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Dec. 25, 2014 - Radio Free Nortwest - H.A. Covington
01:53:50
20141225_rfn
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Oh, then tell me, Sean O 'Farrell, tell me why you hurry so.
Hush your vocal, hush and listen, and his cheeks were all aglow.
I bear orders from the captain, get you ready quick and soon.
For the pikes must be together by the rising of the moon.
By the rising of the moon, by the rising of the moon.
For the pikes must be together by the rising of the moon Oh, then tell me, Sean O'Farrell, where the gathering is to be In the old spot by the river, rightful norm to you and me One word more for
signal, token, whistle of the marching tune For your pike upon your shoulder by the rising of the moon By the rising of the moon, by the rising of the moon With your pike upon your shoulder by the rising of the moon It's Christmas Day, December 25th, 2014.
I'm Harold Covington, and this is Radio Free Northwest.
Okay, because today is the last podcast for the Annus Horribilis of 2014, I'm going to do our annual end-of-the-year all-music show today.
So, you won't have to listen to me play Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer like you do every year.
I've done these year-end music broadcasts in a lot of ways.
This will actually be the fifth one of these that I've produced.
Sometimes I start with a kind of musical history, beginning in the Middle Ages, and working my way up to the days of rock and roll.
And sometimes I've laid out soundtracks or theme music for the Northwest Independence novels, although that's always struck me as a little narcissistic.
This year I've got something of a problem in that during the great computer crash of October, I lost a lot of my favorite music off my primary computer and I'm having to do some stepping to try and recover some of it.
So I think what I'm going to do this year is simply meander.
I'm going to take it easy and just play some of my favorite mellows from the show in a very loosely organized fashion.
Now, some of you may have heard these songs before, especially if you're one of these fanatics who have actually gone to the trouble of downloading and listening to all nearly 260 episodes of Radio Free Northwest, and I admit that it still freaks me out that anybody would do that, but apparently some of you do.
Anyway, to lighten up your Christmas, here are some of Harold's favorite vibes.
Now, let's start off with the early stuff, like I usually do.
You're going to remember from year-end shows past that I've mentioned we don't actually have much by way of music prior to about 1000 AD, because although surely, surely musicians and troubadours and whatnot must have had some method of writing down music in tablature form, no one has yet discovered it or been able to figure it out.
That's one of the holy grails of archaeology and historical scholarship.
To figure out...
What ancient music actually sounded like and listen to the tunes that Julius Caesar played at his orgies or the theme song of the oracle at Delphi, that kind of thing.
Well, we can't go that far back, so here are some medieval mellows for you.
The first song being a sort of reproduction of the 13th century original using original instruments, or rather, original reconstruction instruments, I should say, by a group called the Sequentia Ensemble that specializes in that kind of thing.
And the latter two songs are modern renditions by two excellent medieval music groups.
The End
Between the sea and all of the sand Then we'll be a true love of mine
The End
Daughter, dear
daughter, dear daughter, I've done you no wrong, I've married you to a great lord's son.
The End
Age of six,
the end The End
Okay, now we go from the ancient to the electronic.
I've always had a taste for synthesizer music.
The first number I'm going to lay on you is by the German synthesizer group Tangerine Dream.
Part of the soundtrack from a great flick called The Sorcerer.
The last two are from my childhood in the 1960s, from a time when little boys in crew cuts and plaid shirts were riding bicycles and growing up all over suburban America full of the space program and the great science fiction of writers like Robert Heinlein and Philip K. Dick and Alan E. Norse, Cyril Kornbluth and Alfred Bester.
We watched shows like Time Tunnel and The Outer Limits, and we genuinely believed that the world would be ours forever, and that many of us would spend the greater part of our lives walking on other planets or living in space.
When I was in the second grade, everything stopped in my school, and there was a radio in every classroom as we listened to a live broadcast of Alan Shepard's first manned space flight from Cape Canaveral.
There was almost as much excitement in the early 60s when the first communications satellite was put into orbit.
It was called Telstar, and that's the title of the second piece.
And finally, there's a weird hippie-ish sounding cut from 1969 called the Minotaur, which admittedly was a weird and hippie-ish time.
