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1. |
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Every year begins and ends with Winter
And I’ve known a few that middle that way too
I’ve watched the mornings break and caught the splinters
Seen some that last the day and all night through
I’m not a sentimental sort
I don’t rose tint the past
They always told me life was short
And nothing really lasts
But nights are getting chillier, hills are getting hillier
Even the wind and rain
Are somehow unfamiliar
Oh the weather was different then
I remember way back when
My sister was eight and I was ten
The weather was different then
My memories are like muscles and bones
They feel different depending on the day
They ache when I walk too far from home
Sometimes the ache doesn’t go away
I see my father’s empty beer glass
And his boat down at the jetty
White moths in the long grass
Like the ghosts of confetti
Coal fizzing on the grate
The tapping of a loosened slate
A world between the raindrops
A world that just won’t wait
Oh the weather was different then
I remember way back when
Boys would be boys and men were men
The weather was different then
I’ve gathered seaweed after storms at low tide
And trained the tug-o-war team with a tree
I’ve seen the veins forming in the hillside
And felt the same subsidence deep in me
For the past is ever present
The thens soon outnumber the nows
Each night whether full moon or crescent
I think of all the folk that have lived in this house
Oh the weather was different then
I remember way back when
In wood and peak and pool and glen
The weather was different then
The weather was different then.
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2. |
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It’s been more years than I care to count
Don’t ask me for the exact amount
I remember this place was renowned
As the top dance hall in the south of the island
Twice a week I’d walk up the coast
Sometimes get a lift with the post
Those were the days I loved the most
I had the best moves in the whole of the highlands
It’s changed a lot and barely at all
The room felt so much bigger then or I felt small
But the main thing I recall about the old hall
Is that…
The dance floor sloped ever so slightly
The boys all hoped we’d lean further in
My fella he stroked my sleeve so lightly
And on the way home we were soaked to the skin
Inside they served us tea from an urn
Our mothers would all serve it in turn
But it wasn’t long before I would learn
Of the hidden whisky bottles and that forbidden taste
Back then the roof was made out of tin
You could barely hear the band for the din
Of the rain beating down trying to get in
But it could never beat the beating of my heart as it raced
I’ve changed a lot and barely at all
I felt so much bigger then but now feel small
But the main thing I recall now I’m back in the hall
Is…
The dance floor sloped ever so slightly
The boys all hoped we’d lean further in
My fella he stroked my sleeve so lightly
We all ended up in a heap at the end
So many years
Yet no time at all
The tales are still tall
Though I stoop a little now
But then the dance floor sloped ever so slightly
The boys all hoped we’d lean further in
My fella he stroked my sleeve so lightly
We all ended up in a heap at the end
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3. |
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I came here for quiet
The sky at this hour has such hues
One can lose all a man’s worried ways
But left with more questions than answers
I’ve not slept in days
As I walked on the shore
There I swore I saw ivory keys in the weeds
Not the kind for a door
Imagined their notes
Ringing beneath the boats on the waves
I looked out to the West
As I pondered the rest of those eighty eight levers
With hammers of felt
And smelt the first catch of the morning
Drift in on the breeze
I could ask someone how it was done
Someone who saw or somebody’s son
Surely they know
Why won’t they tell me
How the Duncraig piano
Wound up in the sea?
That’s not the whole of the story
Ignore me if I’m rambling on
Something’s wrong something’s not right at all
I understand that the grand
Was once a gift to the Hall
Don’t mention dimensions
The tension I bear
How I tear out my hair
For the doorway’s so small
How did it fit?
Was it done bit by bit?
Did the room open wide
With a hinge in one wall?
I could ask someone how it was done
Someone who saw or somebody’s son
Surely they know
Please tell us all
How the Duncraig piano
Got in Plockton hall
When it came from the castle
Did it rain? Was it dark
Did it roll on its own or get pushed in a cart
Did each pothole and stone
Make its tone go a little more sharp?
I could ask someone how it was done
Someone who saw or somebody’s son
Someone must know
Just how did they take
The old grand piano
All the way from Duncraig
However it got there
It rots there down on the sea floor
With old oars and the keels of wrecked ships
All stripped of its varnish and garnished with kelp
While the whelks make their marks on its lid
The size of a skiff and the shape of a rudder
I give a small shudder and picture the strings
With all the fish tails playing scales to the whales
While crabs clap along as they sing
I could ask someone how it was done
Someone who saw or somebody’s son
Surely they know
Why won’t they tell me
How the Duncraig piano
Wound up in the sea?
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4. |
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If you look to your left
There’s a loch that is said
To be oldest water in the British Isles
Legend has it that the facets
Of its banks are prone to magic
Causing hazards to the wizards
That pay pilgrimage for miles
Now just turn to your right
That’s the site of a fight
Between the clans of McSomething and McBlah
The locals all insist that when the hills are veiled in mist
The ghosts bicker and chatter
While their horses pitter patter
You can hear the sabres clatter from afar
And it might as well be true
If it’s not what’s that to you?
