Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk

Subject: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Lidy
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 04:12 AM

Help! I sing this song and am currently embarking on a grand project, transferring all my shoddy notebooks of songs into handy searchable cross-referenced database malarkey in the computer, so I'm trying to gather just a few notes on origin. This song, I don't even know where I got it from, so must have been drunk when I learnt it as I neglected to note down a source in my book (also, the handwriting's barely legible and there seems to be a dried-out spilt drink mark around that area!). Does anyone know where it comes from, how old it is or anything?!
Ta
Lidy

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: gnu
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 05:24 AM

Perhaps t'was ye ?

Subject: Lyr Add: Blue Blazin' Blind Drunk
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 06:07 AM

I heard a song that I think is the one you're talking about on a Smithsonian collection called "Music of Scotland." I found the record in the Hershey, PA public library in 1973, and I'm sure it was at least 10 or 15 years older than that. I don't have the record (though I wish I did), so I don't know what the liner notes say about the song. Here are the words, so you can see if it's the one you mean:

BLUE BLAZIN' BLIND DRUNK

Oh, friends, I have a sad story
A very sad story to tell
I married a man for his money
But he's worse than the Devil himsel'

CHORUS
So I'll go and I'll get blue blazin' blind drunk
Just to give Mickey a warnin'
And just for spite I will stay out all night
And come roarin' home drunk in the mornin'

Oh, when Mickey comes home I get battered
He batters me all black and blue
And if I say a word I get scattered
From the kitchen right ben [back] to the room

Ah, but whiskey I ne'er was a-lovin'
But what can a poor woman do?
I'll go and I'll drown all me sorrows
But I wish I could drown Mickey too

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Matthew Edwards
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 07:09 AM

This song, also known as When Mickey comes home or Mickey's Warning, comes from the singing of Sheila Stewart, who in turn learnt it from her mother Belle. Apparently Belle heard an old ploughman sing it at the tattie-lifting in Blairgowrie in the 30's or 40's and she then added a new first verse 'Friends I have a sad story...' as given by Mark above.(Another version is given in the DT: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk.) I think there are several recordings, but as far as I know the most recent one is by Sheila Stewart herself on the Topic CD TSCD515 From the Heart of the Tradition.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Lidy
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 10:59 AM

Thank you, this projest seems to be turning me into an obsessive, I don't want to leave any blank fields unless strictly necessary! At least now I can put in orig: Scotland, sour: Sheila Stewart!

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Emma B
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 01:20 PM

The album is 'Shiela Stewart: From the Heart' as you said Matthew on Topic it is described as Unknown/Public Domain. Shiela made this recording as part of a marathon allnight 32 song session in 1998. The same recording is also available (courtesy of Topic) on a wonderful CD called 'Women of the World' which also includes Norma Waterson and some beautiful songs from North and South America, Spain, Africa India, Indonesia and Hungary

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: John Routledge
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 01:26 PM

Our own Diz does a wonderful version of this powerful song.

It is also sung superbly by Cilla Fisher I think on a "Women's Voices" CD.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Emma B
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 01:35 PM

My friend who used to run a folk club in Macclesfield still sings it regularly - unfortunately, all those who know and love her cannot keep a straight face when she reaches the line 'Of whiskey I na'er was a lover'

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Auldtimer
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 02:17 PM

When "The Stewarts of Blair" sang in clubs or festivals and Sheila got to the, "Of I've na're been a lover" line, this was allways met with gasps and astonnished looks from all of the family members, particulary Bell.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 02:50 PM

Thanks, John
Kind of you to say so---but I always thought it was Irish?? ooppss!!
Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Matthew Edwards
Date: 04 Jul 03 - 03:31 PM

Diz, it was your singing of this that made me think a bit about it so I was able to answer Lidy's query.
On the face of it it could be Irish or Scottish as the Stewarts travelled in both countries, and as Belle's own song ('The Berryfields of Blair', which doesn't seem to be in the DT) attests people came from all over to Blairgowrie. How much of the song is actually Belle's own composition, and how much of it came from the 'old ploughman' we'll probably never know for certain.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 05 Jul 03 - 07:46 AM