That was when the rot was starting.
But I remember that I like this one so much that I bought it on 45 and don't ask me what those were or will be here all night.
I'm out.
*music*
Blue is the spatial limitation of your mind.
you you Some Civil War songs, I think.
And yes, being a Southerner myself, I say Civil War and not War of Northern Aggression.
And I say Southerner instead of Southron.
Because to me, the war is not some quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore that allows modern-day middle-aged Walter Mitty's to dress up in costumes costing thousands of dollars that needs to be spent on getting them and their families to the Northwest.
In order to play games in bloodless and inaccurate reenactments of some of the most horrible and agonizing battles in history, and to strike a pose pretending that they're brave and noble men like our ancestors when in fact they're a bunch of...
Ugh, we won't get into that.
It was a civil war.
A civil war between white men caused by the mere presence of niggers on the North American continent.
Just like the second civil war which is fast approaching will be.
Last year, I learned for the first time that one of my direct ancestors, Elijah Covington of the first South Carolina Volunteers, died in the Union Prisoner of War camp on Harts Island in New York Harbor on May 25, 1865, six weeks after the war was over, when he should have been on his way home.
When I discussed this on Radio Free Northwest...
Comrade Mike from New York and his wife searched out my great-great-grandfather's burial place in New York City and sent me a little plastic baggie filled with earth and grass from his grave, which I deeply appreciate.
This is Kathy Matea.
Bob Roebuck is my sweetheart's name.
He's off to the wars and gone.
He's fighting for his nanny dear, his sword is buckled on.
He's fighting for his own true love.
His foes he does defy.
He is the darling of my heart, my southern soldier boy.
Oh, if in battle he was slain, I'm sure that I should die.
But I'm sure he'll come again and cheer my weeping eyes.
But should he fall in this glorious cause, he's still with me, my dear.
From any sweet heart morn is the loss of a soul and a soul deborah.
I hope for the best and so do all those hopes are in the fall.
I know we shall end the day for southern's never-mean.
And when we think of those who are away, we'll look above for joy.
And I'm mighty glad that my mommy is a southern soul deborah.
Thank you.
you you The next up is a series of songs from the famous White Mansions album from the 1980s.
All the pro-Southern songs, of course, the ones where we're winning.
These are sung by Charlie Daniels, I think.
The States called its sons to its side, boys.
They're hosting up the stars and the bars.
We must all prepare to fight.
Because we feel he's right.
And Joy and Jeff Davis are near and far.
They can't understand our way of life, boys.
They don't want slaves in the new territories.
The knowledge that they lack is there's no cotton if there's no blacks.
And that gives us a reason to succeed.
Come out of the meadows and plantation.
Come away from the shores down by the sea.
Join under the flag with your musket in your bag.
We got to break ties with the North to be free.
Since they got infected, there ain't no choice for us.
We showed them what we meant when something fell.
And if they try to take us back, or come and free the blacks, the good Lord knows we're going to give them hell.
Come out of the meadows and plantation.
Come away from the shores down by the sea.
Join under the flag with your musket in your bag.
We got to break ties with the North to be free.
Come out of the meadows and plantation.
Come away from the shores down by the sea.
Join under the flag with your musket in your bag.
We got to break ties with the North to be free.
Hell, I never did lock them Yankees anyhow.
Always looking down their nose at us like they were something special.
God damn it, this thing will be over in ten weeks'time anyhow.
We're going to whip their ass.
We got to break ties with the North to be free.
So come on, Caleb, you're a man to join in.
When you're fighting Yankees, the redneck's a man's best friend.
We got to break ties with the North to be free.
Amen.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, one more song for our Civil War selection, but this one's going to take a little bit of explaining beforehand.
You know, one of the most pernicious myths in American history is this idea that the Irish immigrants of the 19th century fought only on the side of the Union.
Actually, there were a number of Irish units in the Confederate Army, such as Kelly's Irish Brigade and McCausland's Raiders.
The state of Louisiana seceded from the Union and joined the Confederacy in January of 1861.
Like many localities throughout the South, they raised local militia units to provide for local defense, including a company of Irish immigrants who were, of course, called the Hibernian Corps.
