Weila Waila - The Dubliners

Weila Waila - The Dubliners

3:27

A Drop Of the Hard Stuff, 1967

traditional

Despite the jaunty fiddle and the bouncy tune, and the typical wry growl from the Ronnie Drew that makes you think everything is a joke, this is actually a murder ballad worthy of Nick Cave.  A woman who lives "down by the river seile" (the latter word possibly meaning "dirty" and later corrupted to "Sawyer" in some versions) has a three-month-old baby and one day puts a long pen knife knife in the wee bairn's head.  As with many death story-ballads of this type, no reason is given.  Some people just have that darkness in them.  She is hanged, after being arrested by, amusingly, "two policemen and a man."

Joe Hill - The Dubliners

Joe Hill - the Dubliners

2:48

Revolution, 1970

Written by Alfred Hayes and Earl Robinson, 1936

As a lifelong worshipper at the Church of the Slightly Blemished Bob, the first thing that I notice about this song is that it gave Dylan his first lines of "I Dream I Saw St. Augustine," with the fourth-century saint replacing the IWW labor activist.  This is a song to rally workers, encouraging them to organize, and reminds us that police are, and always have been, weapons of the rich to keep working classes down.  "The copper bosses they shot you, Joe / They filled you full of lead / 'Takes more than guns to kill a man' / Says Joe, 'And I ain't dead.'"  It's a nice idea, but propaganda seems to have weighed down the masses.

Hot Asphalt - The Dubliners

Hot Asphalt - The Dubliners

3:09

Finnegan Wakes, 1966

Written by Thomas Johnstone, possibly, c. 1878

Also knows as "The Hot Ashfelt" (which is how the Dubliners pronounce it here) or even "Hot Ash-pelt," this is a song about a man who works all day laying down asphalt but also is a freedom fighter ("But now I wear the geansaí and around me waist a belt / I'm the gaffer in the squad that makes the hot asphalt").  The geansai is a sweater that shows him to be a man of some position. One day a policeman comes and interrogates him, and he pushes the copper in the boiler of hot asphalt.  They take him out and start to clean him, and then the story gets weirder, as the narrator dies of a cold.  The Irish are great ones for mixing the righteously angry and self-deprecating humor, and this song is no exception.

Kelly the Boy From Killan - the Dubliners

Kelly the Boy From Killan - the Dubliners

2:31

More Of the Hard Stuff, 1967 

Written by Patrick Joseph McCall, 1898

John Kelly was a real-life United Irish leader who fought in the Wexford Rebellion of 1798.  During the battle, Kelly was wounded in the leg. He was moved to Wexford to recuperate but after the fall of Wexford on 21 June was dragged from his bed, tried and sentenced to death.  As usual in Irish rebel songs, hagiography can rear its head: "Tell me who is that giant with the gold curling hair / He who rides at the head of your band? / Seven feet is his height with some inches to spare / And he looks like a king in command."  This rendition is a rousing anthem, proud even in the jaws of defeat, as only the Dubliners can belt it out.

Banks Of the Roses [live] - the Dubliners

Banks Of the Roses [live] - the Dubliners

2:12

The Dubliners, 1964

traditional

This week is all about 1964!

This song dates to the 18th century.  It is sometimes conflated with another traditional tune called "Banks of the Primroses," which is quite different.  This one is about a lad named Johnny who leaves his love because his father doesn't approve.  There is another version in which Johnny kills the girl and buries her on the bank.  In this one the Dubliners sing on their live debut, he just goes on his merry way and imagines marrying another girl.  "The man that doesn't like me / Can leave his daughter at home."  That's cold, Johnny.  Anyway, I've been listening to the Dubliners all my life.  There is no better traditional Irish band.