Thanks, Matthew--as you have no doubt realised I know nothing about the origins of most of the songs I sing or indeed the titles of most of them--but I am learning as I go along and finding it completely fascinating!! So keep educating me--please!! I don't know why I felt Blue Bleezin Blind Drunk was Irish--perhaps the name 'Micky'?
This may also sound a bit stupid--but it seems to lend itself to an irish 'lilt'?

Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 05 Jul 03 - 06:00 PM

The words Cilla Fisher sings on 'Cilla & Artie' (1979) plus some info can be found at My Songbook

Some conflicting info there:

[1984:] Sheila MacGregor learned this song from her mother, Belle Stewart, who some thirty years ago heard an old ploughman sing it while tattie-lifting near Blairgowrie. His version started with v. 2 above ... so Belle made up the first verse herself and inserted it, partly as an opening to the song and partly to provide a reason, a provocation, for the man battering his wife, viz. she'd married him for his money. [...] (Ailie Munro, The Democratic Muse 120)

[2001:] Mickey's Warning, a comic song with serious undertones, was learned during the Stewarts' time in Ireland between the two world wars. (Notes 'Scots Women' - where the title is given as 'Mickey's Warning', and Cilla is the singer, too)

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Matthew Edwards
Date: 05 Jul 03 - 06:23 PM

Can't get that link for Cilla's songbook to work.

Seriously, I'm not all that surprised to learn of 'conflicting' accounts. Belle was a very accomplished writer as well as a singer, and my instinct would be that this, by and large, is her own song. It may have mainly come from the 'old ploughman' in Blairgowrie, but I think that Diz's instinct may also be accurate about the 'Irish lilt' that would allow for another source.

My guess - and this is only a guess - is that Belle brought together several elements from her experience and made them into a complete song. There are some Irish 'bits', plus something from music hall or cornkister style, which she welded together to make the song as we have it today. Perhaps Sheila Stewart might be able to say a bit more, but maybe Belle didn't tell her!

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Noreen
Date: 05 Jul 03 - 07:19 PM

Yvonne, who did you learn it from?

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 05 Jul 03 - 09:07 PM

I'd be more inclined to trust notes from Ailie Munro (Democratic Muse) and Doc Rowe (From the Heart of the Tradition), both based on information supplied by the Stewarts, than those on the "Scottish Women" compilation; until, that is, I know who wrote them. Since only one example of the song appears ever to have been found, however, it's probably rather pointless to speculate on its origin until someone comes up with something substantive. There seems no particular reason, on the face of it, to imagine it to be Irish, as no report of it has ever come from Ireland; though the tune may be as likely Irish as Scottish. It looks like a minor Music Hall piece, really; though that's a subjective impression only, and as likely to be wrong as right.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 06 Jul 03 - 06:05 AM

This is all proving very interesting. I have not a clue why I thought it was Irish but I am quite willing to accept it is not!
I find discussions like this very useful and valuable because I know so little about the music I sing.

I have a recording of Cilla Fisher singing it, Noreen and it caught my imagination completely. To be honest it gives me the shivers to sing it --because it is a truely awful picture it paints. Mainly, because the defiance within the Woman will never be actioned.

That is how I see it anyway but no doubt other's won't. Which would be good--and spark another discussion ;o)

Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Matthew Edwards
Date: 06 Jul 03 - 08:28 AM

It was interesting to have the comment above from 'Auldtimer' about the way Sheila Stewart performed this song.
Ailie Munroe's comments in The Democratic Muse are worth observing :"...sometimes the only way people can react to ugly facts is to joke about them, and 'When Mickey comes home' is obviously in this genre. Sheila [Stewart] gives it the full comic treatment and it is always received with gales of laughter."
It would seem to me that the way Sheila sings it nowadays, as on the recent Topic CD, has a much darker edge to it, although that may be partly an effect of that recording not being a public performance.
Has Sheila actually changed her approach to this song?
Could a man sing it?

