Get all 10 The Crows Of Albion releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of BARD COMPANY: Northern Powerhouse, CrowLore, BARD COMPANY: 'Raising The Standards', Black & White & Read All Over, Screaming Blue Murder, BARD COMPANY: All Systems Go!, Khartoum - From Obscurity To Oblivion (The Demo Sessions) [DOWNLOAD ONLY], Here There Be Demons, and 2 more.
1. |
Screaming Blue Murder
03:10
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Screaming Blue Murder
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the state of the nation
and how we blame our ills
on Muslims and immigration -
talking about people
as though they’re an infestation.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the Banker’s greed
and the people on the street
who we can’t seem to feed -
the way that we trample
on sexuality and creed.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the whole disheartening mess
of the education system,
transport and the NHS -
and how we’re going to get out of it
is anybody’s guess.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the neo-Fascist’s rise,
about how we’re indoctrinated
by Tory owned newspaper lies
and the way we look away
when an industry dies.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
that the rich are getting more
while zero hour contracts
are hammering the poor
and the way we still find money
to support another war
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at intolerance and hate,
about the way you can’t criticise
a Persecution State
without being dragged into
an anti semitic debate.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
for all of the bluster and fuss
caused by unsupported facts
on the side of a bus -
how just one third of the country
somehow speak for all of us.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
at what this government’s done
to the weak and vulnerable,
to the poor man and his son -
and as they stand accused
with their guilt ridden smoking gun
I’m screaming Blue Murder
My heart is on the left
and my blood is red.
Austerity doesn’t work,
it has to be said.
Our ethics and our values
are morally dead.
I’m screaming Blue Murder
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2. |
Sunset Over Lupset
03:26
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Sunset Over Lupset (August 1968)
Lupset sunsets smelled of bonfires,
undercut with new mown grass,
wild mint by the kitchen window,
treasures in the strawberry patch.
Father sat with pint of shandy,
The mower cooling in the shade,
the rake stowed by the garden shed,
the kids with sparkling lemonade.
Summer sun dips on the estate
dragging shadows from the coal hole.
Bird song muffled in humid air
that blankets sweat and soothes the soul.
Sounds of mother in the kitchen
putting salad onto our plates -
ham and cheese and egg and lettuce,
simple food that invigorates.
The summer heat is at its height,
the doors and windows open wide
to let the air move through the house
where sleeping bodies will be fried.
A memory of summers past
before the world stole all our dreams,
where simple things dealt us pleasure -
cold Council pop and Lumb’s ice creams.
Families sitting in back yards,
talking together, having fun,
perfect end to an August week
when debts were paid and work was done.
Sunset over Lupset
August nineteen sixty eight
Sunset over Lupset
Things never felt so great
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3. |
The Bayonet In The Shed
03:53
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The Bayonet In The Shed
He put it there in forty nine,
in a woodworm riddled drawer,
wrapped it in a greasy rag.
A remnant from the war.
On top of it he laid his medals,
nothing more was said
until the day my father
took the bayonet from the shed.
We had pestered many times
and he had said ‘perhaps’
when we asked him if he’d killed
any Krauts or any Japs.
His eyes fixed on something far away,
as though searching for the dead,
but we found out what we wanted
when he took the bayonet from the shed.
He was a sergeant major
in the hell hole that was Burma,
where the Japanese snipers
would target you on a murmur.
He was proud of the campaign
and the boys that he had led
but he never ever talked
about the bayonet in the shed.
He didn’t hate all foreigners
and he said the greatest worker
that he had ever met in the war
was ‘good old Johnny Gurkha’.
That being brave wasn’t about killing,
he was happy when they fled,
then he went down the garden
and took the bayonet from the shed.
He was gone a short while
and when we saw him coming back
he was no longer marching proudly
along a heroes track.
We witnessed the aged warrior
return with heavy tread,
shoulders slumped in surrender
with the bayonet from the shed.
He moved the cloth reverently
and laid the medals by its side
and for the first time in my life
we watched as my father cried.
