A few of the cricket references in this song: 1) The names Geoff and John refer to two of England's greatest cricketers of the 60s and 70s: fast bowler John Snow and batsman Geoff Boycott. 2) The Umpire is the game's referee, and at the end of a game he would pick up the cricket ball and stow it away in the pocket of his white umpire's coat. 3) The line about the ball having "spun" refers to a slow bowler's technique whereby he manipulates the ball by dragging his fingers across its surface as he bowls it, thus causing it to spin in the air and off the turf so that the batsman is often unable to predict its trajectory. 4) Silly Mid On is a fielding position where the fielder is expected to deal with a batman's shots by catching the ball or preventing it reaching the boundary. 5) The Groundsman is the man who takes care of the pitch. 6) "Pushing for four with the spin" describes a batman scoring (or attempting to score) a boundary off a spinning ball. 7) "Days of Grace" is in part a reference to the late-Victorian era batsman W G Grace, the very definition of The Old Cricketer, and the most legendary player in the game's history. Of course the song is exactly as you say: a lament for passing glory, the brevity of life and the transience of human attainment, but it's also a delicious roll in the aching pleasures of nostalgia, particularly the drink-enhanced kind, the "sting in the ale". And that's the beauty of cricket - somehow the game embodies all of this, and so much more.
That is a great summing up. Every cricket player/fan of a certain age hears the lyrics and immediately understands this is for them. It may be the end, but remember those long summer days. That was our time.
A friend told me about Roy Harper and played this song for me when I was in college around 1974. I have never forgotten it and finally looked it up recently. Beautiful song. I believe the song is a metaphor.
Roy sang the song “Have a Cigar” on Pink Floyd’s “Wish You We’re Here” album. This is one of my favourite songs, after hearing him sing it on Test Match Special.
The trouble is, Harri, I don't know about cricket either but I do know that this is an absolutely outstanding song. Part of the reason I like it is that it was a favourite of the best radio presenter I have heard, John Shaw, who was devoted to good music and local cricket. Because of the first, he was sacked by every music station in the East Midlands at least once because he refused to be playlisted but he had a loyal following who knew him as a kind and intelligent person with time for them. And every year from 1975, when the cricket season finished, he played this song. Roy Harper was already a seasoned and popular folkie when the album from which this song was taken was released. HQ was his seventh album and this was its climax although it was just Roy and the Grimethorpe Colliery Band. It's one of those songs where the music and the poetry of the lyrics fit together so well that they can't be separated. There are many cricket references in it, including the "Two pounds six of willow wood" that intrigued you. It's actually the lowest weight of a cricket bat which is made from willow. It also mentions Geoff (Boycott) and John (Snow), two famous cricketers. There's probably an allusion to WG Grace as well. So what is it about? It's about life and friendship and sudden bursts of laughter and laughter dying away and villages and nostalgia and Englishness and being a child and being old and leaving time behind and Eternity and the eternal present and sitting and talking and drinking ale and basking in the sun and the threat of rain and cold and about the green stuff on his knees and about relationships being made and lost and love and loss and death and hope and a common society and working men's leisure time and collieries and factories and small shops and big chapels and steam trains arriving at and departing from stations that nobody uses and sounds of grasshoppers and sights of swallows and about the end of all things and about everything going on and on and on forever and the feeling that in the end, everything must be alright. It's about all of those things and many more and it's 7:23 of perfection.
"It's about life and friendship and sudden bursts of laughter and laughter dying away and villages and nostalgia and Englishness and being a child and being old and leaving time behind and Eternity and the eternal present and sitting and talking and drinking ale and basking in the sun and the threat of rain and cold and about the green stuff on his knees and about relationships being made and lost and love and loss and death and hope and a common society and working men's leisure time and collieries and factories and small shops and big chapels and steam trains arriving at and departing from stations that nobody uses and sounds of grasshoppers and sights of swallows and about the end of all things and about everything going on and on and on forever and the feeling that in the end, everything must be alright." Brilliant words. You nailed it! 👍
Couldn't of put it better myself even if I had considered it over the full five days of a test match! Thank you for your beautiful observations of a beautiful Englishman
You hit the nail on the head. It was essentially a methaphor for death. Leaving the crease, as in the crease on a cricket pitch when the batman is out.