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 06 Jul 03 - 09:43 AM

Matthew--it is difficult my joining in with this as I have no idea who Sheila Stewart is or Ailie Munroe!! I have only recently returned to the 'folk scene' after a lapse of 30years!!!
All I know is that the recording I have heard was definately not comic but I do appreciate what you are saying and indeed humour is often used to mask unhappiness in lots of forms.
I would love to hear different versions of this song.
'Could a Man sing it'??
--Mmmmm--I would say 'yes'--and infact a man singing it may have far more dramatic effect than a Woman singing it as long as it wasn't done with a strong emphasis on the comic aspect--!

What does everyone else think?
Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 07 Jul 03 - 03:28 PM

Sorry, put a com(ma) instead of a dot. This should do the trick:

My Songbook

I think the notes on the 'Scottish Women' CD were written by producer (and fiddler) Brian McNeill.

Diz, Ailie Munro's book on 'The Folk Revival in Scotland' was recently reissued under the title 'The Democratic Muse'. Well worth reading. Don't know where you live, but maybe your local library can help.

If you don't know about Sheila Stewart or other people from the history of British folk music, the Musical Traditions site might help remedy that. It will provide you with reading for weeks!

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Diva
Date: 07 Jul 03 - 04:08 PM

Sheila Stewart...hmm I always want to say Macgregor!!!! I've been singing it for a fair few years and I have a notion I heard Arthur Johnstone of "The Laggan" sing it too,so why shouldn't a man sing it?
K

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Matthew Edwards
Date: 07 Jul 03 - 06:36 PM

Now, now, Kathy, if Sheila prefers to be a Stewart then we have to respect her choice! Nice to hear from you, (and perhaps you can suggest why the 'Berryfields of Blair' isn't in the DT. Do you think there could be a copyright issue?)
You are right - a man could sing this song, although I don't think that I'd want to try it in front of Yvonne!
I have occasionally come across the claim that such and such a song is either a 'man's' or a 'woman's' song. For example some people have said that 'The Death of Queen Jane' is a woman's song, although I think that I would sing it myself if I could remember enough of it!
I'd love to hear how many different ways that 'Blue Bleezin..' could be sung. How do you handle it, Kathy?

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Noreen
Date: 07 Jul 03 - 06:48 PM

Hello Diva, I've been thinking of you while reading this thread, as yours is the only version of this powerful song that I've heard.

I'll tape your version for Diz, if you have no objection?

Good to hear from you, and hope all is well.

No reason why a man shouldn't sing it, as long as he 'got behind' the song. I used to think there were certain songs that couldn't be sung by a man, then I heard Jon Harvison sing Lord Gregory and changed my mind...

Subject: Lyr Add: I'm Going for a Walk, Ed Silberman
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 07 Jul 03 - 11:32 PM

Ed Silberman of San Francisco wrote this back in the early 80's. It's to the same tune but from a man's point of view. It's decidedly not comic.

By the way, does anyone have that Smithsonian collection, "Music of Scotland"? I'd be curious to know who sang the song on it.

I'M GOING FOR A WALK
Lyrics (c) Ed Silberman
Tune: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk (Mickey's Warning)

Oh, friends I have a sad story
And I'll tell it so clear and so plain
I married a woman named Molly
But I bring her a world full of pain

She's the rose of my heart and my treasure
And that's why I just don't understand
Why when we disagree I get bothered
And I give her the back of my hand

CHORUS
So I'm getting my coat and I'm going for a walk
Just to get the wife out of my danger
To pick through my mind in hopes somewhere to find
Why I've become such a stranger

Oh, it isn't because I don't love her
Sometimes we're so tender and soft
But then I'll fly off in a temper
With a rage I can't seem to turn off

