Whoops, there goes another year; whoops, there goes another pint of beer (Billy Bragg) # 148 - 149

Billy Bragg  Greetings To The New Brunette; Deportees/ The Tatler; Jeane; There Is Power In A Union (instrumental) (Chrysalis 12", X14319, 1986)

Billy Bragg Levi Stubbs' Tears; Between The Wars/ Think Again; Walk Away Renee (version) (Chrysalis 12", X14299, 1986)

I know, I know. We're back to the Bs. What gives?

I realised when I was doing the George Harrison lot that I'd forgotten to include the 12 inch singles up to H so here we go - a bit of a backtrack.

That's the good thing with writing a blog - you can make up your own rules.

So here we go - back to the Bs with Billy Bragg. Steve Hillage will have to wait a while.

I've mentioned Mr Bragg from Barking in the blog a few times and even written about Levi Stubbs' Tears before ( http://googoogarjoob.blogspot.co.nz/2009/07/i-dont-want-to-change-world-im-not.html ) so I'll concentrate on Greetings for this post.

It's a double A side with two terrific songs. 

Greetings has some fantastic poetry (how can you lie there and think of England when you don't even know who's in the team) and Deportees is Billy's version of the Woody Guthrie tale. I've seldom heard it done better (outside of Bob Dylan).




Hidden gems: Definitely value for money on the 12" format generally. Walk Away Renee on the Tears 12" is amazing - a really simple tale about taking the crunchy with the smooth with the old Four Tops hit being played on acoustic in the background.

The snap in the tale is 'she cut her hair and I stopped loving her' (as the Tui beer ads in NZ say - Yeah right!)