We sat with him and looked at it
and thought of bodies that had bled
after being introduced to
the bayonet in the shed.
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4. |
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USMF
When the KKK and the Kremlin
Are sharing their vodka and rye
When redneck white supremecists
are making Lady Liberty cry
When The land of the free is walled in
So pesky Mexicans can’t get by
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die.
When the Whitehouse houses a bigot
A misogynist ‘locker room’ fly
When a multi-billionaire
Stands for momma’s apple pie
When a name shines on a tower
That reaches up to the sky
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die.
When a straw thatched Umpa-Lumpa
Pedals the conspiracy lie
When a tax dodging privileged hypocrite
Tells workers he’s their kinda guy
When a bully is sitting as president
And parents tell their children why
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die
Lady Liberty Weeps
In a Minnesota precinct
On a Minnesota street
The day starts like any other
For the Baton Rouge elite
In the land of the brave
In the land of the free
A cop with a pistol
Shoots liberty
A man reaches for a wallet
With a target on his back
Red white and blue
All the patrolman sees is black
Where the gun is law
The sheriff of the west
Has immunity to kill
Wearing a star on his chest
And this is the country
Who sets itself above
The rest of the world
And preaches peace and love
But it can’t control the forces
It creates to protect
And it can’t control the hatred
It chooses to elect
Where every stand off
Is resolved by the gun
And red neck lobbyists
Believe the lies they have spun
Now in Dallas Texas
There are cop killers on the street
The day ends like any other
The cycle is complete
Safety Off
The FBI and the CIA got ‘em
Good ‘ol boys in the KKK got ‘em
Even Doris Day got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
Kids in their daddies cars got ‘em
Rednecks in Dallas bars got ‘em
Sheriffs with tin stars got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
The white and black and brown got’ em
Old folks in mid-west town’s got ‘em
Even the Whitehouse clown got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
Clint Eastwood and John Wayne got ‘em
The holy and insane got ‘em
I’ve heard that Citizen Kane got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
Shopkeepers in their stores got ‘em
Vets returning from their wars got ‘em
Pimps and two bit whores got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
The Washington Post and Fox got ‘em
Randy high school jocks got ‘em
Snipers in tower blocks got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
Heroes on TV got ‘em
The brave and the free got ‘em
Babies on their mamas knees got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
The Waltons and the Brady’s got ‘em
The good guys and their ladies got ‘em
Tupac and Slim Shady’s got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe
Every Independence day got ‘em
Every bullet that goes astray got ‘em
The whole of the USA got ‘em
And they’re never gonna be safe
BODY COUNT
16/10/91
23 Dead – Luby’s Cafeteria – Killeen Texas
4/12/12
27 Dead – Sandy Hook Elementary – Newtown, Connecticut
16/4/07
32 Dead – Virginia Tech – Blacksburg, Virginia
12/6/16
49 Dead – Pulse Nightclub – Orlando, Florida
1/10/17
58 Dead – Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas
AND COUNTING…..
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5. |
Windsor Street
02:33
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Windsor Street
No bunting flutters in the breeze,
no boys and girls, dressed up so neat,
with not a scratch upon their knees.
There are no flags on Windsor Street.
There are no parties in the yard,
the sandwiches will hold no meat.
They will send no greetings card
‘from the residents of Windsor Street’.
There are no beds of scented flowers,
there are no open arms to greet
the crumpled masses who spend their hours
huddled in corners on Windsor Street.
There are no canapés or quince
or any kind of special treat -
just calorific saturated fats since
the jobs were lost on Windsor Street.
So when the bride comes down the aisle
with platitudes thrown under her feet
the folk will try to raise a smile
at the injustice wrought on Windsor Street.
The cheering crowds will sing the happy couples praise,
choreographed to match the beat
of marching bands on sunny days
that never pierce the shadows on Windsor Street.
When the happy couple go to be bed
and lay beneath their privileged sheet
not a single thought enters their heads
of the detritus on Windsor Street.
Little England has it’s sideshow
with celebrities they’ll never meet -
meanwhile resentment will flourish and grow
in the humble abodes on Windsor Street.