Now, we don't know much about them except that they existed and they fought when no one else would.
For a variety of long, involved historical reasons I won't get into, there were almost no Confederate forces in the city itself 15 months later when a combined naval and army force Under Commodore David Farragut and Union General Benjamin Butler attacked,
and the city fathers decided to surrender without a fight, which some may consider pusillanimous, but in view of what the Americans later did to cities like Vicksburg and Charleston and Atlanta, I think we can safely say that the only reason we still have the French Quarter today is because of that surrender, just like we still have Antebellum Savannah today is for the same reason.
In any case, New Orleans ordered its Home Guard units to lay down their arms and disperse peacefully.
But either through some screw-up of typical military incompetence, the Hibernians didn't get the order to surrender, or else they recognized the tyrant's servants, whether they were wearing red coats or blue coats, and decided to hell with this, they weren't going to let these American dogs come into their homes and bite without a fight.
So when Ben Butler was marching his 5,000-man army down the road to occupy the city in what he thought was going to be a cakewalk, those scrappy Irishmen opened fire on their asses.
Held them off for almost six hours, in fact, which really pissed Ben the Beast off.
American soldiers don't like having their cakewalks interrupted by annoying resistance, be they in New Orleans or in Baghdad.
Anyway, a large number of Irishmen died defending the country of my birth, when, for whatever reason, those who were born there would not.
May 9, 1862.
Guru Mila Mahogat, lads.
Nefait Middarmat.
You Irish men and women, To draw me both young and old, A doleful lamentation, Now to you I will unfold, With me to ride, To fall the riddle door, To ride her, I fall the riddle door, Tonight, oh!
One hundred gallant Irishmen we are left for to deplore, whose bodies fell a victim upon their Columbia shore, with me to-ray-ah, my father-e-da-da, to-ray-ah, my father-e-da-da-ton-ay-do.
It was at the siege of New Orleans, upon the 9th of May, our countrymen, they suffered so 'er upon that fatal day, with me too.
I'll be right back.
They were engaged by five to one when charged on with the steel.
But ere him some still loudly cry, we'll die before we'll yield, with me to rye, my father eel da, to rye, her, I father eel da, to die, oh.
They were a puss, they could not stand, exertion proved in vain, they strove to break the enemy's force and drive them from the plain, with me to rye, my father eel da, to rye, her, I father eel da, to die, oh.
Not one of them did their escape Upon that free-to-day, with me too.
Uriah!
Fal-de-reel-da!
Uriah!
Fal-de-reel-da!
Tonight, oh!
To see the streets that evening, each heart would rend with pain.
The human-blooding village, and like any flood, a stream, with me do-ray-ah, a thunder-ah, do-ray-ah, a thunder-ah, to-ray-ah, a thunder-ah, to-day-to.
Men's heads blown off their bodies, the most dismal for to see.
And wounded men did loudly cry with pain and agony With me do I wonder, do I arrive from the moon to the night home The settlers waited then
in advance and broken through the town They trampled dead and wounded men that lay up on the ground With me do I
wonder, do I arrive from the moon to the night home The wounded called for mercy but none they did receive They numbered them upon the dead and threw them in the grave With me do I
wonder, do I arrive from the moon to the night home Three hundred killed and wounded that did lay in the grave One half of them were Irishmen far from their native shore With me do I arrive from the moon to the night home Poor orphans now they may weep and cry and hour and
through the day They let their lovely children go on to our merry-kay With me do I arrive from the little dawn Do I arrive from the little dawn And cry though I that hear those dope-wool lines do not
neglect to toil And labor for a light we rode on the same path to sail With me do I arrive from the little dawn Where I arrive from the little dawn To the night home And I think upon our countrymen The whole daft fair native shore Their friends may mourn for their loss They'll never see them go With me
do I arrive from the little dawn Where I arrive from the little dawn To the night home You know it falls through poverty, they left their need to show with me too.
Raya, Fagurila, Raya, Fagurila, tonight home.
They had no one to heal their wounds.
May angels them surround before the throne of heaven.
May they wear a brilliant crown with me.
Okay, I think it's safe to say that...