I always assumed it was about leaving this life rather than literally the crease. The Radio 1 DJ John Peel said that his producer and friend John Walters wanted to play this record at Peel's funeral. In the event, Walters died first and one of the last things Peel was reported to have said before his own death was "I really miss John Walters. I wish I'd spent more time with him".
Paul Gambacinni just said exactly what you did on his radio 2 show tonight. I read it as a metaphor for death as opposed to a direct reference to cricket. I had heard it before but all art needs a backstory to really be accessible.
This is pretty great. I have to hand it to you Harri. Your channel wins the prize for widest variety and open mindedness in accepting requests. I’ve seen the passion for football among the Brits and, if the same intensity exists among cricket fans, I am not surprised that people are singing about it. Great stuff🌺✌️
Hallucinating light from Roy's HQ album is a beautiful song, and his flat baroque and berserk album is surreal and lamenting songs are best, he's pretty old now, his son Ben harper sounds like him, but different genre
The song is about death. The cricketer (person) leaves the crease (end of life) we never know whether he is gone (memories if the person in life. Thus the mournful sound.
Nice song. I see it as a passage from one phase of life into another. Your choice of tunes to react to continue to surprise! Keep up the great work Harri!
I think the melancholic tone as you quite correctly describe it, is reflecting on the dominance of the West Indies cricket team who were beating everyone in the 1970s when this came out. England were past it in international terms with the West Indies winning overwhelmingly in 1973. HQ came out in 1975 and 1976 saw the legendary "black wash" when the Windies routed England throughout the summer... So it was prescient too
Harri doesn't follow cricket, well I suppose all Brits don't follow football. From the mid-late 1970s to the early 1990s, the West Indies team was the strongest in the world in both Test and One Day International cricket. A number of cricketers who were considered among the best in the world have hailed from the West Indies: Garfield Sobers, Lance Gibbs, George Headley, Brian Lara, Vivian Richards, Clive Lloyd, Malcolm Marshall, Alvin Kallicharran, Andy Roberts, Rohan Kanhai, Frank Worrell, Clyde Walcott, Everton Weekes, Curtly Ambrose, Michael Holding, Courtney Walsh, Joel Garner and Wes Hall have all been inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame. The West Indies have won the ICC Cricket World Cup twice (1975 and 1979 when it was styled the Prudential Cup), the ICC T20 World Cup twice (2012 and 2016 when it was styled World Twenty20), the ICC Champions Trophy once (2004), the ICC Under 19 Cricket World Cup once (2016), and have also finished as runners-up in the Cricket World Cup (1983), the Under 19 Cricket World Cup (2004), and the ICC Champions Trophy (2006). The West Indies appeared in three consecutive World Cup finals (1975, 1979 and 1983), and were the first team to win back-to-back World Cups (1975 and 1979), both of these records have been surpassed only by Australian Cricket Team who appear in 4 consecutive World Cup Finals (1996, 1999, 2003 and 2007) winning 3 consecutive World Cups (1999, 2003 and 2007). The West Indies have hosted the 2007 Cricket World Cup and the 2010 ICC World Twenty20. In June 2019, during the 2019 Cricket World Cup, the West Indies played their 800th ODI match.
I read that it’s a song about the cricket clubs that joined up for the First World War. And that all those men were lost. Does anyone know what the song is about?
A few of the cricket references in this song:
1) The names Geoff and John refer to two of England's greatest cricketers of the 60s and 70s: fast bowler John Snow and batsman Geoff Boycott.
2) The Umpire is the game's referee, and at the end of a game he would pick up the cricket ball and stow it away in the pocket of his white umpire's coat.
3) The line about the ball having "spun" refers to a slow bowler's technique whereby he manipulates the ball by dragging his fingers across its surface as he bowls it, thus causing it to spin in the air and off the turf so that the batsman is often unable to predict its trajectory.
4) Silly Mid On is a fielding position where the fielder is expected to deal with a batman's shots by catching the ball or preventing it reaching the boundary.
5) The Groundsman is the man who takes care of the pitch.
6) "Pushing for four with the spin" describes a batman scoring (or attempting to score) a boundary off a spinning ball.
7) "Days of Grace" is in part a reference to the late-Victorian era batsman W G Grace, the very definition of The Old Cricketer, and the most legendary player in the game's history.