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6. |
We Are The Dead
03:01
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We Are The Dead
we are the dead
the unrequited love
the words we never said
the dreams we never realised
we are the dead.
we are the dead
sat in front of the TV
spending too long in bed
wasting our lives away
we are the dead
we are the dead
arguing among ourselves
never leading being led
to places we don’t want to go
we are the dead
we are the dead
stifling our dreams
In the labyrinths of our head
letting chances pass us by
we are the dead
we are the dead
dousing our passions
so the flames are never fed
then wishing days away
we are the dead
we are the dead
forming our opinions
through the papers we have read
Instead of making news ourselves
we are the dead
we are the dead
following the trails
that other travellers tread
no footsteps in the virgin snow
we are the dead
we are the dead
we could be hanging round old haunts
raising merry hell instead
we procrastinate in graves
we are the dead
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7. |
There Are No Angels Here
03:48
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There Are No Angels Here
Scraping around the vipers nest,
flaming swords and thrusting spear,
black spiders scuttle to the feast
but there are no angels here.
The dragon crawls into their veins,
hallucinogenic ecstasy or fear.
The demon bares his fangs to bite
and still there are no angels here.
The first-born rounded up and caged,
harvesting the mothers tear,
the innocents are slaughtered.
Yes, there are no angels here.
No Seraphim, no Nephilim,
no Archangel seen far or near -
God’s army keep their powder dry.
There are no avenging angels here.
The dead will rise in Babylon,
false prophets will snipe and sneer,
the doubters branded heretics.
There are no longer angels here.
Tangled up in their own strings
the puppets and the puppeteer.
God is dead and Satan lives
because there are no angels here.
The fool sits in the house of white,
Apocalyptic portents appear.
Despite claiming the hand of God
there were never any angels here.
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8. |
Under August Skies
03:25
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Under August Skies
We sat around the table Mam
but none of us got fed,
for the Corn Law has been biting
and we don’t have any bread.
The mill wheels have stopped turning,
so we haven’t any jobs
and we’re under-represented
by the parliamentary nobs.
So we gathered in the field Mam,
with our banners and our flags,
and the soldiers sat in lines
with their brightly coloured nags.
We were organised but unarmed
and adamant we would not yield
as we marched in peaceful protest
arm in arm to St Peter’s Field.
There were tens of thousands there Mam
under baking August heat -
and when Mr Hunt got up to speak
we all jumped up to our feet
and a huge roar went around the crowd
as everybody cheered -
but that was just the signal
that the local magistrate feared.
He called up the Hussars Mam
and sent them in so we’d disperse
and the air was filled with shrieks Mam
and I don’t know what was worse -
the slashing sabres on our backs,
or the blood that soaked the ground,
or the groans of all the wounded,
or the chaos all around.
There were soldiers in the field Mam
and they all had swords and guns
and they hacked their way through daughters
and they hacked their way through sons,
they hacked their way through husbands
and they hacked their way through wives
and they didn’t care a jot
for the loss of poor folk’s lives.
Sorry I didn’t come home Mam
but I’m lying next to John,
trampled by the horses,
but now the horses have all gone.
There are fifteen other mothers
who will grieve the same as you
over this bloody mess in Manchester.
Pray for the dead of Peterloo.
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9. |
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Rosetta Of The Endless Night
She went away twelve years ago
and sent me missives now and then,
although her words were data flow
not written by a lovers pen.
She passed beyond the world of men,
forever from my earthly sight.
Rosetta of the endless night
The numbers came, row upon row,
from places far beyond my ken -
binary kisses from my beau
who touched me softly once again.
The cosmic chirping called out when
my little bird would soft alight.
Rosetta of the endless night
Your energy was getting low,
percentage wise way under ten,
and you were starting to get slow -
no longer giving me your gen.
I grieve my wing-clipped dying wren -
unable to sustain her flight.
Rosetta of the endless night.
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10. |
Bag O' Bones
03:21
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Bag O’ Bones
Please let me introduce myself -
my name is Billy Jones.
