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Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing

Pete Jennings 16 Apr 02 - 08:50 AM
greg stephens 16 Apr 02 - 08:58 AM
Bullfrog Jones 16 Apr 02 - 09:01 AM
Pete Jennings 16 Apr 02 - 09:07 AM
alanabit 16 Apr 02 - 09:09 AM
GUEST,Geordie 16 Apr 02 - 09:12 AM
KingBrilliant 16 Apr 02 - 09:37 AM
GUEST 16 Apr 02 - 09:45 AM
SharonA 16 Apr 02 - 10:02 AM
MMario 16 Apr 02 - 10:15 AM
Skipjack K8 16 Apr 02 - 10:18 AM
Sorcha 16 Apr 02 - 10:19 AM
GUEST,greg stephens 16 Apr 02 - 02:53 PM
Clinton Hammond 16 Apr 02 - 03:02 PM
SharonA 16 Apr 02 - 03:41 PM
GUEST 16 Apr 02 - 04:01 PM
Harry Basnett 16 Apr 02 - 04:09 PM
Little Hawk 16 Apr 02 - 05:37 PM
Lanfranc 16 Apr 02 - 06:06 PM
Ebbie 16 Apr 02 - 06:32 PM
GUEST,Just Amy 16 Apr 02 - 07:07 PM
michaelr 16 Apr 02 - 07:15 PM
Hilary 16 Apr 02 - 07:23 PM
X 16 Apr 02 - 07:32 PM
Jerry Rasmussen 16 Apr 02 - 07:35 PM
Hilary 16 Apr 02 - 07:38 PM
Stephen L. Rich 16 Apr 02 - 07:38 PM
Bullfrog Jones 16 Apr 02 - 07:53 PM
DonMeixner 16 Apr 02 - 07:57 PM
Celtic Soul 16 Apr 02 - 08:09 PM
Bullfrog Jones 16 Apr 02 - 08:14 PM
Jeri 16 Apr 02 - 08:35 PM
Little Hawk 16 Apr 02 - 09:06 PM
Jerry Rasmussen 16 Apr 02 - 09:18 PM
Celtic Soul 16 Apr 02 - 09:28 PM
Midchuck 16 Apr 02 - 09:43 PM
Little Hawk 16 Apr 02 - 09:57 PM
Steve Latimer 16 Apr 02 - 10:02 PM
toadfrog 16 Apr 02 - 10:03 PM
53 16 Apr 02 - 10:42 PM
Jon Bartlett 17 Apr 02 - 04:35 AM
greg stephens 17 Apr 02 - 04:47 AM
KingBrilliant 17 Apr 02 - 05:31 AM
Bullfrog Jones 17 Apr 02 - 10:55 AM
Midchuck 17 Apr 02 - 11:15 AM
Bill D 17 Apr 02 - 11:44 AM
Bill D 17 Apr 02 - 11:47 AM
Emma B 17 Apr 02 - 06:20 PM
Wincing Devil 17 Apr 02 - 11:14 PM
KingBrilliant 18 Apr 02 - 05:53 AM
GUEST,micca at work 18 Apr 02 - 06:25 AM
Grab 18 Apr 02 - 08:52 AM
Trevor 18 Apr 02 - 09:12 AM
pattyClink 18 Apr 02 - 09:53 AM
Pete Jennings 18 Apr 02 - 09:57 AM
KingBrilliant 18 Apr 02 - 10:12 AM
GUEST,leeneia 18 Apr 02 - 11:02 AM
Watson 18 Apr 02 - 11:16 AM
Bullfrog Jones 18 Apr 02 - 11:23 AM
harvey andrews 18 Apr 02 - 11:40 AM
KingBrilliant 18 Apr 02 - 12:42 PM
harvey andrews 18 Apr 02 - 12:46 PM
GUEST,aesop 18 Apr 02 - 01:18 PM
bill kennedy 18 Apr 02 - 01:43 PM
SharonA 18 Apr 02 - 02:21 PM
GUEST,celtic cousin 18 Apr 02 - 04:36 PM
Micca 18 Apr 02 - 05:01 PM
Ebbie 18 Apr 02 - 06:00 PM
lamarca 18 Apr 02 - 06:29 PM
GUEST,Midchuck downstairs 18 Apr 02 - 06:29 PM
Ebbie 18 Apr 02 - 06:35 PM
Nemesis 19 Apr 02 - 09:04 AM
Nemesis 19 Apr 02 - 09:08 AM
Dave Wynn 19 Apr 02 - 09:40 AM
JedMarum 19 Apr 02 - 09:47 AM
SharonA 19 Apr 02 - 11:57 AM
Mrs.Duck 20 Apr 02 - 11:13 AM
Jon Bartlett 20 Apr 02 - 09:17 PM
GUEST,jaze 20 Apr 02 - 09:57 PM
Amergin 20 Apr 02 - 10:06 PM
GUEST,DonMeixner 20 Apr 02 - 10:41 PM
Watson 21 Apr 02 - 12:28 PM
Stephen L. Rich 21 Apr 02 - 10:15 PM
GUEST,mg 21 Apr 02 - 10:40 PM
JenBurdoo 22 Apr 02 - 01:32 PM
JenBurdoo 22 Apr 02 - 01:32 PM
Melani 22 Apr 02 - 01:34 PM
SharonA 22 Apr 02 - 02:54 PM
GUEST,Bullfrog Jones (on the road) 22 Apr 02 - 03:07 PM
Pete Jennings 23 Apr 02 - 07:54 AM
KingBrilliant 23 Apr 02 - 08:17 AM
GUEST,Bullfrog Jones (on the road) 24 Apr 02 - 06:42 AM
Little Hawk 24 Apr 02 - 01:51 PM
Tiger 24 Apr 02 - 05:55 PM
GUEST,mr happy, unhappy no cookie 06 May 02 - 01:43 PM
Little Hawk 06 May 02 - 01:55 PM
Melani 07 May 02 - 01:10 AM
Bert 07 May 02 - 02:45 AM
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Subject: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Pete Jennings
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:50 AM

This started life in a posting Don made to the How do YOU handle requests? thread. Don said anyone requesting Duelling Banjos gets to die...

I countered with Streets Of London. Thinking about it, I was probably being a little unfair as it is a great song and I detect (in the UK anyway) a bit of a comeback since Ralph appeared at the Albert Hall with Show Of Hands (and on the subsequent video) when he did a heart-rending unaccompanied version of it.

