffy
Date: 25 Feb 17 - 04:28 PM

"The working class can kiss my ass,
I've got the foreman's job at last."

Followed by
"I'm out of work and on the Dole
Yer can stick yer red flag up yer 'ole"

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: Sarah the flute
Date: 26 Feb 17 - 04:22 PM

Any more suggestions?
All welcome!

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: Joe_F
Date: 26 Feb 17 - 06:09 PM

GUEST: That couplet is much older. I heard it in Scotland in 1959. You will discover in Google (search under "arse", not "ass" %^)) that it forms the first two lines of many parodies of "The Red Flag".

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: Long Firm Freddie
Date: 27 Feb 17 - 11:39 AM

The ultimate working class resilience song:

Wait Till The Work Comes Round - Gus Elen - Youtube

Lyrics here:

Lyrics at Monlogues.co.uk

Chorus:

What's the use of kicking up a row
If there ain't no work about?
If you can't get a job, you can rest in bed
Till the school kids all comes out
If you can't get work you can't get the sack
That's a argyment that's sensible and sound
Lay your head back on yer piller and read yer 'Daily Mirrer'
And wait till the work comes round.

LFF

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: RTim
Date: 27 Feb 17 - 11:46 AM

I DON'T WORK FOR A LIVING
(James Mullen and Edward Leroy Freeman)

CHORUS: I don't work for a living.
I get along alright without.
I don't toil all day
I suppose it's because
I'm not built that way.
Some people work for love and say
It's all sunshine and gain,
But if I can't get sunshine without any work,
I think I'll stay out in the rain!

1. They say we're all born with a purpose.
They say we're all born with a gift.
Some people like to be famous.
I suppose it's by hard work and thrift.
There's lots of us fighting and striving,
For a seat down in old A.C.T.,
But I've got a seat in my trousers,
And a missus to work for me!

2. Now give me a nail and a hammer,
And a picture to hang on the wall,
And give me a strong step ladder,
For you know that I might fall,
And give me a couple of waiters,
And a barrel of good old Bass Ale,
And I bet you I'll hang up that picture
If somebody drives the nail!

LAST CHORUS: I don't work for a living.
I get along alright without.
I live peacefully.
Labour disputes never worry me.
I love my family, and the missus, oh how I adore!
I decided to make them all happy -- that's why
I never go home anymore!^^

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 05:32 AM

The last few efforts are excellent pieces but they are about NOT working!

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: Snuffy
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 06:46 AM

The OP didn't ask for songs about actually working, but requested songs about:

"the working class and related topics of self esteem and resilience".

IMO recent postings (except for the very last one) are exactly what was requested.

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: GUEST,Tom Mycock
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 06:54 AM

Quite a few Ewan MacColl ones but the ones that come to mind randomly are Champion at Keeping Them Rolling and the Bonny Shoals of Herring.

Hot Asphalt - Luke Kelly sings a fine version but Bob Davenport sings a different one, possibly with his own lyrics. I love them both.

McAlpine's Fusiliers

Navigator by the Pogues / Phil Gaston

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 09:59 AM

Working Man by Rita MacNeil. The Work Song by Kate and Anna McGarrigle, both wonderful.

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: GUEST,Tom Mycock
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 10:43 AM

Not "folk" by any conventional definition but a song written and sung by yer actual working class working workers with jobs, 'Working' by Cock Sparrer is a nice cheeky thumb in the eye to the system

I been working all day for me mate on the site
Running around like a blue arsed fly
I been working
And I been working all day for me mate

Every bleeding minute I been on the go
Up and down the ladder like a fiddler's elbow
I been working
I been working all day for me mate

[Chorus]
Wait for tomorrow at half past ten
When I sign on, but until then
I'll be working
I'll be working all day for me mate

Aint' got no cards, don't pay no tax
For a score in me hand I'll be breaking me back
I been working
And I been working all day for me mate
Call me a crook, call me bent
But I need more than food and rent
I been working
And I been working all day for me mate

[Chorus]

They try to follow me every day
I give 'em the slip and I'm on my way
None of the other blokes thinks it's wrong
'Coz every one of 'em's signing on

[Chorus]

They try to follow me every day
I give 'em the slip and I'm on my way
None of the other blokes thinks it's wrong
'Coz every one of 'em's signing on

[Chorus]

The benefit boys are out of touch
What they don't know won't hurt 'em much
I been working
And I been working all day for me mate

If I'm caught I'll go down for a month or three
But they'll still be paying out looking after me
I been working
And I been working all day for me mate

[Chorus]

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: Sarah the flute
Date: 28 Feb 17 - 08:05 PM

Don't forget they need to be on Spotify too so please check

Keep the suggestions rolling in - great stuff

Sarah

Subject: RE: The Working Class playlist
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 06 Mar 17 - 03:15 PM

Hard Times - Margaret Christl, Ian Robb, Grit Laskin
Will Of The People - Jez Lowe
Taking on Men - Alistair Anderson