Greetings to all Catters. I have suggested this thread because I find myself in a situation where I play my last public performance on St Paddy's Day which is just around the corner. It is my last public performance because unfortunately I find myself on the losing side of a 35-year battle with rhumathoid arthritis which means that I would prefer to quit rather than embark on a long slippery slide which would ultimately result in my musically embarassing myself any more than is necessary.

It has been a hell of a ride and I have enjoyed every minute of it. But there is a time to stop and, for me, this is it. So I have decided to end my final set with a musical autobiographical obituary. I'm putting it up here and would love to hear if any other Catters have found themselves in a similar position,

For the sake of those who live outside the area of the disUnited Kingdom's', the term BSA, refers to a British built motor-cycle. BSA stands for "Birmingham Small Arms". The motor-cycle in question was manufactured by an arms manufacturer which, in truth, was extremely apt and fitting.

That's because the motor-cycle they came up with was perhaps more effective at killing people than all the hardware they had produced before. I jest. They made good bikes, but lethal in the hands of young folksingers fuelled on controlled substances, lust, longing and and huge expectations. If you have ever ridden a raddled BSA down an Irish road laden with dope, lust and Guinness in the small hours of a morning, you will know what I mean!

Anyway....to the song, the title of which I stole from the late, great Harry Chapin.

THE LAST OF THE PROTEST SINGERS


I'm the last of the protest singers
I'm the last of the gallant band
Who over 30-year ago
took our guitars in hand
Because we called for Peace and Justice
and demanded an end to war
we put ourselves out of business
there's not good wars left anymore


It was easy in the fifties
when I was barely grown
and I cut my teeth on the Croppy Boy
and Sean South from Garryowen.
And I learned to whine like Dylan
and moan like Leonard Cohen
in dingy folk club basements
mouldy drunk and totally stoned.


So after seeing "Easy Rider"
I bought myself a BSA
and did wheelies around the Fermanagh roads
in my own peculiar way.
But recreational pharamecuticals
and motor-bikes don't mix
so I found myself most of the time
crawlin' out of a roadside ditch.


But when free lovin' came along
Man, it was good to be alive
for I only put on my trousers twice in 1965.
For I met with a Yankee beauty
as obliging as could be
to Tom and Dick and Harry and Joe
an' me and Bobby Magee
tra la la la la, to everybody
an' me and Bobby Magee.


Then wee girls in John Lennon glasses
and dressed in Army surplus clothes
fell victim to my passions
dreadful songs and deathly prose
But with my Japanese guitar
I struck the proper note
with my beard, long hair and sandals
bandy legs and an Afghan coat.


So for years I howled and gnashed my teeth
and vented all my spleen
on things I thought had happened
in lands I'd never seen.
And it didn't really matter
that I knew sweet damn all
for there was always the chance of the atom bomb
sailing over the Berlin Wall.


But now there's a gap in East Berlin
where the Wall it used to be
and the mealy-mouthed South Africans
have set Nelson Mandela free.
It's like being on the Titanic
and she's barely just afloat
when there's no more Commies left to hate
and the black man's got the vote.


So I'm the last of the protest singers
I'm the last of the gallant band
who over 30-years ago
took our guitars in hand.
But when I look back on my life
at its' triumphs, joys and tears
I've come to the conclusion
that I'm still crazy after all of these years
Yes, I'm still Crazy after All of These Years.


Mickey.