Here, it's replacement is fast becoming The Fields Of Athenry, another great song, but well overdone these days, even according to my Irish mates.

What are you fed up with playing right now?

Pete

PS. Is "fed up with" understood in the US? It means you've had enough of it.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: greg stephens
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:58 AM

Well, I dont get fed up with playing stuff because as soon as that starts to happen i give the song a rest. But as regards songs I'm fed upwith listening to, some candidates come and go: green fields of France and fields of athenry have featured heavily on my list, but way out infront of the field, as it has been since the day it was written, is the 100% oh-my-god not-that-again I'm-going-up-to-the-bar classic: The Streets of London


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:01 AM

Definitely Streets Of London...House Of The Rising Sun...American Pie...Annie's Song...I know what you mean about Athenry, but I've got a nice harmony to add to the chorus, so I don't mind...and not folk, but does EVERY r&b band have to do a crap version of Mustang Sally? Is it in the contract?


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Pete Jennings
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:07 AM

Bullfrog, I'm must be getting senile, not mentioning Mustang Sally. It makes me cringe when the singer holds the mic towards the audience and gets a ragged response, or worse, gets all the drunks singing in H Flat.

And every band in Bedford (England) does it every time they play. Ugh.

Pete


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: alanabit
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:09 AM

"Take Me Home Country Roads" turns this otherwise semi pacifist/vegetarian into a near psychopath...


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,Geordie
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:12 AM

Marrie's bloody wedding..I am sick to death of it. Also, Me and Bobby Magee anything that starts with "come all ye" and Amazing Grace on the bag pipes.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:37 AM

The songs we get fed up with tend to be the ones that are fairly easy to do (to a not too apalling level) - and hence tend to be very popular when people are fledging folk-wise.
This means that people mostly sing them at an early point in their folkly development & hence the renditions are not of the most exquisite.
This theory is based on the fact that most renditions of Streets of London are fairly naff really - but if you hear Ralph McTell sing it then its a whole different thing altogether! The song is not naff - its just that most times you hear it it will be sung by someone with their musical L plates on (learner).
All of the songs mentioned here can be fantastic if performed really well.
So - don't blame the songs - its just a side-effect of how accessible they are, which seems to be a double-edged sword.

Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:45 AM

The Wild Colonial Boy


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: SharonA
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:02 AM

Pete J: Yes, "fed up with" is a slang phrase in the US as well, and means the same thing.

Fed up with playing... "Streets of London", for sure. "Early Morning Rain" is getting to that point, too. Both are in the limited repertoire that I perform with my sometimes-duet-partner. He and I really need to work up some new material!

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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: MMario
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:15 AM

Sometimes I think it's not so much a case of being fed up with a song - but the desire to play something, (somtimes ANYTHING)else.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Skipjack K8
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:18 AM

"I'll tell me feckin' Ma", "The feckin' Black Velvet Band" and "Wild feckin' Rover". Any song that has gained 'feckin' in its nomenclature.

Tunes would be 'Winster feckin' Gallop' and 'Davey feckin' Nick Nack'

feckin' Skipjack


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:19 AM

Red Wing, Faded Love, Amazing Grace on anything, In the Garden, The Old Rugged Cross.......I've been to way too many funerals lately.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,greg stephens
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 02:53 PM

How can anyone claim that Streets of London is not naff? The word naff was specifically invented to describe the bloody dreadful abysmaland generally not very satisfactory song.And in no circumstances would i marry anyone who liked it. hell I wouldnt even


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 03:02 PM

I agree with a lot of the above and must add...

The frigg'n Wreck of the goddamn Edmund stupid over long undercrafted poorly written FitgFeckinGerald!!!!!

Gord once said, if he knew it was gonna be such a 'hit' he would a made it a much better song!

Boy, wouldn't that have been nice eh!

I'm also sick to frigg'n death of Barretts Privateers... in conversation with a Stan Fan at the pub a few nights ago, we fell to discussing Stan the the "What If..." factor... My major input was "Well, I'd like to hope he wouldn't still be singing that frigg'n 'God damn them all' song!"

(the inside joke there is that's what 90% of people who request it, call it...)

I'll also toss in 98% of the material of the band I'm side man for... Ya gotta really wonder about a band that hasn't even changed it's SET LIST in 2+years!!! The last time we learned anything new, we had a whole different bass player!

We should change the name of the band to Terminal Boredom


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: SharonA
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 03:41 PM

My last post had a "Fed up with hearing..." section that seems to have disappeared into the ether. Let's see if I can reconstruct it:

Fed up with hearing... "Amazing Grace" (ever since Judy Collins's lifeless version); "Keep on the Sunny Side of Life"; "When I'm Gone"; "Joe Hill"; "Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream."


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 04:01 PM

Oh no not the fields of Athenry If I hear it one more time I think I'll cry they should ban the bloomin thing there are far better songs to sing I can't stand it, the fields of Athenry

'ere Micca, have you got the rest of that in your book somewhere? Cllr


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Harry Basnett
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 04:09 PM

Pleasant and Delightful done with popping noises, sharks playing melodeons, et al.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 05:37 PM

There isn't enough room on this forum to list them all.

- LH


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Lanfranc
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 06:06 PM

"I won't/can't/can't bear to/* sing Streets of London/Fields of Athenry/Green Fields of France/Galway Shawl/Wild Rover/Will ye go, Lassie, go/The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald/Seven Drunken Nights/* but here is another song that uses some of the same notes and a few of the words!" (*=delete as appropriate)

If asked for House of the Rising Sun I do the Leadbelly version.

If asked for The Band Played Waltzing Matilda I do the Queensland version of Waltzing Matilda.

No-one's hit me yet!

Alan


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 06:32 PM

I'm learning to lighten up just a bit in a song circle when it comes to a song or tune that I'm sick of- I remind myself that they are obvious favorites, and in any case, 3 to 5 minutes later it will be over.

That said, I'm TOTALLY tired of Columbus Stockade Blues, I Saw the Light, Amazing Grace, Me and Bobby McGee, Wildwood Flower (unless sung by someone who knows the version that makes sense){I'll twine with my mingles... indeed}, You Are My Sunshine-

In some cases, a song or tune has eventually come back into favor in my mind, so I guess there is hope for improvement. After all, people will persist in singing them.

Ebbie


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,Just Amy
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:07 PM

My friends (Sheer Pandamonium) sing "Black Velvet Band" as a 50's Doo Wop song and it is much better that way.

