An exile’s lament
Posted on
June 04, 2013 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Because we all of us do what we can, wherever we are.
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Wings Over ScotlandA tall tale
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Love Billy Bragg!
What a brilliant vid. That pulled me out of my Tiananmen 24th anniversary downer … well, almost.
(never forget June 4)
Pure class.
I’m not ashamed to say that I used to work in a B&Q down south. One of the reasons they coined their nickname for me – ‘Commie Jock’ – was because, in a workforce of over 40, I was one of only three that was a member of a trade union (USDAW), and I recruited the other two!
Take Down The Union Jack
Mr Bragg was at the Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh last night. Apparently he had some choice words to say about UKIP and others. My mate said it wasn’t really relevant to Scotland but was interesting anyway. Thank God we’ve got a referendum coming up.
And BB played ‘Handyman Blues’ as his first encore, I am reliably informed.
I don’t get it.
Still going to be voting Yes though. 🙂
I don’t get it.
“I know it looks like I’m just reading the paper
But these ideas will turn to gold dust later
Cause I’m a writer, not a decorator”
If he can’t be here taking practical steps towards building a new Scotland, he can do his bit by using his talent for writing.
@Pedro,
Do you mean the Billy Bragg song/video or the Rev’s headline and accompanying text?
If it’s the former, then, apart from being a great advert for Wickes, the song seems to be about a love-torn artist who’s trying to persuade his partner that art has its virtues and if s/he wants someone to build a deck in the garden, or put up a shelf or whatever, s/he might have to look elsewhere.
If it’s the latter, I assume that the point the Rev is making is that, wherever we are and whatever we do, those of us working for a Yes vote are all making a contribution to our shared objective – independence. I think of the ideas and help, advice etc that we all disseminate here, and elsewhere, in terms of what the ‘father’ of conservatism, Edmund Burke, called ‘Little Platoons’. You send these ideas, thoughts into cyberspace, or on the doorsteps, or wherever and they germinate, sometimes slowly, sometimes like a bolt of lightning. But they all make their contribution to the cause.
Hear, hear, Rev Stu.
My other half’s out leafleting. I’m looking after the kids (someone has to)
And you are exercising your considerable talent and energy to further the cause.
Hats off to you
I don’t get it either. This subtlety has to stop, Rev. A bunch of ugly, tone-deaf mongs singing a jingle for a DIY store just sounds too much like a PPB for the Labour Party. Please consider our sensibilities and don’t do this again.
Quite simply a great song by a great English singer. Just because we want to be independent doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t or appreciate good English music.
“Just because we want to be independent doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t or appreciate good English music.”
Oh, we do. Here’s some. And not a roll of wallpaper in sight.
What a lovely song and fun video 🙂
In my relationships I’ve always been the ‘handyman’, putting up shelves, tiling the floors, in addition to the usual girly wallpapering and painting stuff. I helped my dad to reroof an outbuilding, driving 880 screws through the metal sheeting to the ribs beneath, then tiling the sauna floor… Mitre saws, spirit levels, tape measures, plumb lines, chalked strings, I know the stuff.
I feel sorry for all modern, office-working, kind men, who’re somehow supposed to know all this DYI stuff and build houses for their women and children (in Finland – building the family home is the ultimate macho, manhood thing). They’re great men, kind, caring, humorous men, so what if they don’t know their torqs from their phillips 4 or phillips 2? But times are changing.
I also feel sorry for all the girls and women who’ve been conditioned to not know how to do anything technical or carpenter-y or builder-y or anything to do with cars.
Around 15 years ago my dad asked me what I wanted for Chistmas. He was thinking along the lines of perfume or something, I wanted a proper tool box with the usual tools you’d need in a household so I wouldn’t have to keep borrowing his or boyfriends’ tools. My best Christmas pressie ever. Especially because my dad had been teaching me how to use them since I was tiny.
Before my time, primary school crafts spilt boy/girl at age 9/10. Girls did knitting and sewing, boys did woodwork and metalwork. In the late 1970s, right on time for me, we were offered a choice. Of course no boys took sewing/knitting crafts, and I was the only girl in woodwork/metalwork. The kind but bewildered teacher paid special attention to me although some of the boys would’ve needed his help more.
Today, few boys select the knitting/sewing line but quite a few girls do woodwork/metalwork. Power to them! We can sew a button and put up shelves! Men might feel a bit threatened when their women can assemble the IKEA furniture on their own…
I think these gender stereotypes are stupid. Not all men are very good at DIY, some women are. Some men are great at everyday cooking, many women aren’t. Laundry is pretty easy and simple nowadays. Whites, darks, the fucking label states the temperature! It shouldn’t be too difficult for anyone. (Though my new-man little brother washed a wonderful hand-knitted woolen guernsey by our mum in the washing machine. It’s now the right size for his 10-year old daughter.) Of course it’s sad if a two-adult household doesn’t have a single handyman or cook or laundry expert between them. Then we’re talking neo-helplessness.
@JA
That wasn’t a great song by a great English singer. It was a load of pish.
A bunch of fat English blokes sitting around feeling sorry for themselves and making lame excuses for their inability to hold a screwdriver the right way up wouldn’t inspire anyone to do anything.
Presumably they know which end of the pen to hold. They seem to be able to handle knives and forks with remarkable ability.
Life is too short for this. I’m off.
Quite right, Rev. And you do even more than most!
I have always loved Billy’s work, and I’m not surprised to see him supporting independence. Perhaps being at one remove allows him to see that the policies being put forth by the SNP are closer to traditional ‘Labour’ values than Labour are.
As for DIY – as far as I’m concerned it means ‘Don’t Involve Yourself’! 😀
Lumi – have a listen to this, your words made me think of it for some reason although i am no great fan of Springsteen.
