venta

Thanks to ChrisC for pointing out to me that it was the fiftieth anniversary of Aberfan today. Actually, what he said was "do you know anything about Aberfan?"

Yes. Yes, I do. But not from history lessons. The history I learned of trade unions and the struggle for workers' rights ended about a hundred years earlier. Nothing I learned in school told me about the obscure Welsh village where a spoil-heal from the local coal mine grew dangerously large, and then slid sideways to engulf buildings (including a school) and kill nearly 150 people, mostly children.

But I did grow up in the folk clubs of Durham. And mining disasters are something they've got covered. Poignant, political, poetic, polemic, the folksong writers are there, covering the everyday lives of everyday people.

Which is, incidentally, why I've finally conceded that Billy Bragg is a folk singer. Around the time of the financial crisis I saw Jez Lowe, who sang Bareknuckle, a song he'd written about the bankers' disregard for the casualties of their actions. Shortly afterwards, I saw Steve Tilston, who sang Pretty Penny, a song he'd written in response to those same bankers. And I thought yes, this is what distinguishes a writer of folk songs from any other singer/songwriter with a guitar, this documenting of the ordinary people's fight against The Man.

And then I saw Billy Bragg, debuting Last Flight to Abu Dhabi. And he kicked off about the "banker who made a lot of cash" and I thought, oh. Maybe I am about to lose this long-running argument about whether he's a folksinger.

Anyway. One of my earliest memories is being somewhere (Darlington Arts Centre? I'm not sure) and hearing the Teesside group The Wilsons. If you ask me today, I'll tell you that The Wilsons are an institution and one of my favourite singing groups, approximately 70% close harmony and 30% arsing about.

But when I was a kid, I was scared of loud noises. And the Wilsons are loud. I've seen panicking soundmen lunge for their desks after they have mistakenly assumed that folk music = quiet and twee. My parents report that when The Wilsons opened a new cub in their town recently the sound - unamplified - pinned an unsuspecting member of the bar staff against the back wall. The Wilsons in the 1980s were big men with big hair and big voices, and I was terrified.

I remember them singing Close the Coalhouse Door, the Alex Glasgow song from the play of the same name. It's a fairly scary song, with a fierce, harsh harmony in their arrangement. I didn't know what they were singing about, but I knew it was something dreadful.

The Wilsons never seem to come over as well recorded as they do live, but to mark the day, here's them singing the song.



(Skip to 1:45 if you want to avoid the arsing about part ;)