I hope NEVER to hear "As Time Goes By" ever again (" Play it, Sam. You played it for her. You can play it for me."). There is always someone singing that song off key and badly phrased. It just makes me sick.

I wish our VP would stop whistling "If I only had a Brain" from Wizard of Oz. It makes us very nervous.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: michaelr
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:15 PM

Danny Boy! Can't stand it! And everyone thinks it's an Irish song... (shudder)

Michael


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Hilary
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:23 PM

Most of the above, although I haven't heard anybody round here do 'The wreck of the E...' or 'Streets.. My heart sinks at the thought of 'Streets' 'cos my guitar teacher based ALL the lessons on it. I TRY not to whinge as it's usually the general public who ask, & it helps get them involved, & 'Fields of ...' is the faourite song of a friend who hasn't got the time to practice new songs ....

But it sure is time to go to the loo when they start.

Apologies for thread drift, but has anyone found out who actually wrote ' O no, not the fields of Athenry' ? ( which I LOVE.) Last I heard it was agreed it wasn't Les Barker.

Hilary


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: X
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:32 PM

Duelling Banjos, Foggy Mt. Breakdown, Jed Clampett.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:35 PM

This thread seems heavily tilted toward the British Aisles. The only songs I can think of over here (which have gracefully faded from popularity) are Come Together by the Youngbloods (which I liked for a long time, when the only place I heard it was out of my stereo) and Michael Row the Insipid Boat Ashore. I guess I'm getting a little tired of "I'm a Rover, Seldom Sober."... whatever it's called. I also get sick of singing some of my own songs if they get requested too much. Some have gone on the back burner for years. Anyone else get sick of THEIR OWN SONGS?

Jerry


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Hilary
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:38 PM

...'The Leaving of Liverpool' I count myself lucky to get through a night without hearing that one.

A local amateur guitarist/singer (the only person I refuse to call a musican) used to have bets put on which order he would come out with 'Leaving of...' / 'Fields of ...'. Other players who were sick of all-the-above would sometime do them so at least the song would be done well.

Just to be awkward, I'm very fond of 'Columbus Stockade Blues' - but isn't sung very often around here.

Is there a song you think you'll NEVER tire of hearing ???

Hilary


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Stephen L. Rich
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:38 PM

Most of the songs I'm tired of have been mentioned. Allow me, however, to add "Sweet Home Chicago" to the list.

Every blues band non-Chicago-based blues band that I've ever heard does it -- usually poorly.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:53 PM

Pete J --- if you're in Bedford and I'm in Stony, I think we're seeing the same bands doing Mustang Sally! Anyway, back to the thread... Dirty Old Town...You've Got A Friend...That advert for MacDonalds and Campbells Soup -- you know, the Glencoe song (funny both clans went into catering...)


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: DonMeixner
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 07:57 PM

"Streets" is a song I never tire of doing so when I come to Ireland/Scotland/England I promise not to go near it. Many of those songs that have died in the Isles are gaining new life over here. Galway Shawl is popular over here even by the performers. I almost hope I never have to play The Rattlin' Bog again. But I do it to keep my wind up.

But I'd stick Flight of Earls, When New York Was Irish, The Sick Note and (No offense meant or social or racial disparagement intended) every single Tin Pan Alley Irish song I've ever heard that were writen by real Irish people with "itz" "erg" "sen" "ski" "ein" "ien" "yne" or "ini" on the end of their last name.

Don


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Celtic Soul
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:09 PM

Here's a question that has long perplexed me, my 'Cat friends...

Someone *please* tell me *WHY*, when there are decades upon decades of "oldies" music to select from, do "oldies" stations only play the same 10 songs over and over again, day after day??? I cannot listen to an oldies station for long, as eventually, you hear the same Billy Joel song, the same Aerosmith song, and the same Rolling Stones song. No matter that each of these people/groups have put out many many albums in their day, you will still only hear one or two songs from their repetoire, and *never* any deep cuts (in my opinion, the stuff that makes #1 is not necessarily the best a band has to offer). Add to this that there are a huge amount of artists that have come and gone over the years, but they only play a handful of them.

What's with that?

But, to answer your question, if I *never* heard or had to sing "Drunken Sailor" again, it would be a happy thing. Or "Roll the Chariots". And as beautiful as "The Boatman" is, I could do without that one for a year or two...or twelve...as well.

*But*, we *will* do them...if the crowd wants 'em, and many times they do. C'est la vie...it is a small price to pay for being able to do what we do.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:14 PM

....oh, and Every Time We Say Goodbye sung by someone who's learnt it from the Mick Hucknall version. They always sing 'I can hear a lark somewhere WAITING to sing about it'. What does a lark sound like when it's waiting to sing? Does it clear its throat? Gargle? Practice its bloody scales? But I don't let it get to me.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Jeri
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:35 PM

I get fed up with overdone songs, but I find when they're put away for a bit, I enjoy hearing them again - IF I liked them in the first place. "Country Roads" is one I got mightily sick of, but I rather like hearing it now. I also can like hearing an old "standard" when somebody different does it well and with feeling.

As far as tunes go, I can tire of them a lot faster. There are some we do in our session that I got sick of before I even managed to learn them. And don't even mention Feckin' Billy In The Feckin' Lowground. I liked it when we first started playing it, but after 2 feckin' years of feckin' doing it every feckin' friday...


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Subject: Lyr Add: STREETS OF BRECHIN (parody of "..London")
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:06 PM

I am also sick of "Streets of London"! I got revenge finally by writing a parody of it, based on a very small town that is not far down the highway from Orillia, Ontario. It's called "Brechin".

Streets of Brechin

Have you seen the sidewalk kids
Who hang out on the streets of Brechin?
Baseball caps upon their head and nothing much within
Vacant faces, witless poses
Nose rings dangling from their noses
Killing time and dreaming about the seven deadly sins
And how can you tell me you're lonely?
And say your life's a waste of time?
Let me take you by the hand
And lead you through the streets of Brechin
We'll do some checkin' that'll make you change your mind

Have you seen the daily gathering
Of the Brechin lionesses?
With their bulging shopping bags and their gossip magazines
Catching up on local scandals
Staring down the teenage vandals
If you run afoul of them, you'll know just what I mean
And how can you tell me you're lonely?
And say your life's a waste of time?
Let me take you by the ear
And lead you through the streets of Brechin
We'll do some checkin' that'll make you change your mind

And, have you seen the closet queen
Who minces down the streets of Brechin
Past the scowling rednecks and the jeering kids
No one there to peck or pinch him
Come sundown they'll prob'ly lynch him
Then get drunk and wreck the place just like their daddies did
And how can you tell me you're lonely?
And say your life's a waste of time?
Let me take you by the nose
And lead you through the streets of Brechin
We'll do some checkin' that'll make you change your mind
Let me take you by the nose
And lead you through the streets of Brechin
We'll do some checkin' that'll make you change your mind

* Brechin is pronounced BREK-in, rhymes with neckin'....

