Language   

No Hay Pan

The Young 'uns
Languages: English, Spanish


The Young 'uns

Related Songs

Robson’s Song
(The Young 'uns)
Jarama Valley
(Alex McDade)
David Guest
(The Young 'uns)


2019
The ballad of Johnny Longstaff
Johnny-Longstaff
Lyrics taken from mudcat.org


The Ballad of Johnny Longstaff è un concept album preso da uno spettacolo di teatro folk che narra la storia di Johnny Longstaff, eroe della "working Class", l'avventura di un ragazzo che inizia mendicando per le strade arriva in Spagna nelle Brigate internazionali, passando per la partecipazione alle Hunger Marches e alla battaglia di Cable Street

Any Bread? - Carrying the Coffin - Hostel Strike - Cable Street - Robson’s Song - Ta-Ra to Tooting - Noddy - The Great Tomorrow - Ay Carmela - Paella - No Hay Pan - Trench Tales - Lewis Clive - David Guest - Over the Ebro - The Valley of Jarama



This song started on a flight to Canada in July 2017 and took a long time to finish. The story Johnny relates in the live show about being served cat meat was going to be its own song but I struggled with how to go about it and so we decided in the end that we’d let Johnny tell the story in his own words (though we edited out the bit where he said it tasted like chicken!) The second verse came from this email from Duncan

I went to see my Aunt, she told me of a story my Dad told her many years ago.
Dad said that he and his mates were banned from every church in Stockton, the reason for this, and as they were suffering from real hunger they stole candles from churches to eat. - Duncan Longstaff

The first verse owes something to this brilliant line in one of my favourite books of recent years 
Morning broke like a frying pan - The Tusk that did the Damage Tania James
There’s a rumble on the street 
No Hay Pan
The sound of hungry feet 
No Hay Pan
Morning breaks once more
Like a ship upon a shore
A boot upon a jaw
No Hay Pan

Now when I was a lad 
No Hay Pan
The times they were bad 
No Hay Pan
But we did all we could 
Break any rule we would
Too hungry to be good 
No Hay Pan

We crept into a church 
No Hay Pan
And there upon a perch 
No Hay Pan
We saw two candles then 
We whispered ‘Lord Amen’
And we ate both of them
No Hay Pan


The silence of the town 
No Hay Pan
Broken by the sound 
No Hay Pan
A lonely mother’s call
Night begins to fall
The longest night of all
                                  
No Hay Pan 

Contributed by Dq82 - 2019/5/19 - 19:31




Main Page

Please report any error in lyrics or commentaries to antiwarsongs@gmail.com

Note for non-Italian users: Sorry, though the interface of this website is translated into English, most commentaries and biographies are in Italian and/or in other languages like French, German, Spanish, Russian etc.




hosted by inventati.org