Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 11:01 AM

Let's ban The Murder of Maria Martin then:
Come all you thoughtless young men,
A warning take by me
To think on my unhappy fate
To be hanged upon a tree.

My name is William Corder,
To you I do declare
I courted Maria Marten,
Most beautiful and fair.

I promised I would marry her
Upon a certain day;
Instead of that I was resolved
To take her life away.

I went unto her father's house
The eighteenth day of May
And said, “My dear Maria,
We will fix a wedding day.”

With her heart so light she thought no harm
To meet me she did go.
I murdered her all in the barn
And laid her body low.

After the horrid deed was done
She laid there in her gore
Her bleeding, mangled body lay
Beneath the Red Barn floor.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 10:18 AM

Whereas the alarming connotations in Little Richard's verse below do not worry anybody. I'm with Moorley man.

From the early, early mornin' till the early, early night
When you caught Miss Molly rockin'
At the House Of Blue Light

The prostitutes did three hourly shifts I believe, but she sure likes to ball!
I think Little Richard got away with it because the 1955 hit 'The House of Blue lights' was about a different establishment altogether.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 09:05 AM

Final edit, I promise ....

The kicker about "Green Green Grass" is that those requesting it for their serviceman relatives didn't listen to the lyrics much either: the reveal in the last verse is that it's about a condemned man's last night in his cell, sung in the first person. But it had "Home" in the title, so it got requested, quite possibly sight unseen.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 08:16 AM

Rats: wrong click.

.... a massive number of requests. Thus "Green Green Grass of Home"'s popularity; the fact that it's syrupy added to its appeal to certain segments of the record-buying public.

"Delilah" OTOH is a force-ten belter. Hitting the top A in the verse (a jump of nearly an octave, done cold) is a guaranteed money note for any tenor: I remember the spontaneous cheers when this was done by one of the panel members in I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 08:06 AM

Joe: Was it "The Green Green Grass Of Home" you were thinking of? that, I agree, is syrupy, but there's a reason it got (*ahem*) pushed up the charts. There used to be a requests programme on BBC Home Service called "N-way Family Favourites" (for varying values of N), which was basically people asking for requests for family members serving in Europe. Any song with the word "home" in it got a large number of re

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 07:56 AM

It's pathetic, just how many folk songs have a murder? 1000s I'd wager!!

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 06:39 AM

Suggested alternative: Tom Lehrer's "I Hold Your Hand In Mine" (though that also lacks the belting-it-out-at-gale-force-10 nature).

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: GUEST,Lang Johnnie More
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 05:50 AM

Nobody seems to remember the Alex Harvey Band [ except me ] :
https://youtu.be/yPTwQfyBoEE

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Roger the Skiffler
Date: 04 Feb 23 - 05:03 AM

When I was having trouble logging in to Mudcat my Facebook avatar, Thimble O'Hooligan, started a similar thread on the Mudcat FB page with similar results. I suspect more fans will sing it than before!
RtS

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 08:17 PM

Gee, I never listened to the lyrics before. I thought it was just another syrupy Tom Jones song, and had no idea murder was involved.
I never liked Tom Jones. Sorry if that offends somebody. But here is a link to the thread with the lyrics:

https://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=91406

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 08:11 PM

Now let's not get carried away with this "ban" stuff. The WRU have simply said that the WRU choir won't be singing it. The crowd, as ever, will sing whatever they want. As for banning the Bible from RE, yep, I'll buy that!

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: MoorleyMan
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 07:40 PM

Whatever next? Banning the Bible from religious education? This is getting silly. Over-reaction and overkill. C'mon....

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 07:26 PM

I hope the ridiculous "ban" is ignored

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 07:02 PM

Mack The Knife, great though it is, somehow lacks the anthemic quality of Delilah...

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Raggytash
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 06:32 PM

Biblical I suspect CND

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 06:03 PM

How about substituting "Mack the Knife"?

