AUGUST - THE MONTH OF REPEATS : CATTLE AND CANE

There's still a fair bit of music not previously featured before on TVV going to be coming your way as a fair bit of vinyl has been accumulated through visits to dusty second hand shops and via the internet.  But all that takes time to record and turn into mp3s and just now I'm a bit pressed for time. So I'm going to use most days in August to look back at old postings that have featured classic 45s and give newer readers a chance to listen to some indie classics.  I reckon this is as good a place to start as any.

From TVV, Thursday January 15 2009

IT WASN'T ALWAYS A SONG THAT GIVES ME SAD THOUGHTS

It was previously a song that reminded me of living away from home for the first ever time, with great flatmates whose tolerance of my bad habits and grumpiness in the morning I never really appreciated until the day we all went our separate ways.
 
Nowadays, it just makes me think of the sad and premature death of Grant McLennan.

I recall a schoolboy coming home
Through fields of cane
To a house of tin and timber
And in the sky, a rain of falling cinders
From time to time, the waste
Memory wastes


I recall a boy in bigger pants
Like everyone
Just waiting for a chance
His father's watch, he left it in the showers
From time to time, the waste
Memory wastes


I recall a bigger brighter world
A world of books
And silent times in thought
And then the railroad, the railroad takes him home
Through fields of cattle
Through fields of cane
From time to time, the waste
Memory wastes
And the waste
Memory wastes


Further, Longer, Higher, Older.

Written in the summer of 1982 by a homesick Australian using a borrowed guitar in a bedsit in the Paddington area of London. Released as a single in February 1983, it can also be found as a track on the LP Before Hollywood.

mp3 : The Go-Betweens - Cattle and Cane
mp3 : The Go-Betweens - Heaven Says





And finally.....a rather understated cover

mp3 : The Wedding Present - Cattle and Cane