Feel free to sing it anywhere, but it's only around the Orillia area that it really cracks people up, cos they KNOW about Brechin! :-)

- LH


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:18 PM

Celtic Soul: A few years ago, I was in the office of the manager of an oldies station, asking if they'd do a public service announcement. The manager asked me if I listened to their station, and I answered "No, I love the old songs." He looked a little puzzled, and I said, "I don't want to hear the same songs endlessly.. I've already gotten sick of most of them." I asked him why they play the same songs, over and over again. He said that they have a "rotation" of 300 songs that they play (and they're on the air 24 hours, seven days a week. You can imagine how many times you have to repeat each song, in one week. Figure it out. I asked why they didn't play a bigger variety of songs by artists, instead of just one or two, and he said, "That's what sells." And I imagine he's right. I told him that he'll never have me as a listener, but that if I took over his job, I'd make the programs far more interesting, and run the station into bankruptcy within three months.

My theory is that with 90% of people, if you ask them to name ten favorite songs, you can figure out within a couple of years, how old they are. It's all got to do with the onset of puberty. Once the hormones start raging, popular music becomes the soundtrack for fantasizing about, or eventually actually making out. As soon as they get married, life becomes an endless repetition of "oldies." Music to wash your car by.

I still like the old rhythm and blues and early rock and roll... even the music of the 40's. But, I didn't lose interest until the 90's when rap finally killed the melody.

Just my opinion....

Jerry


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Celtic Soul
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:28 PM

Well said, Jerry, and thanks for the answer. I guess down deep I already knew why, but it's still puzzling why people would *want* to hear the same songs over and over when there is a world of music out there.

And now, I think it's time to start a different thread!

Thanks for the inspiration, Jerry!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Midchuck
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:43 PM

Here's another way to deal with Streets of London, courtesy of Mike Agranoff:

McDonald's Kitchen
Lyrics: Carol McNelly
Music: Streets of London by Ralph McTell

Have you seen the young girl who serves McDonald's burgers,
Stacking them in boxes in their dry little piles?
In her eyes you'll see no pride,
'Cause she knows what they've put inside.
When she sees us eating it's the only time she smiles.

(1st verse rewritten by Mike Agranoff:
Have you seen the young man at the fast food counter
Stacking one more Big Mac box 'longside the other ones?
In his eyes you see no pride cause he knows what they put inside
It's yesterday's burgers on yesterdays buns.

Chorus:
So how can you tell me you're hungry,
And say a snack you'd like to find?
Let me take you by the hand and lead you through McDonald's kitchen,
I'll show you something to make you change your mind.

Have you seen the old girl in the closed up Wendy's,
Scraping off the pieces from the tables and the floor?
In an effort to disguise them she takes them back and fries them,
But you still recognize them when they come round once more.

(chorus)

Have you seen the businessman outside Colonel Sanders,
His appetite is fading as he stops and peers inside?
All around the city, little voices cry: "Have pity
On one more forgotten kitty who's now Kentucky Fried."

(chorus)

Peter.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 09:57 PM

Yep, that's it, all right, Jerry. They're endlessly reliving the wild and carefree days of their youth...the "hungry years", so that's why they listen to the same old songs over and over again. It's kind of sad.

One thing about folk music though...the songs range more widely in theme and subject matter than is the case with "radio" music, and that gives folk music more depth. The radio couldn't care less about folk music. It "doesn't sell". (C)RAP sure does though, doesn't it?

What a world we live in....the sheep all line up obediently at the till, and wait to get fleeced. They mostly buy exactly what they're told to. It's a closed loop. I detest commercial radio stations.

- LH


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Steve Latimer
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:02 PM

My Brother is a Rock drummer. He's looking to play with a band who refuse to play Mustang Sally & Sweet Home Alabama. He hasn't found one yet.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: toadfrog
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:03 PM

Mostly Britishers in this thread. If they sang Fields of Athenwry - say - once every two months over here, I'd agree that this was far too much. I've never heard "Wild Rover," and don't mind one bit. My nominees:

"Rolling down to old Maui" (which must have been written for a Chamber of Commerce).
Mary Ellen Carter.
Blowin' in the Wind


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: 53
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:42 PM

My Girl by the Tempations. If I had a dollar for every time I played this song, I would have some cash on hand.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Jon Bartlett
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 04:35 AM

This thread addresses songs supposedly good once but overdone. I'd like to address APPALLING songs, appalling when they were written (and they were all WRITTEN, this century: all of the traditional stuff we know has already been winnowed) and appalling now. First, all of Stan Rogers' oevre. All of it is sentimental or violent (or perhaps I should say, sentimental and violent, because the two characteristics travel together). Then, all of Ralph McTell's oevre (or at least that portion of it I've been unfortunate enough to hear) for the same reason. And for a treat that most appalling and banal song about "lonely prison walls", and "lonely harbour something something", and suggesting witlessly that we "raise our child with dignity" (with the em-PHAS-is on the wrong Sy-LAB-ble). My 2c.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: greg stephens
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 04:47 AM

Jon G Bartlett raises the interesting question of distorted emphasis in bad songs.I think the really repellent feature of Streets of London(not that the whole thing isnt repellent in the extreme) isthe strange way you're obliged to sing "two carrier bags" (not that I've ever sung it myself I'm glad to say).


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 05:31 AM

Well, I am moved to defend "Streets" - but only since I heard it at Easter sung by Ralph Mctell & it really did make a difference.
There seemed to be a hell of a lot more tune in it when he sang it - whereas most singers of it produce something very flat & bland. He gave it life - whereas most renditions give it terminal vomity-ness.
And what is this about singing "two carrier bags" strangely? In what way strangely? And in what way obliged?
Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 10:55 AM

You're not alone Jon, that song about raising our child with dignitee is The Fields of Athenry that everyone else is complaining about!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Midchuck
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 11:15 AM

Prior post condemns....all of Stan Rogers' oevre. All of it is sentimental or violent (or perhaps I should say, sentimental and violent, because the two characteristics travel together

YES! Isn't it GREAT! The man was a genius!