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 05:25 PM

Do you mean, why, why, why, Delilah? :-)

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: cnd
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 04:05 PM

I love Tom Jones as much as the next guy, but as an outsider totally unfamiliar with Rugby/Soccer singing cultures -- why Delilah?

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 03:41 PM

As it says in the article quoted above, removed from the playlist in 2015, but Banned by WRU (Welsh Rugby Union) this week.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by Welsh Rugby Union
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 03:39 PM

Didn't this happen years ago?

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by WRU
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 03:27 PM

Or Man City's version of 'Wonderwall' (by Oasis):

Today will be another day, I wish I'd never been a Blue
I'm sure we saw it all before when we went down to division 2
I don't believe that any team has played the way we do,
apart from Slough.

Last week we had a bad defeat that we really could have done without
Felt sure that we were gonna score, but again we left the field with nowt
I don't believe that Bill Shank-er-ley could stop us going down,
Nor could Don Howe

And all the roads to Wemb-er-ley are winding
We ain't got any silverware for shining
We haven't won a single thing for over 20 years
and we wont do now
Cos maybe, we should have got Liam Brady
But after all we got Alan Ball

Today was gonna be the day when I thought we'd sign someone new
But the deal crashed, not enough cash, and he'd only ever played for Crewe
I don't believe that anybody would sign in their right mind anyhow

And all the shots we have on goal go wider
No one ever seems to play a blinder
There are many teams that I would love to see us beat
But I can't see how
Cos maybe, we should have got Richard Madeley
But after all we got Alan Ball.

Subject: RE: Delilah 'Banned' by WRU
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 03:15 PM

Come on you Welsh, show a bit of imagination! Do what the Liverpool kopites did, take the song by the scruff and change the words! Here's The Fields of Athenry, as sung on the Kop:

Outside the Shankly Gates
I heard a Kopite calling:
Shankly they have taken you away
But you left a great eleven
Before you went to heaven
Now it's glory round the Fields of Anfield Road.
All round the Fields of Anfield Road
Where once we watched the King Kenny play (and he could play)
Stevie Heighway on the wing
We had dreams and songs to sing Of the glory round the Fields of Anfield Road
Outside the Paisley Gates
I heard a Kopite calling
Paisley they have taken you away.
You led the great 11
Back in Rome in 77
And the redmen they are still playing the same way
All round the Fields of Anfield Road
Where once we watched the King Kenny play (and he could play)
Stevie Heighway on the wing
We had dreams and songs to sing
Of the glory round the Fields of Anfield Road.
Outside the Hillsborough flames
I heard Kopite mourning
What so many taken on that day
Justice has never been done
But theirs memory will carry on
And it's the glory round the Fields of Anfield Road.
All round the Fields of Anfield Road
Where once we watched the King Kenny play (and he could play)
Stevie Heighway on the wing
We had dreams and songs to sing
Of the glory round the Fields of Anfield Road.
Of the glory round the Fields of Anfield Road.

I think we call it the folk process...

You can even hear it, given a quick google! :-)

Subject: Delilah 'Banned' by WRU
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 03 Feb 23 - 02:40 PM

It's the song that fans have belted out for many years at Wales rugby games.
But now the Welsh Rugby Union has announced that Delilah will no longer be sung by choirs at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff.
The 1968 Tom Jones hit has long been controversial because of its references to a woman's murder by her jealous partner, and it was removed from the choir's playlist in 2015.
But, with Welsh rugby at the centre of a storm about sexism and misogyny, the WRU officially banned it this week.
It continues to divide opinion.
The Scottish singer Lewis Capaldi performed it at his show in Cardiff on Wednesday night, hours after the news broke.

Quote above is from BBC News

With tomorrow being the opening day of the '6 Nations' rugby championships I would imagine the fans will belt it out louder, more often, and for longer. At the match (Wales v Ireland) and in the local pubs both before & after the match.