The Boat is Past its Best

 

These are lyrics to a new sea song The Boat is Past its Best.

The chorus and phrases in parentheses are sung by everyone. The remainder is for one or more soloists. The concept is simple. The crew are humorously telling us (or reminiscing between each other) about their old boat - a craft close to their hearts but clearly reaching the end of its working life.

1. We've got a boat (we've got a boat)

We've had it years, it's still afloat

But there are times (but there are times)

it puts us to the test.

For there is more (yes there is more)

time spent on fixes whilst ashore 

We often think (we often think

"The boat is past its best.")

CHORUS 

It's past its best, we're sad to say

Repairs - there've been a lot

The boat is past its best today

But it is all we've got.

It's served us well, it's kept us safe,

It gave us fellowship, 

It's past its best but we have faith:

We'll give it one more trip.

2. A bit broke off (a bit broke off)

Dropped from the masthead up aloft

yet no one was (yet no one was)

up there in the crow's nest.

The jib once ripped (the jib once ripped);

We had no spare, the captain flipped

and growled to us (and growled to us

"The boat is past its best.")

3. The compass jammed (the compass jammed)

We didn't go where we had planned,

went further south (went further south);

we meant to go due west.

Our rudder caught (our rudder caught)

on weed, we listed to the port

and so we cursed (and so we cursed 

"The boat is past its best.")

4. The anchor chain (the anchor chain)

came loose, we drifted off again.

It took an hour (it took an hour)

to bring the boat to rest.

The hawser rope (the hawser rope)

tied to the dock would have to cope.

Ashore we sighed (ashore we sighed,

"The boat is past its best.")

The Ships That Won't Go Down (music)

It's been some time since I posted something to this blog. There has been a distinct lack of poetry - as poetry - from my brain/hand recently. This isn't to say I've been idle. My words have been created with a view to adding music - so they are lyrics, even though they tend to adopt a standard meter.

Being a member of the Lytham St Annes Shanty Crew, I've been writing the occasional song to add to our repertoire. I've been writing words and music, arranging sea shanties, and in January I was particularly active.

Having discovered a website of public domain poems, I've started trawling through the many hundreds of poems looking for nautical ones that have a rhythm that begs for me to write some music.

One of these was a poem of "The Ships That Won't Go Down" by Australian poet Henry Lawson. The free program MuseScore 2 was handy to create the manuscript, and after a little practice I was happy enough to create a multi-track recording that I could present as a demo to the crew.

Today I created a SoundCloud account and uploaded the demo.

So here's a link - just to show I truly am doing some writing!

https://soundcloud.com/user-108871411/the-ships-that-wont-go-down-demo

A Zombie Christmas

The December 2016 "Pub Poets"' gathering had a theme of a Very Zombie Christmas. For my contribution I decided to write a parody on a sequence of Christmas songs and carols - on a zombie theme.

Verse six and seven were later additions, but I performed the other verses a cappella on the night.

I should have posted this earlier but there's a good reason why not.

I've since created a multi-track recording of myself in four-part harmony and wanted to include the link to an MP3 of "A Zombie Christmas". So here it is.

Link to A Zombie Christmas MP3

If you want to follow along with the words whilst you listen, or simply want to read the words and imagine the tunes in your head - here they are.

A Zombie Christmas

Silent Night
Silent Night – I’d like to bite
On your head. ‘Cause I’m Undead!
Don’t need urging to feast on your brain
No! It’s not because I am insane
The simple reason’s because
It’s a Zombie Christmas.

We Three Kings of Orient Are
Common Zombie origins are
Wild mutations – some quite bizarre
Virus and voodoo, some you may pooh-pooh
But you know what we are.
Oh – As we lumber, you take flight
Running off with all your might
Still proceeding, may be bleeding
All we want’s a little bite!

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
I’ll bite the flesh of gentlemen
And ladies here today
Because I like the flavour
I’m a local food gourmet
Encephalitic hemispheres
Are lovely to flambé
Although raw brains are something to enjoy
Girl or boy
Yes raw brains are something to enjoy.

Once in Royal David’s City
How d’you foil a rabid zombie?
Take an axe and chop off its head
If another way is needed
Then arrange a shotgun instead.
If you miss, be reconciled –
You will have your brain restyled.

Oh Come All Ye Faithful
With some brains, a mouthful’s
enough for our enjoyment
But we eat more to meet our stra-a-tagem
Blood’s running from our lips
for the zombie apocalypse.
We do more than just gnaw them
We do more than just gnaw them
We do more than just gnaw them
We won’t be ignored.

Away in a Manger
There's no imminent danger
From the walking undead
But the risk then increases
If we're running instead.
With cars then you might try
to drive far away.
We will rip you to pieces
So keep us at bay.

While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks At Night
While zombies watched the cars drive off
Not all of us pursued.
Eventually the dawdlers come;
We don't all like fast food.
We're not, you see, into "street cred" -
We'll seize amaxophobes,
Glad that those folk who don't like cars
Will lose their frontal lobes.

We Wish You A Merry Christmas
So a big thanks to George Romero
We thank you – George Romero
Yes, a big thanks to George Romero
From e-ver-y-one
By deciding to sing
These words I do bring
I wish you a zombie Christmas
And that’s it – I’ve done!

Rather Not Be The One (song)

And now for something completely different. Words and music on YouTube!

I wrote the song Rather Not Be The One as part of a creative writing exercise: the task being to create a response the Clean Bandit song/video Rather Be. You may wonder why I subverted the original love song. Probably because in my twisted mind it sounded a bit like a stalker's tale. And anyway, why not?

This is the second version of this project. Without the course deadline, I made the song faster, in a lower key, with a little more attention to the timing of instruments, and re-recorded the vocals. The earlier version is still viewable if you really must compare them!

Technical Details:

Audio: First time trying out the Ignite music software on my laptop together with the associated M-Audio Keystation 49es.Draft version transferred to an H4N digital recorder and multi-tracked some vocals for importing back into Ignite. As mentioned, I subsequently transposed the instruments to a lower key and sped the project up from 140bpm to 170bpm. This meant re-recording the vocals but the original take needed improvement anyway.

Video: Windows Movie Maker,  source images saved from a Google search (with appropriate usage rights), further modified with Xara Photo & Graphic Designer.