But Tom Russell's stuff is even more violent and more sentimental. He's my current favorite by a long shot.

Peter.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 11:44 AM

well, there are some good choices noted that are either over-done, or should never HAVE been done (I also weary of "The Heart of the Appaloosa")....but

my all time favorite to NOT hear again.."Circle of the Sun" by Sally Rogers..an 'almost' catchy little tune-like thing for half a verse, but the lyrics say nothing, and say it badly and with lousy meter...


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 11:47 AM

oh, yeah!,,and "Fox on the Run" and whatever that bluegrass thing is about the dying rebel soldier! "will my soul pass thru the southland"


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Emma B
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 06:20 PM

Oh Hilary - I've just got back from the National where I heard Louis Killen sing a superb version of "The Leaving of Liverpool" It's NOT necessarily the song but how it's sung (although I do make an exception for that truly awful Fields of. . ..) By the way does anyone know just how many tunes The Wild Rover can be sung to ? Some friends were once requested to 'do' it in a session - after 24 versions, including the Laughing Policeman, it was equally enthusiastically unrequested. I recommend this policy


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Wincing Devil
Date: 17 Apr 02 - 11:14 PM

If I hear "The Rolling Hills of New Jersey" one more time, I'll... (It's a parody of "The Rolling Hills of the Border")

I try to make it a point every month to find a chantey that I haven't heard at a sing, and isn't in the "Chantey Hymnal" A while back, someone sang a little ditty bemoaning the sameness of songs done at pub sings. We usually get to do two laps around the room, so I do a "newbie" and a "standard".

And Yes, I use cheat sheets!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 05:53 AM

That Fields of Athenry thing - is it really properly Irish? - It doesn't have any of the feel of a proper celtic song. It sounds more like something someone cooked up for a musical?
Unfortunately its the "Club Song" of London Irish Rugby team - so we have to hear it far too often for comfort.
I will confess to having given it a heartrendingly over-emotive rendition once at the singaround in a local after a match. A bit unforgiveable of me really - but since I knew it would go down well with the Rugby fans drinking in the other bar I couldn't resist.....

Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,micca at work
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 06:25 AM

"Oh No, Not the Fields of Athenry
If I hear it one more time I think I'll Cry
They should Ban the bloody thing
there are better songs to sing
I'm so fed up with the Fields of Athenry"!

Cllr, and Hilary, The Parody "Oh No not the fields of Athenry " was written by the inimitable Malcolm Austen, and if he is Ok with It I will post the full words here later, apparently the song grew out of a chance remark made by Malcolms SO Moira (Craig) on a tour in Ireland, where, apparently, everywhere they went someone sang " fields of Athenry". Malcolm also told me that his parody gets very "black and white respnses", people either Love it or Hate it, NO middle ground!!!! I have noticed similar when I have sung it!!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Grab
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 08:52 AM

Flight of the Earls - urgh! Also From Clare to Here (written by a Londoner). And there's some bloke round our way who does an interminable song about a woman who becomes a prostitute and kills herself, which plain makes no sense (she goes home, finds her dad's died, so she becomes a prostitute - yeah that makes sense).

We have a guy round our way who does a really good version of Streets of London - I'd be happy to listen to that for a while.

Graham.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Trevor
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 09:12 AM

Kris, I think it's something about the way some people sing the 'carrier bags' line in five syllables rather than the more natural (I reckon)4.

And I agree - I hate singing it, it's always asked for, I hate other people, but it's different when the man himself does it (although when he performed here one time they got the local primary school kids to sing along with him and that was pretty excruciating).

Maybe John G you haven't heard much of his material, or seen him perform.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: pattyClink
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 09:53 AM

Okay, Athenry is hereby condemned. But yiz are still entranced with the long and tiresome Kilkelly, right? Go figger.

And add another soul tormented by Amazing Grace!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Pete Jennings
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 09:57 AM

Grab, the "Londoner" who wrote From Clare To Here was none other than Ralph McTell, who also wrote Streets of London...which appears a lot in this thread.

Pete


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 10:12 AM

So why do people do that thing (in S of L and loads of other songs) where they distort the natural syllables to fit a standard unchanging melody line & phrasing for each verse - why not attack it the other way around & adjust the melody/phrasing appropriately for that line?
One wouldn't say "carrier bags" with 5 syllables, so why on earth would anyone sing it that way?
Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 11:02 AM

I've never heard the Field of Athenry, so I looked it up in the Digital Tradition. I see what you mean. Words hypocritical, tune bland.

My person unfavorite is Amazing Grace. Every time I hear the author's life story, it's more sensational. Taken a slave by Barbary Pirates, eh?

I told my husband that if they play Amazing Grace at my funeral, I would come back and haunt him.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Watson
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 11:16 AM

There's no excuse for anybody ever to sing Dirty Old Town or Poverty Poverty Knock again.

I hate it when you go to see someone who is famous for one particular song and they've probably been asked to do it every night for the past 30 years, then they sing a completely different, and usually inferior arrangement.
I hope to see Ralph McTell on his current tour. I would rather he left Streets of London out of the programme, it's a good song, but I've heard it too often. But if he does feel obliged to sing it, I'd prefer him to do it properly!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 11:23 AM

From Clare To Here -- God, another dirge from the McTell pen! Reminds me of when Noel Murphy played at a local folk club. Apparently he was quite well-known for his version of 'Clare' (well at least he's Irish). Unfortunately, one of the floor singers didn't realize this and did his interminable take on the song! Then Murph, undaunted (but with good grace) did the whole bloody thing again!! Thankfully, to paraphrase Max Boyce, I wasn't there!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: harvey andrews
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 11:40 AM

Interesting how this thread features songs that the folks like so much.Why does success equal failure to so many?
However, here's my pet groan. I must preface it by saying the writer is one of the all time greats and I have nothing against the song per se..as was said earlier in the thread it's the way it's sung, so;
"The band played Waltzing Matilda"
It gets me to the loo faster than an emetic when a floor singer gets up at a folk club and announces that they intend to perform it. There is a British folk club curse on certain songs that ensures that the singer sings them slower and slower as each chorus goes by."Matilda" is a long song but believe me I've heard it go at the pace of an elephant plodding up Everest, and if I'm following the singer I have to cut at least one song from my set! And then I find myself playing my first song so fast to wake everybody up that smoke comes from my fingers.This is not the only song that suffers from lack of pace, but it's certainly the most often performed in my experience.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 12:42 PM

Harvey - my theory on why success is a song-killer is in my early post right near the top. I think it tallies with what you're saying.

Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: harvey andrews
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 12:46 PM

Read and agreed!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,aesop
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 01:18 PM

No has mentioned "Dona Dona". Maybe it's just a New York Jewish thing, but if I hear about the "calf with a mournful eye" one more time I'll scream. And much as I loved Paxton's "Last Thing on My Mind" when I first heard it 30 years ago, I've had enough of it by now. There are so many wonderful songs that no one ever sings. It's a shame.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: bill kennedy
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 01:43 PM

please never, ever again sing the 'Unicorn' song, or 'puff the magic dragon', or 'leavin on a jet plane', or 'amazing grace', & I hate it when November comes round because I know I'll hear 'Edmund Fitzgerald',...

boy, this list could be pages long, songs I wouldn't mind not hearing ever again, yet there are pages more of songs I'll never tire of. was there a thread of those?


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: SharonA
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 02:21 PM

Aesop: Oh Lord, yes, add "Dona Dona" to my list! In fact, put it at the top of the list. I had mentally blocked that one out, mercifully; dubious thanks for reminding me of it! *gag*


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,celtic cousin
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 04:36 PM

Played in an 'Irish' pub band last year. Coming from a 'folk/country/bluegrass' background and having been dormant for a few years all the songs mentioned were new and fresh to me. I was just happy to be working again. However, it got old relatively quickly and I tried to move the band in a more 'musical' direction. They'd been slamming out passable versions of 'Fields'..'Whiskey in..' 'Leavin' of'..'Loch Lomond', etc. and doing very well. Plenty of bookings and a good website. The songs I'd suggest and we'd arrange were always things like 'Queen of All Argyle'(Even 'it's' overdone, now) or 'Skibbereen', 'Ramblin' Irishman' and 'Nancy Whiskey'. Even tried 'Ordinary Man' and 'Feet of a Dancer'(Maura O'connell). Did them as well as we could and the audience would just sit there and look...polite applause, etc. We'd finish the night with 'Rattlin' Bog' and the place would go nuts. Go figure. What I think happens is that people find a 'musical comfort zone' and don't like to be challenged to think too much in a pub situation. We, as musicians like to stretch and once we've got our 'chops' together it takes alot to keep us interested. Once, I saw the late Gamble Rogers get a request for 'Salty Dog Blues' in the middle of his show. An embarrassed hush fell over the audience. Gamble asked, "Son, where are you from?" "Michigan", came the reply. Gamble stared at him for awhile, half smiling. Tapped his guitar twice and launched into the wickedest version of 'Salty Dog Blues' I've ever seen or heard. Took an instrumental break w/fingerpicks any bluegrass guitarist would have been proud to have played with a flatpick! Of course it brought the house down...That kid bought a whole box of LP's to take home to his friends and relatives...


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Micca
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 05:01 PM

As promised the lyrics of Mlcolm Austens parody are here just here


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 06:00 PM

I agree, old Maui is definitely on the list.

Last night at music, I was reminded of another one: 'New River Train'. When I was a kid in the 40s and picking pole beans for pocket money in the summertime, we kids used to sing endlessly in the fields, 'Oh, my darlin', you can't love one', etc, ad nauseam. It was on the order of 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.

I never heard the new river train refrain, and I suspect that was tacked on later. In any case, I don't consider it a good song, no matter how you approach it, and I don't understand why good musicians like to perform it. It's not even fun to pick, much less sing.

Rant off.

Ebbie


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: lamarca
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 06:29 PM

There's two different categories here: the songs you get tired of hearing other people do, and the songs that you're tired of performing yourself. In our Open Sing crowd, some people will remember you for one song of all the ones you've ever sang - and it inevitably becomes one you wish no-one had ever heard you sing! Even if it's a good song, people will ask you to sing that one song over and over and over...

One friend, a lovely singer with a fine repertoire, constantly gets requests for "Five Constipated Men". There was one person who would always ask my husband to sing Wade Hemsworth's "Black Fly" song - never anything else. Even though we're all (mostly) amateurs in our singing circle, it feels like the stories of Jerry Jeff Walker threatening to strangle the next person who asked him to sing "Mr. Bojangles" - nice song, but, good grief, he does so many other wonderful songs as well!

I guess that's the curse of the "One-Hit Wonder" mentality in audiences...folks with a short attention span can only remember you for just one thing.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,Midchuck downstairs
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 06:29 PM

Yeah, but "New River Train" has such possibilities...

You can't love six, unless you've got two....

You can't love eight, and then masturbate...

etc.

Peter.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Apr 02 - 06:35 PM

Well, Midchuck, at least you have different lyrics!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Nemesis
Date: 19 Apr 02 - 09:04 AM

Did anyone see recently on UK TV a short comic clip in the programme, um, um forgotten the ruddy title...

Anyway, 'Ralph MacTell' is in a club playing SoL. Rapturous applause from tank-topped middle-aged real ale drinkers.

RM: "Thank you, and now I'd like to sing a new song ....." (Howls of dismay) "No-ooooo-", sound of beer glasses crashing to the ground.. RM: "I'd like to sing a song entitled ..." Audience in unison: "Streets of London!" RM: "No, a song entitled ..." Audience: "Nooooo-oo-o! Streets of London!" RM: "Actually, this is a song ... Audience: "Streets of London!' RM (sighes): "LOOK! I'm going to sing a different song!" starts playing intro chords - Audience grows menacing: "Streets of London!" RM (resignedly)sings "Have you seen the old man ..... " Audience visibly relaxes and smiles.

(Well, it was hilarious visually...)


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Nemesis
Date: 19 Apr 02 - 09:08 AM

Did anyone see recently on UK TV a short comic clip in the programme, um, um, forgotten the ruddy title...

Anyway, 'Ralph MacTell' is in a smokey club playing 'SoL'. Rapturous applause from tank-topped middle-aged real ale drinkers, slightly face-whiskery in a late '60s up-dated-for-the-'90s sort of way

RM: "Thank you, and now I'd like to sing a new song ....." (Howls of dismay) "No-ooooo-", sound of beer glasses crashing to the ground..mutterings of disbelief. RM (brightly): "I'd like to sing a song entitled ..." Crowd in unison: "Streets of London!" RM quietly emphatic : "No, a song entitled ..." Crowd shouts: "Nooooo-oo-o! Streets of London!" RM (doggedly): "Actually, this is a song ... Crowd yells: "Streets of London!' RM (sighes): "LOOK! I'm going to sing a different song!" starts playing intro chords - Crowd grows menacing: "Streets of London!" RM (resignedly)sings "Have you seen the old man ..... " Crowd visibly relaxes and smiles.