What does it mean when you feel like an exile but you’ve never been away from the place?
And what does it mean when you’re a Weegie who feels every bit as lost in Edinburgh as you would in London?
And what do you call a Scot who’s never ever been to Aberdeen?
@ Jiggsbro + YesYesYes
Ah, I’m with you now. It’s pretty obvious when you step back and think about it. Cheers!
@HoraceSaysYes,
“As for DIY – as far as I’m concerned it means ‘Don’t Involve Yourself’.
Heh-heh.
We always referred to it as ‘Do In Yourself’. Mind you, I’m one of those sad people who likes to build decks. The most satisfying part, I’ve found, isn’t when you’ve screwed in the final screw to the last deck-board, but when you do your noggins, that’s when you know you’ve broken the back of the job.
“Oh, we do. Here’s some.”
Fell asleep after 30 seconds. SHOCK NEWS JUST IN: people have different tastes.
@ YesYesYes
Noggins (England) are dwangs in Scotland 🙂
I sometimes wonder what became of Red Wedge. What was the fruit of their labour? Wistful older men remembering…where did their England go?
Thanks Rev. After a very long day of physical work that gave me a real chuckle.
I saw Billy Bragg at the G8 concert in Edinburgh in 2005. He said he preferred to be with demonstrators than be at home watching a televised concert.
He has respect for the Scottish left wing tradition and, I think, wishes England could express patriotism without imperialism.
“Fell asleep after 30 seconds. SHOCK NEWS JUST IN: people have different tastes.”
Not so shock news, been around for a long time – some stuff is crap, and being fashionable crap can’t rescue it.
@YesYesYes
The most satisfying part, I’ve found, isn’t when you’ve screwed in the final screw to the last deck-board, but when you do your noggins,
That would be in England mate. Up here in Scotland the proper term for noggin is dwang.
hope this helps when you build your next deck ????
@ Adrian B
you beat me to it
some stuff is crap, and being fashionable crap can’t rescue it.
Absolutely.
@AdrianB,
True and you’re right to draw attention to this. I learned to build decks when I was down there and that’s what they were called. I’m afraid it’s stuck with me. It’s a bit like the anglicised word for football, ‘footie’. I’d always used ‘fitba’ when I was a kid but, to this day, I still hear myself using the anglicised version.
“Not so shock news, been around for a long time – some stuff is crap, and being fashionable crap can’t rescue it. “
Whatever. Just by the by, I wonder if you have any idea how dispiriting it is to post something a bit more personal and heartfelt for a change, only to get people angrily complaining that they don’t like the song, as if that was the point and as if everyone was ever expected to like the same music.
If not, incidentally, the answer is “really”.
@ Rev Stu
Some of us like Billy Bragg AND Thomas Tallis. Hope that doesn’t make us schizo.
I like Tallis. Enormously. I’d kill for a chance to sing the top line in Spem in Alium. But this thread isn’t about Tallis, so I think good manners suggests we don’t drag our own tastes into a thread RevStu has started about something else. If you don’t like Billy Bragg, just don’t listen to it. Stu wasn’t trying to Rickroll you, he was quite upfront about what the music was.
Stewart Lee in a music video? How could that be anything other than brilliant? Wait, you’re telling me the actor Kevin Eldon is in it as well?!?
You may not be able to post leaflets Stu, but you’re doing what you can, and you do it brilliantly.
Scotland Tonight eclipsed by Emmerdale. So I have a quick glimpse at WOS – what’s this – Billy Bragg???? Never heard the song before and loved it – self deprecation, the ultimate mark of self confidence. Thanks Stu – a great wee boost at the end of the evening.
Don’t want to drag on the Tallis thing, but Spem in Alium was the music Clive Stafford Smith lived with while fighting a (statisically hopeless) defence case in Alabama (I think). I hope Billy Bragg would appreciate the connections.
@ Morag
I think we are agreed that Rev Stu does a great service to the Independence movement. He lays himself open to ridicule with every thread he writes. I don’t think Vronsky meant to be ill mannered. I certainly hope he didn’t think I was.
I saw Billy Bragg play in Glasgow about ’82 or ’83 – somebody had phoned in a bomb threat to the QMU – so we were all evacuated out the building and he did his gig outside, standing on the steps of the medieval history building in University Avenue.
@ clochoderic
Man, I remember that. I hadn’t paid for a ticket but saw him play on the steps instead as I wandered up from the Curlers or somewhere. I think it was late 84 – the miners’ strike was on. There were a lot of good bands booked at that time at the QMU, the Smiths for one… Prefab Sprout and Blancmange were others (…er….).
And I saw Billy Bragg again at the Cambridge Corn Exchange – must have been 1992 or thereabouts.
Anyway, thanks Rev.
Thanks, Stu, from a part-time exile who got it straight away.
I do appreciate Billy’s songwriting talent but not a fan of his music, if you get my meaning.Here’s some decent English music….
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_dNx21woGY4
I don’t think Vronsky meant to be ill mannered. I certainly hope he didn’t think I was.
No, I don’t think he meant it. It’s the sort of pretentious thing I might easily have done myself without thinking about it. But Stu obviously was a little bit upset, so I now understand where he’s coming from on this. Having been an Exile myself for 24 years, 9 months and 18 days (approximately).
@ Morag
Thanks for the reply. Face to face conversation is so much less complicated than this internet interaction.
We need a Scottish Billy Bragg. Come on, all you would-be folkies and poets – now is the time to step up and sing for your country!
Had the kids and grandkids in for dinner, and the vino was doing most of the talking. Sorry Rev, no offence intended – you had to be here. Spem in alium – please give it another chance, or three. I’ve often found that the things I like best are not the things I liked at once (dirty laughter).