You might know me better
as that useless bag o’ bones
that gets under your feet
when you’re staring at your phones,
planning all your creature comforts
on extortionate pay day loans.
Bag O’ Bones, Bag O’ Bones
Lying in the street without a home.
One bitter night from dying here
Where all my hopes and dreams were thrown.
Well I was once like you my friend,
I haven’t always been alone
huddled up in corners
where the autumn leaves have blown,
I once dreamed the dreams that you dream,
I once owned the things you own,
but now I’m cold and hungry
where the desperate seeds are sown.
Well I was married very young
to a lovely girl named Joan
we lived a life of luxury -
if only we had known
that just around the corner
I would soon be on my own -
the bailiffs came to kick us out
of the matrimonial home.
You pass me with your coffee cups
and grimace when I groan,
you cannot stand to fight the war
that rages in this homeless zone.
I’ve lived for months inside this sleeping bag
I feel like I’ve been sewn
into a grave – without a name.
So exits Billy Jones…
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11. |
On The Slag Heap
02:49
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On The Slag Heap
Quenching the eternal flame,
the furnaces won’t burn again,
the northern dragons will lay still -
the Government has had its fill.
At its heart a molten core
that will implode and beat no more.
The mill will close, the light will die
and in the dark the ghosts will cry.
The workers will go home to bed
not knowing if their family’s fed
or if they will become a number
disappearing whilst they slumber.
Another industry breathes its last,
what once was present becomes past,
the mines, the docks and now the steel
like butterflies upon a wheel.
When the grass has covered all,
like graves with bodies in the soil,
some day we will look back and say
these tired beasts had had their day.
But that will be only half a tale -
economics made them fail,
priced them to a lingering death -
squeezed them of their failing breath
Yet in the end nobody cared
how these aging titans fared
they didn’t hear their sad swan song -
but they will miss them when they’re gone.
‘Another dog has had its day’,
the fawning politicians say -
and like a dog they put it down
destroying one more northern town.
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12. |
Catechism
03:07
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Catechism
I will not be defined by ancient Gods,
or the archaic teachings in their books.
I will tread warily around their words
and avoid the hidden traps and snaring hooks.
I will not stand behind a coloured flag
and spout my blunt imperialistic views
or drape it on a coffin when I die
or burn it on the early evening news.
I will not make a choice that’s based on skin
or the way another human being speaks,
the way another human being struggles
to find the human touch a human seeks.
I will not blame a desperate refugee
for fleeing from a rocket spat war zone
and running to the safety of the west
and trying to find identity and home.
I will not be defined by lines on maps
or those, hastily drawn, across the sand,
for anyone can make a mark on paper
or claim a settlement as their homeland.
I will not be defined on where I live
or the destination of my birth.
I am not a citizen of land
but, rather, a child of planet earth.
You will not know me by my flesh and blood
or what is in my soul or in my mind.
I will not be identified by thoughts
for that is not the measure of mankind.
You will only know me for my words -
written, said and also what I do
and let me tell you something man of hate
there’s many more of us than there’s of you.
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13. |
Jerusalem
03:57
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Jerusalem
I woke up this morning, and none of the news was good
Death machines were rumblin' 'cross the ground where Jesus stood
And the man on my TV told me that it had always been that way
And there was nothing anyone could do or say
And I almost listened to him
Yeah, I almost lost my mind
And I regained my senses again
Looked into my heart to find
That I believe that one fine day all the children of Abraham
Will lay down their swords forever in Jerusalem
Well maybe I'm only dreamin' and maybe I'm just a fool
But I don't remember learnin' how to hate in Sunday school
Somewhere along the way I strayed and I never looked back again
But I still find some comfort now and then
Then the storm comes rumblin' in
And I can't lay me down
And the drums are drummin' again
And I can't stand the sound
But I believe there'll come a day when the lion and the lamb
Will lie down in peace together in Jerusalem
And there'll be no barricades then
There'll be no wire or walls
And we can wash all this blood from our hands
And all this hatred from our souls
And I believe that on that day all the children of Abraham
Will lay down their swords forever in Jerusalem
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14. |
Perhaps
02:40
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Perhaps…
Perhaps it‘ll be over
when I dare to open eyes
blinded by the centuries
of imperialistic lies.
