Category: Musical Events

Support gig in St Ives

I’ve been a little depressed at having to cancel a few dates this year because of ill health (including a Lafrowda fundraiser and the Weston-super-Mare Sea Shanty ad Folk Music Festival, unfortunately – shanties are not very Harley, but the event would have been fun). However, I’m very pleased to have been invited to support the rather excellent Green Diesel at the St Ives (Cornwall) Arts Club on August 9th. (And as it’s quite near to where I live, it shouldn’t be a problem healthwise this time.)  Tickets (only £3!) from Eventbrite.
David Harley

The Doomsday Gig

“…you sell a lot more records
when you’re permanently depressed…”
(Peter Buckley-Hill – apologies if I’ve misquoted. I can’t remember the name of the song, either.)

Recently I was thrown into a state somewhere between rage and gloom when one of my songs – admittedly not a particularly cheerful example of my oeuvre – was roundly and publicly condemned by two people for being depressing. (Well, we can go into debates another time about session etiquette, whether social comment is folk, and whether no-one should ever write anything that isn’t upbeat.)

After the gloom wore off, I started contemplating going back to that session with a handful of the gloomiest songs I know (of) and realized that without even looking at my own songs, I could easily find enough material to empty the Albert Hall several times over.

  • David Ackles: His Name is Andrew
  • Bob Dylan: It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)
  • Phil Ochs: Crucifixion
  • Lord Gregory. The Recruited Collier.  And about a third of all the Scots ballads I’ve ever been tempted to fake an accent to sing.
  • Richard Thompson: The End of the Rainbow (or possibly Never Again, or Poor Ditching Boy, or Stuck on the Treadmill, or even Pavanne)
  • Blind Lemon Jefferson: See That My Grave is Kept Clean
  • One of several songs called Oh Death
  • Lay this body down
  • Hank Williams: I’m so Lonesome I could Cry, or Wedding Bells, or Lonesome Whistle
  • The Everlys (don’t know offhand who wrote these): Ebony Eyes, or Take a Message to Mary, or Crying in the Rain, or Rocking Alone in an Old Rocking Chair, or I’m Just Here to Get My Baby Out of Jail
  • Leonard Cohen: Avalanche, or Dress Rehearsal Rag, or One Of Us Cannot Be Wrong – I’m sure I could think of one or two more…
  • Brother Can You Spare a Dime?
  • Nic Jones: Ruins by the Shore
  • Bruce Springsteen: Brothers Under the Bridge
  • The Lyke Wake Dirge (probably the tune Britten used rather than the one YT et al recorded: any French horn players around Ludlow?)
  • Don’t they know it’s the end of the world? (Kent-Dee)
  • Texas Girl at the Funeral of her Father (Randy Newman)
  • Jackson C. Frank: Here Come the Blues (Blues Run the Game would be a contender, too)
  • Fred Neil: Blues on the Ceiling
  • Neil Young: A Man Needs a Maid or After the Goldrush.
  • Bill Caddick: Oller Boller (am I the only person in the world who loves this song?)
  • Steve Goodman: Penny Evans (I don’t have a problem switching gender for a good song: see Recruited Collier).
  • Ann Briggs: Go Your Way, My Love
  • Weary Blues
  • Eric Bogle: No Man’s Land or The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

You know, I really want to hear that set. And I was starting to think about a running order, but I kept bursting into tears.

David Harley