One of our favorite topics of conversation here on the Lunatic Fringe is, of course, guns and gun control.
So here's some gun songs for you.
Two from here in America and one from an Irish perspective.
And don't worry, I won't play Lynyrd Skynyrd's Saturday Night Special.
Good song though it is.
About the time my daddy left to fight the big war I saw my first pistol in the general store, in the general store.
When I was 13, I thought it was the finest thing I ever had seen.
So I asked if I could have one someday when I blew up.
Mama dropped a dozen eggs.
She really blew up.
Yes, she really blew up.
She didn't understand.
Mama said the pistol is the devil's right hand The devil's right hand, the devil's right hand Mama said the pistol is the devil's right hand The very first pistol was a cap and ball coat Shoot as fast as lightning but it moves a mile slow It moves a mile slow And soon I
found out it'll get you into trouble But it can't get you by About a year later got a cold.45 Called the peacemaker but I never knew why I didn't understand.
Mama said the pistol is the devil's right hand I got into a card
game in a cumberland town, caught a minor cheatin' So I shot the dog down.
Shot the dog down.
Watched a man fall.
Never touched his holster.
Never had a chance to draw.
The trial was in the morning and they brought me out of bed.
Asked me how I made it.
Not the guilty I said.
Not the guilty I said.
You got the wrong man.
Nothing touched a trigger but the devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
Nothing touched a trigger but the devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
Mama sent a pistol at the devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
The devil's right hand.
To the town of Alfre, who rode a stranger one fine day.
Hardly spoke to folks around him, didn't have too much to say.
No one dared to ask his business, no one dared to make a slip.
The stranger there among them had a big iron on his hip, big iron on his hip.
It was early in the morning when he rode into the town.
He came riding from the south side, slowly looking all around.
He's an outlaw, loose and running, came the whisper from each lip.
And he's here to do some business with a big iron on his hip, big iron on his hip.
In this town there lived an outlaw by the name of Texas Red.
Hmm.
He was vicious and a killer, though a youth of twenty-four.
And the notches on his pistol numbered one and nineteen more.
One and nineteen more.
Now the strangers started talking, made it plain to folks around.
Was an Arizona Ranger, wouldn't be too long in town.
He came here to take an outlaw back alive or maybe dead.
And he said it didn't matter, he was after Texas Red.
After Texas Red.
Wasn't long before the story was relayed to Texas Red.
But the outlaw didn't worry men that tried before were dead.
Twenty men had tried to take him.
Twenty men had made a slip.
Twenty-one would be the ranger with a big iron on his hip.
Big iron on his hip.
The morning passed so quickly it was time for them to meet.
It was twenty past eleven when they walked out in the street.
Folks were watching from the windows.
Everybody held their breath.
They knew this handsome ranger was about to meet his death.
About to meet his death.
There was forty feet between them when they stopped to make their play.
And the swiftness of the ranger is still talked about today.
Texas read it not cleared leather for a bullet fairly ripped.
And the ranger's aim was deadly with a big iron on his hip.
Big iron on his hip.
It was over in a moment and the folks had gathered round.
There before them lay the body of the outlaw on the ground.
Oh, he might have went on living, but he made one fatal slip when he tried to match the ranger with a big iron on his hip.
Big iron on his hip.
Big iron, big iron.
When he tried to match the ranger with a big iron on his hip.
Big iron on his head.
We remember back in time, the year of 69. You laid your doubts of war into our streets.
We could not stand idly by and let our families die.
We fought you back and joined the IRA.
So stop your fucking crown, we IELTS won't lie down.
And give away our guns to a foreign land.
No, some takes not our guns, will you ever get from us?
You can stick your decommission up your ass.
Well, you murdered 14 young men, and you'll do the same again.
Decommission you will never, never see.
As long as we have men, like the famous fighting men.
Yes, those famous fighting men from cross with the land.
So stop your fucking crown, we IELTS won't lie down.
And give away our guns to a foreign land.
No, some takes not our guns, will you ever get from us?
You can stick your decommission up your ass.
No, some takes not our guns.
We IELTS won't lie down.
No, some takes not our guns.