When the bodies have been buried
underneath their rubble rooms
and the children all lie sleeping
In their bleak nursery tombs.
We’re raising a firestorm
across the middle east.
We’re throwing money at it –
We’re strengthening the beast.
We’re killing whole families.
You can see where we have been,
where the cities have been levelled
by the rabid war machine.
Perhaps I will be happy
with my name on a rocket
that makes its way to Syria
in some war monger’s pocket.
How many deadly missiles
does it take to kill ideas
in an enemy that deals
in terror, hate and fear?
Perhaps I’ll side with generals
who justify their cause
by the number of deaths
obliterated by their wars.
Where targets are acquired
and planes are in the air
and they don’t know what to do next
and they don’t really care.
Perhaps I’ll ignore the people
who elect to parliament,
someone they can trust
to vote with this government.
I’ll stab my Judas knife
into the back of men of peace.
The wolf in the flock,
draped in a bloody fleece.
Perhaps it will be none of this
and all will see some sense
that bombing foreign countries
is the worst form of defence -
the terrorist will not be home,
he’ll be some where else plotting
atrocities on foreign soil
while Syrian’s are rotting.
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15. |
Fairy Cakes
02:29
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Fairy Cakes
They believed in a mythical being,
who supposedly loved his creation.
Omnipotent and all seeing -
His will needing no explanation.
They followed his lore from a book
by disciples raising the stakes -
saying one thing they just shouldn’t cook
were those sinful and bad fairy cakes.
“Good will to all men” they proclaimed
(but the women don’t get a mention),
the white bearded god was acclaimed
for his homo-erectus invention.
Famine, starvation and war
were delivered for all of our sakes
but don’t ask a bakery store
to decorate bad fairy cakes.
So they prayed for divine intervention
over such an abomination
(peace and love didn’t get a mention
they beat out their biblical frustration).
They sprinkled their mixture with bile
and threw in the nuts and the flakes
but no way on God’s green earth
were they going to bake bad fairy cakes.
The priests were getting quite frantic
(momentarily forgetting the joys
of their extra-curricular antics
with unwary, young choirboys).
But when the devil is hungry,
you do whatever it takes
to keep him away from the bakery
and those blasphemous, bad fairy cakes.
The god squad were all up in arms
at the thought of all of those “queers”
indulging in teacakes and barms -
it resurrected disturbing fears
that at the last supper it’s written
there were no hens, only drakes,
and who knew if they were smitten
by a batch of those bad fairy cakes.
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16. |
The Devil Don't Own Me
06:19
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The Devil Don’t Own Me
He may have saluted the corrupted cross
In Hitler’s Germany,
or whispered to Judas Iscariot,
hanging from a tree,
he could have pulled the trigger finger
back in nineteen sixty three,
he may own the soul of rock and roll
but the Devil don’t own me.
He may pollute the air we breath
or the raging, deep blue, sea.
He may breath on polar ice caps
on his subtle killing spree.
He may steal food from starving children
or the hope from you and me,
he may arm the fights of acolytes
but the Devil don’t own me.
He may own the greedy bankers
and the false economy,
the fascist newspaper owners
in the lands of liberty,
he may own the cops and robbers,
he may strive to set them free
from the laws they place upon us -
but the Devil don’t own me
He was at the witches coven,
looking for his fee,
when the British Government
compacted with the DUP.
He locked their morals in blood
and threw away the key.
The devil owns the country
but the devil don’t own me.
He may own the halls of government
and the sly, dark powers that be,
the state run institutions,
he may own the state TV,
he may control what we hear,
he may control what we see,
the Devil may be media savvy
but the devil don’t own me.
He owned the Milk Snatcher
and the Grey Man forking peas,
the Jolly Sailor Boy
and the Bullingdon Club bullies.
He was in the wrong line at Orgreave
urging on the young PC’s.
Yes the Devil sides with devils
but the Devil don’t own me
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