Of course the song is exactly as you say: a lament for passing glory, the brevity of life and the transience of human attainment, but it's also a delicious roll in the aching pleasures of nostalgia, particularly the drink-enhanced kind, the "sting in the ale". And that's the beauty of cricket - somehow the game embodies all of this, and so much more.
That is a great summing up. Every cricket player/fan of a certain age hears the lyrics and immediately understands this is for them. It may be the end, but remember those long summer days. That was our time.
A friend told me about Roy Harper and played this song for me when I was in college around 1974.
I have never forgotten it and finally looked it up recently.
Beautiful song.
I believe the song is a metaphor.
Roy sang the song “Have a Cigar” on Pink Floyd’s “Wish You We’re Here” album. This is one of my favourite songs, after hearing him sing it on Test Match Special.
Two pounds six (ounces) - He's referring the weight of the bat. Lovely use of major 7th chords in this song.
The trouble is, Harri, I don't know about cricket either but I do know that this is an absolutely outstanding song.
Part of the reason I like it is that it was a favourite of the best radio presenter I have heard, John Shaw, who was devoted to good music and local cricket. Because of the first, he was sacked by every music station in the East Midlands at least once because he refused to be playlisted but he had a loyal following who knew him as a kind and intelligent person with time for them. And every year from 1975, when the cricket season finished, he played this song.
Roy Harper was already a seasoned and popular folkie when the album from which this song was taken was released. HQ was his seventh album and this was its climax although it was just Roy and the Grimethorpe Colliery Band. It's one of those songs where the music and the poetry of the lyrics fit together so well that they can't be separated. There are many cricket references in it, including the "Two pounds six of willow wood" that intrigued you. It's actually the lowest weight of a cricket bat which is made from willow. It also mentions Geoff (Boycott) and John (Snow), two famous cricketers. There's probably an allusion to WG Grace as well. So what is it about?
It's about life and friendship and sudden bursts of laughter and laughter dying away and villages and nostalgia and Englishness and being a child and being old and leaving time behind and Eternity and the eternal present and sitting and talking and drinking ale and basking in the sun and the threat of rain and cold and about the green stuff on his knees and about relationships being made and lost and love and loss and death and hope and a common society and working men's leisure time and collieries and factories and small shops and big chapels and steam trains arriving at and departing from stations that nobody uses and sounds of grasshoppers and sights of swallows and about the end of all things and about everything going on and on and on forever and the feeling that in the end, everything must be alright.
It's about all of those things and many more and it's 7:23 of perfection.
"It's about life and friendship and sudden bursts of laughter and laughter dying away and villages and nostalgia and Englishness and being a child and being old and leaving time behind and Eternity and the eternal present and sitting and talking and drinking ale and basking in the sun and the threat of rain and cold and about the green stuff on his knees and about relationships being made and lost and love and loss and death and hope and a common society and working men's leisure time and collieries and factories and small shops and big chapels and steam trains arriving at and departing from stations that nobody uses and sounds of grasshoppers and sights of swallows and about the end of all things and about everything going on and on and on forever and the feeling that in the end, everything must be alright." Brilliant words. You nailed it! 👍
Couldn't of put it better myself even if I had considered it over the full five days of a test match!
Thank you for your beautiful observations of a beautiful Englishman
You hit the nail on the head. It was essentially a methaphor for death. Leaving the crease, as in the crease on a cricket pitch when the batman is out.
It's about life, Hari.
I always assumed it was about leaving this life rather than literally the crease. The Radio 1 DJ John Peel said that his producer and friend John Walters wanted to play this record at Peel's funeral. In the event, Walters died first and one of the last things Peel was reported to have said before his own death was "I really miss John Walters. I wish I'd spent more time with him".
Paul Gambacinni just said exactly what you did on his radio 2 show tonight. I read it as a metaphor for death as opposed to a direct reference to cricket. I had heard it before but all art needs a backstory to really be accessible.
The album Stormcock from 1971 and in particular the track The Same Old Rock is for me his masterpiece.