What’s the sense in letting facts
Spoil a lovely view
Hey R*****’s
What you tell ‘em today R*****’s?
What do you sell ‘em?
A fairy story?
A magical mystery?
As if we ain’t already got enough history.
This stream has healing properties
And that one, there’s a lot of these
Look at that little crop of trees
They’re witches who were cursed
With a life of immortality
By druids using sorcery
We’ll stop for a quick cup of tea
I hope you brought your purse
Now this old well grants wishes
Old wives tell the men they kisses
That a spirit here punishes
Those who are not pure of heart
Here are forests planted by old kings
Tales of children born with wings
A hundred other made up things
Our fiction is an art
And it might as well be true
If it’s not what’s that to you?
What’s the sense in letting facts
Spoil a lovely view
Hey R*****’s…
Round about the middle of that roofrack tailback
A tour van white and little with windows tinted black
Driving dreamers round the nation
Fuelled by pure imagination
And with each circumnavigation
The island has a little more
Folklore than it had before
Hey R*****’s…
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5. |
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Every well here has a name
Though so few of them remain
Some ran dry while others walked
Some were gagged to stop their talk
Làn de dh’ùir, no cnàmh’n nan tòrr
Mac-talla mùcht’ cho balbh ri cloich
Sgeul san uaigh a-nis fàs fuar
Gach tobar aost’, gun sgeul gun tuar
All the holes in history
History is full of holes
All the holes in history
History is full of holes
Tha ainm aig gach tobar ann
Ged tha an t-uisge nis annt’ gann
Thiormaich cuid is dh’imrich cuid
’s air cuid chaidh casg ’s an cumail diùid
Filled with earth or choked with bones
Stifled echos mute as stones
Stories buried growing cold
The wells get old, their tales untold
Tha iomadh beàrn san eachdraidh
All the holes in history
Tha ’n eachdraidh làn le iomadh beàrn
History is full of holes
Tha iomadh beàrn san eachdraidh
All the holes in history
Tha ’n eachdraidh làn le iomadh beàrn
History is full of holes
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6. |
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The trees begin to blacken
Delta branches are attacking
More persistent than the bracken
Crowding in around our ears
The reassuring snap of braces
All our clothes have zips not laces
We can squeeze through confined spaces
And we’re bringing all our gear
Now the roof ladders are rattling
And the elements we’re battling
I think someone has been meddling
With the roadsigns around here
We don’t smoke but we can smolder
We give hot stuff the cold shoulder
We keep meticulous records
In our developmental folders
In the highlands and the islands
Where the heather hides the hydrants
The wind blows on thin roads
And the sheep bleats cut the silence
Keep your eyes on the horizon
We’ve got sirens
And blue lights on
If you called us then we’re coming
Through the ash and embers we’ll be running
Oh things are hotting up
On coast roads we meander
Like some raging salamander
We don’t take bribes or back-handers
But won’t say no to a cup of tea
There’s domestic fires from chip pan fryers
Cars in ditches, burning byres
Emergency
Cat stuck in tree
That happens less than on TV
And no we can’t wait until
There’s a pleasant weather frontal
Now the rain is horizontal
But there’s no moment to spare
There are people in the way of harm
Drag them out but do it with charm
It might just be a false alarm
But we won’t know ’til we’re there
In the highlands and the islands
Where the heather hides the hydrants
The wind blows on thin roads
And the sheep bleats cut the silence
Keep your eyes on the horizon
We’ve got sirens
And blue lights on
If you called us then we’re coming
Through the ash and embers we’ll be running
Oh things are hotting up
Now the watch commander’s shouting
We’ve got fire in the mountains
Ten miles but who’s counting?
Don’t accept no substitutes
It don’t matter if we’re sleeping
Because if that pager’s bleeping
You can bet there’s nothing keeping
Us from pulling on our boots
We’ve got hose jets and BA sets
We’ve got acronyms for all events
We tackle threats and rescue pets
I’ve got midges in my helmet
We’ve all got midges in our helmets
Things are hotting up
In this cold and misty isle
We put out fires in style
And we do it with a smile
Things are hotting up
On this wet and windy rock
If we find a door is locked
We’ll break it down but always knock
Things are hotting up
We’ve got the magic and the science
All stored on the appliance
We treat danger with defiance
Things are hotting up
But it’s going to be okay
We’ve got protective gloves on
To help us seize the day
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7. |
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You could paper these walls in old school photographs
I can name them all
You seem amazed there were so many of us
This boy fixed my slates and leading
I attended that girl’s wedding
And there was just no forgetting what became of her
But now the school is all but empty
These old pictures easily outnumber those who still attend
Two brothers, one per room
A playground quiet as a tomb
They closed the place this afternoon
What will it become?