No, some takes not our guns, will you ever get from us?
You can stick your decommission up your ass.
And memory of the ten, there were Ireland's bravest now.
We will not forget the ones that fall and die.
Decommission you can see, will never, ever be.
Because the I and I will always be around.
So stop your fucking crown, we IELTS won't lie down.
And give away our guns to a foreign land.
No, some takes not our guns, will you ever get from us?
You can stick your decommission up your ass.
You can tell the RUC, those black bastards from the king.
Then we'll never, march down the valley road.
Never, never, never.
We want to make a fight.
We will stand up for our right You can take your fucking march and give us peace So stuff your fucking crown We have his boat leg down And give away our guns to foreign land No
syntax, not our guns Will you ever get from us You can stick your day commission up your ass No tumble, you're an ass If you think that it will last Six counties are under tyranny You can tell we Tony Blair And my
mole, the monkey care They can stick your day commission up their ass So stuff your fucking crown We have his boat leg down And give away our guns to foreign land No
syntax, not our guns Will you ever get from us You can stick your day commission up your ass So stuff your fucking crown We have his boat leg down And give away our guns to foreign land No
syntax, not our guns Will you ever get from us Cause the IRA will always be around Oh, the IRA will always be around Yes, the IRA will always be around Yes, the IRA will always be around Yes, the IRA will always be around you Where does my musical fancy wander now?
I know, let's have some Militaria.
Big band marching music stuff.
I actually lost a lot of that during the October crash, but I think I still have some of it around I can play for you.
Okay, let's start out with two German marches, both fairly famous, Dry Lillian and Die Wacht am Rhein, and then we'll go for a march version of the ultimate South African folk song, Sari Marais.
These are assorted military mans whose name escapes me at the moment.
The music is playing.
The music is playing.
The music is playing.
The music is playing.
To make a long and very complex story short, in 1792, a man named Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle wrote one of the greatest revolutionary anthems ever composed.
It's called Les Marseillais, and it came about as follows.
Through a series of events which I won't detail, the French revolutionary government in Paris was in pretty grave peril.
I'm talking about the first revolutionary government of men like Danton and Barras and Mirabeau, who, for better or worse, sincerely believed in what they were doing.
I don't mean Robespierre and Marat and that gang of head-lopping lunatics who came later.
France was being invaded by foreign armies who wanted to restore the monarchy by force, and the government in Paris was shaky and under threat from subversive elements right in the city.
Danton called on what amounted to a kind of militia.
He asked all of the sections of the Jacobin Club, as they were called, to assemble armed men in towns and districts all over France and march on the capital to support the government.
On July 30, 1792, the first of these militia units, from the southern port city of Marseille, entered Paris to save the revolution.
Rouget Delisle allegedly saw them marching by beneath his window with their muskets and pitchforks and so forth, and he was inspired to write what became the national anthem of France.
I don't know who this lady is, but she sings it pretty well, I think.
I don't know who this lady is, but she sings it pretty well, I think.
I don't know who this lady is, but she sings it pretty well, I think.
I don't know who this lady is, but she sings it pretty well, I think.
She sings it pretty well, I think.
We'll see you next time.
We'll see you next time.
Okay.
Okay, I told you at the beginning that I was going to avoid the narcissism of getting musical over my Northwest novels, and then I remembered something I promised a certain female comrade a few months ago.
Now, we were talking about my writing and how when I'm working on a major fiction project, I usually make up theme music for the characters in my head, and she wanted to know what the theme music for my female characters was, and I told her.
And she wasn't familiar with most of them, so she asked me to play them on Radio Free Northwest, and I promised that I would do so on the year-end all-music program, and so here we are.
And I actually almost forgot my promise, but for the record, here are my theme songs for my four major female characters in the novels.
First off, of course, there is Kiki McGee in The Brigade.
This is Madonna.
