Herga Kitty

I see someone's resuscitated this thread so I thought I'd have another look.

Yes, murder/rape etc ballads are 'gut-wrenching' but then so is Saturday night in the casualty unit at my local hospital. As it happens, I agree that 'Prince Heathen' is a very powerful song in the same way that 'Straw Dogs' is a very powerful film, and like that film the song is by no means without artistic merit. Perhaps it's unfair to pick on it too much.

I do know, however, that I played it to an old girlfriend several years ago with the usual 'You've GOT to hear this song' preamble. She didn't like it much. About a year later she told me she had been raped while she was working abroad so perhaps it was understandable that she didn't quite get the appeal.

OK, you can't allow for everyone's sensibilities and you shouldn't try or you'd never create anything. But, you know, I used to LOVE Steeleye Span in the 70's. Then after they broke up I sort of forgot about them (as you do if you have a life) until another old girlfriend (don't ask) bought me a then-new album by them which featured yet another grisly ballad about babies being murdered. By 1989 I couldn't quite bring myself to treat this as innocent entertainment in the same way I could when I was a teenager and even more ignorant than I am now.

I realise we're getting away from the 'What's you favourite song' thing but we've all grown up (if that's the right word) with this music. Maybe it doesn't do any harm to reflect on what it means to us now by comparison with what it might have meant to us 30 years ago.