(Well, it was hilarious visually...)


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Dave Wynn
Date: 19 Apr 02 - 09:40 AM

What a brilliant thread. We are doing an awful pub gig this Saturday (Lord Nelson Pendlebury Manchester UK....shameful ad) for a charity and this thread has provided us with a full two hours of stuff that even a pub crowd will know. Remember the awful cry from pub audiences "Why don't you sing us something we know"

Well that rates as my "If I hear it again I'll do murder" phrase.

Spot (Where have all the flowers gone and If I had a Hammer)


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: JedMarum
Date: 19 Apr 02 - 09:47 AM

I simply don't play a song that I don;t wanna hear! Keeps it simple. That way if I play Streets of London (and I do very occasionally_ it's simply because I wanna hear it.

This helps keep even the overplayed songs, interesting to me.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: SharonA
Date: 19 Apr 02 - 11:57 AM

lamarca mentions "the curse of the "One-Hit Wonder" mentality in audiences...folks with a short attention span can only remember you for just one thing."

Truer words were never typed! What bothers me is that radio stations cater to that mentality (and thereby perpetuate it) – not just the oldies stations that Celtic Soul mentioned, and other commercial stations, but the publicly-funded "community" stations as well. Case in point: there's a folk show on a Philadelphia PA radio station on Sundays, and when the host announces that he's about to play a song by the Austin Lounge Lizards, I know that there's an almost 100% chance that it'll be "Old Blevins".


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 20 Apr 02 - 11:13 AM

Having only been involved with folk music for the last 5/6 years an awful lot of what is being said above smacks of 'folk snobbery'. A lot of the songs mentionned are new to me and some are among my favourites 'Mary Ellen Carter''Down to old Maui'. If everyone who has been around the block a few times stops singing them then how will new comers hear them.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Jon Bartlett
Date: 20 Apr 02 - 09:17 PM

Nothing wrong with Maui as a song - it doesn't increasingly grate on you the more you hear it, tho it can become boring. But if you want a song to demonstrate what happened to all the energy and idealism of the sixties and how it turned sour, religious, violent and sentimental all at the same time, the Mary Ellen Carter's the song for you. Anent "Dona Dona" - just replace that mournful calf with a Palestinian and you've got a whole new song. Just like the calf, they're in the wrong place at the wrong time. My 2c


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,jaze
Date: 20 Apr 02 - 09:57 PM

I'm with Mrs. Duck. Perhaps because I'm not a performer and therefore can choose when and how often I listen to a song. I've only just recently discovered "Streets Of London" can you beleive that? And right now I'm really liking it. I can understand how you could grow tired of performing the same songs over and over. Emmylou Harris made a commnet about songs-saying that they need to be performed in new places by new voices to keep them alive. I think this is also true. Do audiences really become that hostile if you don't perform a song?


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Amergin
Date: 20 Apr 02 - 10:06 PM

personally i would put my vote in for Amazing Grace....and wild rover....and no man's land....

Jerry, if we ever meet...I will request handful of songs over and over and over and .....


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 20 Apr 02 - 10:41 PM

Grab, that song about the prostitute who kills herself apparently after becoming a hooker because her dad died can only be "Tecumseh Valley" by Townes Van Zandt. A great song by a great writer. I gotta say I am enjoying this thread. I am amazed at the hot buttons here.

Don


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Subject: Streets of London: update
From: Watson
Date: 21 Apr 02 - 12:28 PM

We saw Ralph McTell in Bridgnorth last night.
He included Streets of London in his set. He didn't make a big deal about it, he just played it beautifully, and the audience loved him for it, in fact I think several hundred people would have left the theatre disappointed if they hadn't heard that one song.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Stephen L. Rich
Date: 21 Apr 02 - 10:15 PM

KingBrilliant -- "vomity-ness" now THAT'S a word I'll have to remember.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 21 Apr 02 - 10:40 PM

my top three remain

Barrett's Privateers How Can I Keep from Singing Bright Morning Stars

but thank you for reminding me about Kilkelly Ireland. Fortunately no one actually in my acquaintance sings that one. And to ruin a good group sing, how about 30 or so versus of old time religion.

mg


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: JenBurdoo
Date: 22 Apr 02 - 01:32 PM

I have to admit I enjoy a lot of the songs listed -- though I hated Dona Dona and can only vaguely recall it, thank dieties. I strongly agree with the bit about having to sing something countless times as opposed to listening. I only sing in private (to my little brother and sister, ages 8 and 6), and am often forced to hunt down the words to something new just so I don't become thoroughly sick of singing them to bed every night. Their all-time favorite is a cutesy song called "The Biplane Evermore" which I enjoy but which they ask for EVERY D*MN TIME. Also 'Gallant Forty-Twa' and two different versions of Maid O' Fife -- the well-known "Irish Dragoons" version and the Scottish "Bonny Barbry-O" which I learned from the Battlefield Band.

I do sing them lots of old standbys like Fields of Athenry and Willie McBride, but those aren't so bad since 1) they're not overdone in our household and 2) the kids don't like them enough to ask for encores like the first four I mentioned.

Yes, there are drawbacks to having the kids fight over who gets to go to bed first and be sung to! My parents don't truly recognize the sacrifice I make for their peace and quiet. "If you guys go to bed a 1/2 hour early, I'll sing you two extra songs...each." Oooh, my achin' head... It's a good thing I know extra verses to most of these, because I can cut them short and the kids don't notice.

I reiterate that I love these songs, both old and new, and they all have their place in my repertoire. But singing them over and over and over and over again to small children....

Jennifer


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: JenBurdoo
Date: 22 Apr 02 - 01:32 PM

I have to admit I enjoy a lot of the songs listed -- though I hated Dona Dona and can only vaguely recall it, thank dieties. I strongly agree with the bit about having to sing something countless times as opposed to listening. I only sing in private (to my little brother and sister, ages 8 and 6), and am often forced to hunt down the words to something new just so I don't become thoroughly sick of singing them to bed every night. Their all-time favorite is a cutesy song called "The Biplane Evermore" which I enjoy but which they ask for EVERY D*MN TIME. Also 'Gallant Forty-Twa' and two different versions of Maid O' Fife -- the well-known "Irish Dragoons" version and the Scottish "Bonny Barbry-O" which I learned from the Battlefield Band.