Truth is never far behind You kept it here and well If I live to tell the secret I knew that we'll rise And we'll have the chance again I knew
that we'll rise If I ran away I'd never have the strength To go very far
How would they hear The beating of my heart Will it grow cold The secret that I hide Will I grow old How will they hear When will they learn How will they grow A man
can tell a thousand lies I've learned my lesson well Hope I live to tell the secret I have learned Till then It will burn inside of me The
truth is never far behind You kept it here and well If I live to tell the secret I knew that we'll rise And we'll have the chance again A man can tell the secret that I've found
you I've learned my lesson well I've learned my lesson well I've learned my lesson well And then there's the homespun character of Rooney Wingfield in A Distant Thunder.
Gotta be something southern and country for Rooney.
This is Nobody's Darling.
We'll be right back.
Don't you hear that banjo sing?
Wish that guy was mine.
Don't you hear that banjo sing?
I wish that guy was mine.
Don't you hear that banjo sing?
Oh, I wish I was a pineapple banging on a tree.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
Take a bite of me, my love.
Take a bite of me.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
And then there's probably, I think, my favorite female character in the books, just because her dialogue turned out to be so interesting, Nightshade from A Mighty Fortress.
This one is from way back in my day from Jefferson Airplane, and I close the novel with it.
This one is from way back in my day.
One generation got so hard.
This generation got no destination to hold.
Pick up the prize, and now it's time for you and me.
Got a revolution, got a revolution.
Hey, come on now, we're marching to the sea.
Got a revolution, got a revolution.
Who's in front of me, we'll do we.
We are volunteers of America.
Volunteers of America.
Oh, I've got a revolution.
I've got a revolution.
This one's coming up the streets.
Got a revolution, got a revolution.
Hey, I'm dancing down the street.
Got a revolution, got a revolution.
We are volunteers of America.
Oh, yeah.
We are volunteers of America.
We are volunteers of America.
Volunteers of America.
Finally, Finally, from Freedom Sons, this is Georgia Meyer's theme.
I heard this when I had just started to create her character, and I knew this was it.
I'd found Georgia's song.
This is Cindy Lauper.
Sometimes I'm afraid when you go Sometimes I'm afraid when you come home Underneath it all I think I'm afraid when there's nothing wrong But if I was being Welcome
I'm a fierce believer, afraid to fall But if I was fearless Could I be your reckless friend?
And if I was there for us Could you be the one who comes rushing in?
Sometimes I'm always
I'm so afraid of the dark I can't find no light in my heart I can feel my hand Pushing away from your heart as I can But
if I was I'm rushing.
Him.
Thank you.
Thank you.
One of my favorite musicians is a guy from my home state of North Carolina named Mike Cross.
He's a folk singer, balladeer, fiddle player, real great entertainer.
I was going to play you three straight Mike Cross cuts, but we're running long, and I want to close out with a nice Irish hoolie, so I'll only do two of them.
This is from the Alive and Kicking album.
Applause Thank you.
Thank you.
The Musicology Department at UNC Wilmington is proud to present this evening's lecture in Musicology.
Tonight's lecture deals with the Appalachian fiddle.
Many people wonder how the Appalachian fiddle creates its unique sound and thus sounds so different from the violin.
It does so because of the way in which it is constructed, which is in the following manner.
We take an ordinary cigar box.
We attach a series of laminated popsicle sticks.
This creates the sound chamber in the neck of the fiddle, as it's now called.
Now, the handsome scrollwork up here is actually a cryogenically frozen Tennessee land snail.
Do you understand?
Now, taking the entrails of a mature feline, that is, cat gut, we stretch them across the sound chamber.
These are the strings.
Now, taking an ordinary cherry wood stick, we stretch hair from the tail of a horse, freshly washed, across the stick.
We sprinkle it heavily with pine rosin, that is, sap from the pine trees, indigenous to the Appalachian region.
Finally, and most importantly, Inside the sound chamber, we place a live baby kitten.
Now, as the horse hair is drawn across the cat gut, two things occur.
First of all, the baby kitten hears mother's entrails vibrating.
That shakes it up.
Secondly, the rosin dust from the bow flakes down into the sound chamber and irritates the kitten's nostrils.
This causes the kitten to shriek aloud and thus produces the sound of the...
Appalachian fiddle.
*Music*
Take that lady by the fist, take that lady by the fist Lead her out in a great body of food Take that lady by the toe, take that lady by the toe See us how far you can go!