Where have all the children gone?
And what are we that stayed
Who will thread the daisy chains
And jump in puddles when it rains
What becomes of stars unwished upon
Where have the children gone?
You wouldn’t think I’d miss the noise
Or the glimpses of unfathomable games
No smell of pencils freshly sharpened
Classroom windows all are darkened
A million reasons why it’s happened
But why’d it happen here?
Where have all the children gone?
And what are we that stayed
Who will skim stones on the sea?
Who will climb the trees? Not me.
Who will learn the lessons we get wrong?
Where have the children gone?
I browse a while through all of those
Dusty files of tidy rows
Frames all with their date and class
The same reflection in the glass
I catch a glimpse of my old self
By which I mean my young self
I wonder
Where did we all go?
Where have all the children gone?
And what are we that stayed
Who will thread the daisy chains
And jump in puddles when it rains
What becomes of stars unwished upon
Where have the children gone?
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8. |
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When we were young our parents told
Tales that made our blood run cold
Of water creatures they would teach us
How they’d drag us down beneath the waves
I heard these stories every day
How selkies lured the girls away
The Minch’s blue men grimly looming
And typhooning sailors to their graves
How do you cross a water course
When it’s tossed by a ghostly horse
And even the most modest burn or spring
Is the spirit of some old and evil thing
Each day we walk so near the sea
But daren’t go in for fear we'd be
Cursed or even worse a verse
In yet another song old sailors sing
It’s a wonder any of us learned to swim at all
When the sea and streams and rivers seemed to brim
And crawl with such monsters
But when it seemed all hope had long run dry
A woman in a minivan came by
And in that van a canvas pool
That she assembled in our school
Annie Weir was here to help us float
Without the need for a single boat
The island’s children forgot their fright
Of all the seal men and water sprites
And now alongside myths of mermaids we
Have the swimming pool lady
The swimming pool lady
The swimming pool lady.
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9. |
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Hemmed in tight by years of things
That groaned all night like playground swings
Time piled up, day on day
The lawns of youth all scorched to hay
Feelings snarled up like brier
Loosely fenced with rusting wire
A hillside cold and pale as bone
Where I slid down
Alone alone
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
Plans and dates arranged all neat
And fixed in place like climbers’ cleats
Under the sheets I’m pinned and straight
Like notes beneath a paperweight
But from my bed I clearly see
The shape of the wind in the blasted trees
And memories I’d overheard
Flew through my thoughts
Like panicked birds
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
Down the frozen slopes I speed
Where all the woes and hopes agreed
You’re all I want and all I need
Toboggan
Adrift in some unnamed forever
Below the snow lay fern and heather
Where we go we go
Together
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
Carry me
Toboggan
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10. |
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I think about them every day
I dream about them in the night
How some prefer to squeeze their prey
While others like to bite
I search for them out on the moors
I lift up stones and look under
I’ve sifted pebbles on the shores
Where I wonder, I wonder
What happened to the snakes
Snakes Snakes
What happened to the snakes
Snakes Snakes
Round here?
What happened to the snakes
Snakes Snakes
What happened?
Why did they all just disappear?
I used to see them all the time
In Geary, Gillen, Hallin, Halistra
On windy rainy days and fine
Heaven only knows how I’ve missed ya
‘Cos now I see I took you for granted
How could I know I’d feel like this
I admit I never knew what I wanted
I never ever thought | would miss that hiss
What happened to the snakes…
The adders just don’t add up
The adders just don’t add up
The adders just don’t add up
I can’t add up the adders
No snakes here only ladders
What happened to the snakes…?