I do sing them lots of old standbys like Fields of Athenry and Willie McBride, but those aren't so bad since 1) they're not overdone in our household and 2) the kids don't like them enough to ask for encores like the first four I mentioned.

Yes, there are drawbacks to having the kids fight over who gets to go to bed first and be sung to! My parents don't truly recognize the sacrifice I make for their peace and quiet. "If you guys go to bed a 1/2 hour early, I'll sing you two extra songs...each." Oooh, my achin' head... It's a good thing I know extra verses to most of these, because I can cut them short and the kids don't notice.

I reiterate that I love these songs, both old and new, and they all have their place in my repertoire. But singing them over and over and over and over again to small children....

Jennifer


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Melani
Date: 22 Apr 02 - 01:34 PM

Re: Ralph McTell and "Streets of London"--Bob Franke's two biggest "hits" are "Hard Love" and "For Real". He is smart enough to know he can't get through a concert without being asked for them, so he has put them together as a medley. Makes everyone happy and gets it out of the way.

I personally am getting a little tired of "The Sloop John B."


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: SharonA
Date: 22 Apr 02 - 02:54 PM

Melani says putting songs together as a medley "makes everyone happy and gets it out of the way"

...well, almost everyone. Personally, I hate medleys. I feel that they cheat the audience out of hearing the favorites that those people bought tickets to hear. IMO a performer with a trademark song like that should grit his or her teeth and just sing the thing yet again one more time, with feeling, every time.

For me, the "fed up with hearing" syndrome comes in when someone's trademark song is covered a bazillion times, or is sung at a circle a bazillion times, or is requested of a cover artist a bazillion times. But these anecdotes about Ralph McTell playing and re-playing "Streets of London", while keeping it fresh, makes me respect the man all the more.

To illustrate my point, here's an excerpt from James Taylor's song "That's Why I'm Here":


Fortune and fame's such a curious game
Perfect strangers can call you by name
Pay good money to hear fire and rain
Again and again and again
Some are like summer coming back every year
Got your baby got your blanket got your bucket of beer
I break into a grin from ear to ear
And suddenly it's perfectly clear
That's why I'm here


(Full lyrics here: http://www.james-taylor.com/albums/thatswhy.shtml)


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,Bullfrog Jones (on the road)
Date: 22 Apr 02 - 03:07 PM

Absolutely -- if I went to see Ralph McTell, I would expect to hear SoL, but I think Pete J, who started this thread, was referring to the song as performed by anyone BUT Ralph. Incidentally I met up with Pete J at his 50th birthday bash on Friday night. Thanks Pete and friends for making me so welcome. And thanks (NOT!)to London Irish for beating Northampton in the Rugby Union Cup Final on Saturday, which was bad enough news in these parts anyway, but even more so because the London Irish theme song, which we got ad nauseam at the game and then in the session on Sunday, is..... The Fields of Bloody Athenry!!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Pete Jennings
Date: 23 Apr 02 - 07:54 AM

Blimey, Bullfrog, you must have had a good time at my birthday bash - it was Saturday not Friday! Anyway, I can talk, cos I don't remember what happened to Sunday...

And you're right - SoL by anyone other than Ralph is a definite no-no.

Pete

PS. "Oh dear" department: I got up the band and one of the numbers we played was "I Wanna Go Home" (aka Sloop John B). I'm now a victim of my own thread!


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 23 Apr 02 - 08:17 AM

Yaha!!! London Irish Won!!!
And you didn't mention by how much........
Mark, Hamm & I were there - and Hamm & I were belting out the old Fields Of Athenry with all our hearts, as those lovely sweaty men thundered down the field all adrenaline & huge thighs......
Then we just had to sing it at the session at The Swan afterwards (well it was that or Molly Malone - at least we gave them a choice).
Thoroughly ashamed now though (again).

Kris


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,Bullfrog Jones (on the road)
Date: 24 Apr 02 - 06:42 AM

Sorry Pete, of course it was Saturday. It must have been that Ruddles you forced on me! Thankfully I'd left before Sloop John B, so your secret's safe...


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Apr 02 - 01:51 PM

Waltzing With Bears

- LH


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Tiger
Date: 24 Apr 02 - 05:55 PM

You know, these are all pretty nice songs!

I think we all suffer fron 'membrances of poorly-sung versions (like with head in RUS or a lyrics sheet).

Comments on this aspect ?????????


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: GUEST,mr happy, unhappy no cookie
Date: 06 May 02 - 01:43 PM

jerry rasmussen

yep!

i get fed up of people all over the place asking me to do my first big hit 'happiness'

the prob with this type of composition is that even if i do a serious song, i'm sort of typecast and folks expect another tongue in cheek one- so sometimes laugh inappropriately


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Little Hawk
Date: 06 May 02 - 01:55 PM

Jerry - You're not the first singer to be hounded by his "first big hit"! Not by a long shot. I saw Kristofferson do "Bobbie McGee" in a rather peculiar way on a couple of occasions. He was clearly so sick of the song that he could barely stand to sing it at all, so he started screwing around with it.

Troll - Yeah, some of these are nice songs. Over-exposure can play havoc with art. Imagine if the Mona Lisa was painted on the side of every bus and office building in North America...and a little miniature of it was on everyone's dashboard.

- LH


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Melani
Date: 07 May 02 - 01:10 AM

LH--re: Mona Lisa--it just about is everywhere. I have a Mona Lisa bathtub duck.


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Subject: RE: BS: Songs you're fed up with playing/hearing
From: Bert
Date: 07 May 02 - 02:45 AM

I kinda agree with Tiger. They are all good songs, that's why we hear them so often.

I think, though, that it's the singer that makes the song. I can listen to anything that is sung by a good singer. You must listen to our Seamus singing Danny Boy or Olly McElhone singing Fields of Athenry.

And I heard Terraplane (LEJ's band) do a bloody marvelous rendition of Mustang Sally last Friday. In fact everything they did was great. Why they are not more well known I'll never know.

Some songs get overdone at certain times or in certain areas, so you might get fed up with Tom Dooley for a while or Will the Circle Be Unbroken at another place or another time. But let's not put these songs to far away that they get forgotten. Just try to sing songs now and then that no one has heard before.


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