Sing that girl and I ain't fooling Sing that girl and I ain't fooling Come to love and I don't need no school
Oh, let's all go to three
Oh, let's all go to three Oh, let's all go to three Oh, let's all go to three Oh, let's all go to three
Oh, let's all go to three And now it's time for something grim and gory and bloody Let me bum you out Good
evening to you, mister The bounty hunter said You don't know
me, but I know there's a price upon your head I know you're wanted dead or alive That's what the posters say But I never shoot a man at night When he ain't had time to break So I'll give you a chance
Until sunrise tomorrow, my friend Before I come to shoot you down and bring your body in I warn you that I do my work quite well with all night I've tracked down many a man, I've taken many a life
Father, do not mourn for me, Mother, do not weep Whenever a man's soul, that also shall he reap I spent a long sleepless night with fear upon my breast Trying to get ready for my morning duel with death I hid up in a hayloft out on the edge of town And
at sunrise the bounty hunter came to shoot me down I fired down the bounty hunter standing in the street He raised his gun and fired a round of shots back up at me He hit my chest and shoulder and my gun flew from my hand Now I'm trapped up in this
hayloft, wounded unarmed Father, do not mourn for me, Mother, do not weep Whenever a man's soul, that also shall he reap The bounty hunter holds his fire and hoppers up at me Come out and take it like a
man, I'll make it quick and clean I know my time is running out and there's no way I can stall So I reach and grab the pitchfork that's hanging on the wall My body arches as I stretch and face the rising sun And I feel like a warrior's bow freshly carved and strung I launch my body through the air and the pitchfork in my hand
Now my muscles start to rust, my thoughts are growing cold While Gabriel and Satan shoot cramps for my soul And I'll see you next time.
Thank you.
Well, when the old sod was in the old sod, I picked up a taste for the music.
These are some of my favorite Irish numbers, in no particular order of importance or anything like that.
I just like them.
We'll start off with the cores and the chieftains and then move on to the Bothy Band, and then we'll just see what comes up.
We'll start off with the cores and the chieftains and then move on to the other side.
This is the Dubliners from back in the day when Ronnie Drew and Luke Kelly were still with the group.
This is a good recording, but you really need to hear these guys on a nice wet Sunday afternoon in the Wexford Inn on Wexford Street in Dublin where everybody's packing into the pub during the two hours that they're open on Sunday around noontime on lunchtime so they can knock back as many Guinnesses and Irish whiskeys as they can before they have to go home to the Sunday dinner or back to Mass or whatever.
And...
Up on the stage, you've got the Dubliners grinding away with their Guinness and their Irish whiskey, knocking back as much of it as they can.
So it's definitely an experience.
We'll hush and listen, and his cheeks were all aglow.
I bear orders from the captain, get you ready quick and soon.
For the pikes must be together at the rising of the moon.
At the rising of the moon.
At the rising of the moon.
For the pikes must be together at the rising of the moon And come tell me, Sean O'Carroll, where the gathering is to be At the old spot by the river, quite well known to you and me One more word for signal
token, whistle out the marching tune With your pike upon your shoulder at the rising of the moon At the rising of the moon, at the rising of the moon With your pike upon your shoulder at the rising of the moon Out from many a mud-walled
cabin, eyes were watching through the night Many a manly heart was beating for the blessed morning light Farmers rang along the valley to the banshee's lonely crew And a thousand pikes were flashing by the rising of the moon By the rising of the moon By the rising of the moon And a thousand pikes were flashing by
the rising of the moon All along that singing river that black mass of men was seen High above their shining weapons flew their own
class steerage on the Titanic from the movie Titanic, if you remember this scene.
Music by Ben Thede
Music by Ben Thede you Well, our time's up for this week's edition of Radio Free Northwest.
This program is brought to you by the Northwest Front, Post Office Box 4856, Seattle, Washington 98194.
Or you can go to the party's website at www.northwestfront.org.
This is Harold Covington, and I'll see you next week.
Until then, Sasha Underban.
Freedom.
Oh, and by the way, a very Merry Christmas to all of you and yours, and a great New Year, okay?
Oh, and by the way.
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