Hats off to Roy Harper
led zep have a song mentioning him, 'hat's off to roy harper' it's on led zep 3
This is pretty great. I have to hand it to you Harri. Your channel wins the prize for widest variety and open mindedness in accepting requests. I’ve seen the passion for football among the Brits and, if the same intensity exists among cricket fans, I am not surprised that people are singing about it. Great stuff🌺✌️
Hallucinating light from Roy's HQ album is a beautiful song, and his flat baroque and berserk album is surreal and lamenting songs are best, he's pretty old now, his son Ben harper sounds like him, but different genre
The song is about death. The cricketer (person) leaves the crease (end of life) we never know whether he is gone (memories if the person in life. Thus the mournful sound.
Great analysis Harri!
Wow! Thanks Harri. I love this track, and haven't heard it in a great while. Cheers
A very mellow song with a bit of sadness to it. I love it Harri
Nice song. I see it as a passage from one phase of life into another. Your choice of tunes to react to continue to surprise! Keep up the great work Harri!
Always loved this! It just be Geoff...
From the great HQ album. Check out The Game with Dave Gilmour on guitar too!
I think the melancholic tone as you quite correctly describe it, is reflecting on the dominance of the West Indies cricket team who were beating everyone in the 1970s when this came out. England were past it in international terms with the West Indies winning overwhelmingly in 1973. HQ came out in 1975 and 1976 saw the legendary "black wash" when the Windies routed England throughout the summer... So it was prescient too
The "black wash" was the 1984 series which West Indies won 5 - nil. England did manage two draws in '76....just! 😃
When an old cricketer dies, his ghost can be seen as a twelfth man at silly mid on (a fielding position) - there are only 11 players
Might just be the most English song ever were it not for ‘ One of those days in England’ also by Roy Harper.
Wonder if Led Zeppelin's "Hats Off To Roy Harper" on LZ 3 album is about this guy.
Yes it’s him
Jimmy page wanted Roy to join Led Zeppelin before they found Robert Plant
"2 pound, 6" ounces. Its the weight of the bat. They were much lighter back in the day.
Harri doesn't follow cricket, well I suppose all Brits don't follow football.
From the mid-late 1970s to the early 1990s, the West Indies team was the strongest in the world in both Test and One Day International cricket. A number of cricketers who were considered among the best in the world have hailed from the West Indies: Garfield Sobers, Lance Gibbs, George Headley, Brian Lara, Vivian Richards, Clive Lloyd, Malcolm Marshall, Alvin Kallicharran, Andy Roberts, Rohan Kanhai, Frank Worrell, Clyde Walcott, Everton Weekes, Curtly Ambrose, Michael Holding, Courtney Walsh, Joel Garner and Wes Hall have all been inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame.
The West Indies have won the ICC Cricket World Cup twice (1975 and 1979 when it was styled the Prudential Cup), the ICC T20 World Cup twice (2012 and 2016 when it was styled World Twenty20), the ICC Champions Trophy once (2004), the ICC Under 19 Cricket World Cup once (2016), and have also finished as runners-up in the Cricket World Cup (1983), the Under 19 Cricket World Cup (2004), and the ICC Champions Trophy (2006). The West Indies appeared in three consecutive World Cup finals (1975, 1979 and 1983), and were the first team to win back-to-back World Cups (1975 and 1979), both of these records have been surpassed only by Australian Cricket Team who appear in 4 consecutive World Cup Finals (1996, 1999, 2003 and 2007) winning 3 consecutive World Cups (1999, 2003 and 2007).
The West Indies have hosted the 2007 Cricket World Cup and the 2010 ICC World Twenty20. In June 2019, during the 2019 Cricket World Cup, the West Indies played their 800th ODI match.
What a boring post, seriously shorten that shit.
And it could be Geoff Boycott and it could be John Snow...
Or Jeff Arnold the Surrey trundler?😁
Hors de Ouevres...from Stormcock, go hang with some mates first then hurry home and stick this on....all the best x.
Chirp , chirp , slept well !
I read that it’s a song about the cricket clubs that joined up for the First World War. And that all those men were lost. Does anyone know what the song is about?
Grimethorpe Colliery Brass Band.....
It’s about the cricket clubs who went to world war 1 and lost their lives/friends.
2 pound six was the weight of the bat, 2lb 6oz
Ere mate, check out the Roy Harper covers and tutorials by 'Bad Speech' on CZcams.....
Cricket bats are always weighed in pounds.
Leaves the crease could mean he died possibly, or simply retired to pasture new.