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11. |
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The doll’s house overlooks the sea
No one rings the bell or calls the phone
It opens with a single key
Locked in a box no bigger than a stone
No letters, no bills
No cats on sills
Staring out at the birds in the tree
It stands alone as the grey waves foam
The doll’s house overlooks the sea
When daffodils rise and nod their heads
At the first blooms budding on the reaching boughs
A stranger comes to make the beds
And beat all the rugs for the colour to rouse
And the bravest weeds will stretch and squeeze
Through the bars of the cattle grids
Just to brush and feel all the hire car wheels
Bringing dolls to play in the old doll’s house
Knock on the doll’s house door and see who answers
Knock knock on the door of the doll’s house
When the fern and bracken are shoulder high
And the ground’s alive with voles and mice
When the sun stays long in a gentle sky
Children play but never the same child twice
When the days are bright and it’s light at night
And the sheep all scatter and roam
The place never slowing with the coming and going
The doll’s house looks most like a home
Knock on the doll’s house door and see who answers
Knock knock on the door of the doll’s house
When the leaves turn gold then copper and brown
And the ewes mourn for their absent young
The last of the dolls from the far off towns
Rubs where the last of the black flies stung
And the trees grow bare and the potholes stare
Up at a low slung sun
The doors are closed and the waste disposed
Now the doll’s house work of play is done
Knock on the doll’s house door and see who answers
Knock knock on the door of the doll’s house
Now from my boat as I sing to seals
I see the dwellings dark as Winter nears
Make a mental note while I mend the creels
Here each building’s less than it appears
No chimney smoke, no sign of folk
Or dogs or chickens or cows
Each brick and slate with the very same fate
Every home has become
Just another doll’s house
Knock on the doll’s house door and no one answers
Knock knock on the door of the doll’s house
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12. |
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The isle is full of noises
It’s coming from the schools
From hands and lungs and voices
Not adults with their tools
Jaggie Thistles and The Jammers
The sound can be intense
Nan said “let’s get the kids some instruments”
‘Cos things are looking bleak
No matter where you are
A different cut each week
Leaving a different scar
The roads reduced to rubble and the buildings need cement
The world is full of troubles and terrible events
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
A whistle or recorder
A chanter or guitar
Harmony from disorder
We’re one big orchestra
From Dunvegan to the Plockton School of Excellence
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
Nan’s got a plan and you know it makes sense
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
We never know what’s coming, life keeps us in suspense
But we will come out strumming, we will make our dents
And tackle all the trials that the world presents
We’ve just got to get the kids some instruments
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
Nan’s got a plan and you know it makes sense
But we’ve got to get the kids
We’ve got to get the kids
We’ve got to get the kids some instruments
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13. |
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I heard someone say or maybe they wrote
That life is a lot like rowing a boat
Calm sea or storms, up or downstream
You can only go on if you face where you’ve been
I stare at the shore as I pull away
I don’t need any more than I’ve got today
People tell me look forward to things
But I like to see what yesterday brings
I know there’s no knowing
Where I’m really going
As I float into the blue
But aye, there’s a lot to look backward to
All the calendar days struck through
There’s a lot to look backward to
Someone advised me, what did they say?
Some days the horizon is further away
Some memories fade but some of them last
And nothing remains quite like the past
The things I could mention, the things that I know
All those good intentions piled up like snow
Folk younger than I want to find their lost youth
They might as well try to grow back a lost tooth
I know there’s no knowing
Where we’re really going
As we float into the blue
Aye, there’s a lot to look backward to…
For old time’s sake, for young time’s sake
Time’s the one thing we can’t make
Pastimes, fast times, goodness sake
All Time wants to do is take
And we know there’s no knowing
Where we’re really going
As we float into the blue
Aye, there’s a lot to look backward to
All those calendar days struck through
There’s a lot to look backward to
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This album was inspired by conversations in community spaces around Skye and Lochalsh then recorded by local musicians as part of the Culture Collective project funded by Creative Scotland and co-ordinated by local events charity SEALL. Profits from album sales go to Alzheimer Scotland.
www.seall.co.uk
www.culturecollective.scot
Booklet blurb:
These songs are inspired by conversations that took place in community halls around Skye and Lochalsh throughout Scotland’s Year of Stories 2022. But there are no stories on this record, only signposts to the possible tellers. If you want to know what happened to the missing grand piano from Duncraig you will have to go asking around in Plockton. If you want to know about the abandoned wells of Trotternish you should talk to someone in Kilmuir or Staffin. Is the Waternish snake population really in decline or does the man who made the observation simply no longer go prodding around in the undergrowth like he did when he was a boy? When did the floor of Breakish Hall stop sloping? Who lived in the houses that are now holiday lets and second homes? What fairy tales do visiting tour guides conjure up out of thin air and why don’t they stick to the actual history of the area? What made Margaret Anne Weir travel around all the schools in Skye with a portable swimming pool and why does Nan Cleghorn want every child to have an instrument? The answers aren’t on this album, just the questions.
This record was made as an excuse to get people together in community spaces - first to talk, then to play, then to listen and dance and talk again. The singers and musicians are from all kinds of backgrounds and jobs - paramedics, teachers, nurses, doctors, firefighters, cleaners, community volunteers, care-workers and all manner of other things. The songs are not historical documents or social data, they are not definitive and they are certainly not the last word, they are merely a reflection of something too large to render into a single piece of art.
So what is the community album project? It’s a pop record. And like other pop records it is up to the listener whether or not it matters, whether it plays in the background while they’re washing up or becomes the soundtrack to a great defining moment of their life, whether it is broadcast through expensive speakers or ear buds, in the car or on a phone, in the published track order or scattered across multiple playlists. The songs aren’t important, just the people who play them and the people they’re based on and the people that went before any of us ever picked up an instrument.
So listen at your leisure in whatever manner/order/device you’re comfortable with, then afterwards go and ask someone to tell you a story about themselves. Then tell them one in return.