When I was a kid, the folks quarrelled
And sometimes my dad used his hand
And I stood and I stared in amazement
"I'll never be that kind of man"

CHORUS

Now some say I should go to a doctor
And some say I should go see the priest
And some say I should find a new living
For my job turns me into a beast

And at night when I look on my children
I know I'm not raising them right
For I know children bicker and quarrel
But I see Jimmy's learning to fight

CHORUS

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 08 Jul 03 - 04:03 PM

I would really appreciate hearing another version of this song--so if Diva has no objections I would be very grateful--Thanks Noreen.

Also Susanne many thanks for the information--I shall look as soon as I get an hour or two!!(I live in Cheshire BTW)

As for you, Mr Edwards--what are you trying to say???!!! ;o)

Seriously, I think the subject of violence against Women is very emotive and therefore a Man singing it with great passion and feeling could actually have a staggering effect on the song--I would love to hear it.

See you tomorrow, Matthew.

Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: JennyO
Date: 09 Jul 03 - 10:17 AM

A guy I know sings this (he is Irish, too, and the Irish lilt seems to fit). It comes across very powerfully.

Jenny

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Yvonne
Date: 09 Jul 03 - 02:45 PM

Say what they may, Jenny--my gut feeling tells me it is Irish ;o)
Would love to hear him sing it.

Diz

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: JennyO
Date: 10 Jul 03 - 12:30 AM

Not much chance of that I'm afraid, Diz, unless you're in Sydney. He's a session singer who has not recorded anything. I might ask him what he knows about it. I'm with you on the gut feeling.

Jenny

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Diva
Date: 10 Jul 03 - 12:10 PM

Please do Noreen. Its a cracking song regardless of who sings it. Matthew...my point being I have been singing for a very long time and I have known Sheila when she was Macgregor ******BG****** An' me just a strap o' a lassie too

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Noreen
Date: 10 Jul 03 - 02:09 PM

A sweet young thing!

Thanks Kathy.
x

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 10 Jul 03 - 08:39 PM

I've sung "Mickey's Warning" for years (although sparingly -- it gets a strange reception sometimes) but I think I learned it from a recording of Belle Stewart not Sheila. At least that's how I have it attributed in my notes.

I'm always tempted to sing it right after having sung "Fathom the Bowl". (If I could get away with singing two songs in a row in my usual venue.)

Linn

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Mike
Date: 18 May 08 - 01:04 PM

I'vebeen singing this song on and off for 15 years, I am not the best judge, but people have told me it is very meaning ful sung by a man!
Sorry I am about 4 years too late!

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 May 08 - 04:13 PM

Let's get it right.
In revenge for getting the **** kicked out of her, a woman declares she will go out and get drunk herself.
As sad, nasty little song
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Dave MacKenzie
Date: 18 May 08 - 07:00 PM

Having first heard the Stewarts singing this in the 60s, I'm always surprised when singers sing about Mickey rather than their own husband's name. Whenever I heard Belle singing it, she always san "Alex",then Cathie and Sheila substituted their own Husband's names.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Diva
Date: 19 May 08 - 03:17 AM

Powerful, especially when sung sparsely. Sad, most definately...wife beating and turning to drink as a result but nasty?????

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 May 08 - 03:20 AM

Most certainly - when it's sung as a humourous song, as it invariably is.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,Phil at work
Date: 19 May 08 - 05:02 AM

Not invariably. For some reason the song's having something of a vogue at the moment; Rachel Unthank and James Yorkston both do versions. Hers is raucous and angry-sounding (you wouldn't want to be Mickey when she got home), while his is quiet and woozily melancholy, not so much blue-bleezin' as walking-into-the-doorpost-and-falling-over blind drunk.

