The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #36123   Message #497679
Posted By: Fiolar
03-Jul-01 - 02:30 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Take Me Back to Castlebar
Subject: Lyr Add: TAKE ME BACK TO CASTLEBAR
Here is the full version. I must apologise for the missing words in the penultimate verse. The version I've got seems to have been recorded live in a pub and the background noise with the audience joining in has to heard to be believed. The artists by the way are Foster and Allen. Here goes.

I'm waiting for John Murphy's van to take me to the site.
I'm working seven days a week from morning to dark night;
And when I step into the van and gently close the door,
The first thing that they ask me "what I did the night before."

CHORUS: Take me back to Castlebar in the County of Mayo.
It's the only place in Ireland I'm longing for to go,
Where they greet you with a friendly smile and bid you time of day.
When I set me foot in ould Mayo, I never more will stray.

My boss, Jack the Ganger-Man when asked about the time,
Himself and ould John Murphy worked deep down in the mine,
He says he meets him often at the Dorchester Hotel.
If you want to get promotion, get down and dig like hell. CHORUS

Back in Connemara when he gets in the hump,
He talks about the money he made while working on the lump.
He blames ould Maggie Thatcher and Jim Callaghan as well.
He says he's made his money now and they can go to Hell. CHORUS

????? from Pakistan, who's no higher than the duck,
He sells his wares upon the site, that fell off the back of a truck.
He says he is a carpenter and that may well be true,
But I've never seen him working yet, he's always in the loo. CHORUS

At the Duke of York on a Saturday night, Mick Reilly does relate,
He says he first came over here in 1938.
That was the year before the War, if me memory serves me clear,
For written on the factory wall, "No Irish Wanted Here." CHORUS

Again apologies but maybe someone else will have the full version. It's one of those rare recordings which I was lucky to get hold of.

HTML line breaks fixed. You had “bk” instead of “br”.--JoeClone, 24-Mar-02.