Some more of Walter "mediating" himself
Jim Carroll

RECORDING HIMSELF
Anyhow, I set it up once and plugged in, I tell you, that was a good job; I was right nervous doing it.
I thought myself, I used to think I could manage to sing the old ‘Rambling Blade’; I put it on and it sound so blooming horrible I wiped it right out, oh, that did sound dreadful; I don’t think that was as bad perhaps as I thought it was, but that was a long while, I trying different things until, you know, I thought that was better as I kept hearing it, you see.
And I know that was about October, 1972 when I started it; Oh, I don’t know, it took about up to Christmas time to fill one side; I used to forget there was verses in the songs, you see, I used to keep wiping it out and putting them on again. That took a long time to get them up into the pitch I could sing them in, not having sung the things.
Well I got one side done somewhere from the October up to the Christmas1972 this was. And I know when it come over to the following New Year I was in here one Saturday night and that was bitterly cold; oh, that was a wind frost, wind coming everywhere. I was that cold I had a big fire going one side and that little stove the other.
So I thought then I’d do some more taping. Anyhow, so I got warmed up, I had a strong dose of rum and milk, and I had another one. And so I got the tape recorder going, I can remember well enough; that was Caroline And Her Young Sailor, and when I finished it was the best I ever did do.
Well, I found out I drank more than I should, I had to keep right still. Well, I switched it off; that was true, in fact I was drunk, and then of course I went to bed, I never did have any more, and the next morning when I got up and tried it I knew I was, how that was coming out with all then words all slurred, so I wiped it all out.
Well I found then as I kept going, that it wouldn’t pay to drink anything.
Anyhow, eventually that was filled up in the March, that was March 1973.


FOLK CLUBS
I had a vague idea they had folk clubs of some description, all these doctors, solicitors etcetera would go and sing in someone’s big house. I never realised you see, working people done that, never knew a single thing about it.

PICTURES WHILE SINGING
J C   Can I ask you something else then Walter. When you’re singing in a club or at a festival, who do you look at, what do you see when you’re singing?
W P   Well, I don’t see anything.
J C   You don’t look at the audience.
W P   No, that’s why I like a microphone; I’d rather stand up in front of a microphone and that sort of thing ‘cause it’s something to look at, that’s what I like, this sort of thing in front so you can shut the audience out, ‘cause I can shut the audience right away from everywhere.
J C   So what do you see then, when you’re…..?
W P   Well actually what I’m singing about, like reading a book; you always imagine you can see what is happening there, you might as well not read it.
P Mc   So you see what you’re singing about?
W P   Hmm
P Mc   And how do you see it; as a moving thing, as a still thing?
W P   That’s right.
P Mc   Moving?
W P   That’s right. The Pretty Ploughboy was always ploughing in the field over there, that’s where that was supposed to be.
J C    Over there?
W P Hmm.
J C    So it’s that field just across the way?
W P   That’s right.
J C    How about van Dieman’s Land?
W P   Well, that was sort of imagination what that was really like, in Warwickshire, going across, you know, to Australia; seeing them chained to the harrow and plough and that sort of thing; chained hand-to-hand, all that.
You must have imagination to see; I think so, that’s the same as reading a book, you must have imagination to see where that is, I think so, well I do anyhow.
P Mc   But you never shut your eyes when you’re singing, do you?
W P    No, no.
P Mc   But if you haven’t got a microphone to concentrate on, if you’re singing in front of an audience, where do you look?
W P   Down my nose, like that.
P Mc   Yes, you do, yeah.
W P   That is so. Have you noticed that?
P Mc   Yeah.
J C   Do the people in the songs that you sing, do they have their own identity or are they people you know or have known in the past?
W P   No, their own identity, I imagine what they look like.
J C   You imagine what they look like?
W P   That’s right, yeah.
J C   And when you sing the song they’re the same people every time, they look the same every time?
W P That’s right, yes, yes, that’s right. All depending what it’s about or the period, that’s right.
J C   And they were dressed in the period…?
W P   That’s right yeah, yeah.
J C   So where would you put The Pretty Ploughboy, what sort of period?
W P   Lord Nelson’s time.
J C   So they’d be wearing……?
W P   That’s right; the beginning of the last century.
P Mc   What about the song like The Trees They Do Grow High or Broomfield Hill?
W P    Oh, that’d go back really as far as…. Buckled shoes, that sort of thing. Well no, they wore buckled, but anyone ploughing would never wear buckled shoes but I mean they dressed in, you know, fairly smart clothes and a ring on their thumb sort of thing.
J C   And how about Dark Arches, what would be the type of…?
W P   Oh, myself; if you’re singing about yourself that must come in it (laughter).