I agree with you about the actual song - taken straight, i.e. played for laughs, it is a sad, nasty little song. But interpretation can make a big difference. John Kelly does something similar to "Sam Hall", turning a bloodcurdling music-hall belter into something genuinely moving.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Bearheart
Date: 20 May 08 - 06:38 PM

Driving home from a teaching gig yesterday I had been listening to an old tape of Cilla doing it (from her album with Artie). Plaintive and melancholy, with an undercurrent of anger-- at herself as well ("I married a man for his money/and he's worse than the devil himself"). Drinking in that way is surely self-punishment as much as punishing the man.

I had decided on listening to it again (after some years) to put it in the new version of my personal songbook; not because I sing it much in public but because it's a good reminder of what not to do. Then here was the thread.

I too had heard Sheila sing it, not humorously but with pathos. In fact I've never heard it sung any other way. I would think that to sing it humorously would require being very out of touch with one's feelings...

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 May 08 - 11:30 AM

The sad thing about the song is that when the Belle sang it on stage she did so as a comic song.
She and Sheila made a routine of it:
Belle:                  "Of whiskey I ne'er was a lover"
Sheila (spoken):   "That's a damned lie".
I was appalled when some audiences/singers around the clubs began to object to songs which they regarded as 'sexist' - IMO it showed a basic misunderstanding of the tradition, and of literary culture in general, but in the case of domestic violence, I'm more than happy to make an exception.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Diva
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:10 PM

I have heard some singers sing it as a jaunty wee effort and I usually ask them if they understand the song.......and certainly whenever I've heard Sheila sing it there is a rawness to it.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Jan 11 - 02:58 PM

I heard "Mary Black" sing it on RTE TV, about 20 years ago , I've been looking for it ever since . So thank you guys , For the lyrics and all the info....If it's possible to get it on CD , any info would be much appreciated....Regards....Andy..... [e-mail]...

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST,myles
Date: 29 Feb 12 - 09:23 AM

Is it not a geordie song? Pretty sure it is... Definitely not irish anyway

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: meself
Date: 29 Feb 12 - 10:31 AM

I know this song only from a recording of Sheila Stewart. Never would have occurred to me that it could be "comic" ....

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 12:20 AM

The Unthanks have a recording of it out now...

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 05:02 AM

Have heard Siobhan Miller sing it too.
It is a song that disturbs me a bit, as well as seeing people singing it with big smiles on their faces, tho' I accept the argument about some people using black humour as a coping strategy in the face of adversity.
Same feeling about Eric Bogle's "Glasgow Lullaby".

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 05:16 AM

Meant to say, I have heard Sheila Stewart sing it on a number of occasions: she had a great way of putting a song across, using her story-teller's gift of drawing in her audience. I say "had" as she retired from public performing at a sellout concert at Auchtermuchty Festival 2 years ago, and was adamant that there would be no temporary lay-off followed by a series of come-backs!
Interestingly, she also used to say that she could not sing her mother's songs until after she was given permission in Belle's old age, or some of them had to wait until Belle was gone.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 06:02 AM

Sheila's final song at Muchty was The Parting Glass iirc. It was magic and very fitting.

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: michaelr
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 11:54 AM

Linda Thompson includes the song on her latest CD Won't Be Long Now and has penned a fourth verse:

All my friends and all my relations
They tell me that I should leave home
But as frightened as I am of Mickey
I'm more frightened of being alone

Subject: RE: Origins: Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk
From: Vic Smith
Date: 11 Jan 14 - 12:50 PM

Belle sang it as "Just tae give Alex a warning...."
and it was Alex that interrupted with a mumbled "That's a bliddy lie" after the line "Oh! of whisky I ne'er was a lover." ....and note the spelling, this is not about that fake Irish or American stuff. When I was a boy the adults in my extended family ask me to promise that I would never drink whisky with an "e" in it.

Going back five and a half years to Jim Carroll's post of 21 May 08 - 11:30 AM, I was a great fan of practically everything that the Stewarts did, but I was horrified that they presented a song about domestic abuse as a comedy song.