Get all 21 Mother of Order releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Anniversary Tune, riverrun, Auld Lang Syne, The Unquiet Grave, Maids When You're Young, Bella Ciao, Warp and Weft, (Missing my) Home by the Sea, and 13 more.
1. |
Can you Help us a Bit
03:52
|
|||
|
A “Lancashire Lad” has been writing
Long letters at home to the Press ----
He tells how America’s fighting
Has plunged in the direst distress
The men and the women and children –
The hands of the mill and the pit;
Heartbroken and famished they wander,
And cry, “Con yo help us a bit?”
No more at the bell’s cheery ringing
We hurry away to the mill;
At our labour no longer we’re singing,
The loom and the shuttle are still;
Lord, lead us not into temptation
To thee in our sorrow, we cry,
O stretch forth Thine arm o’er our nation,
Send succour, or thousands must die.
“Con yo help us a bit” oh! our brothers,
Who far from old England have fled
Con yo help the poor fathers and mothers,
And children that perish for bread;
Con yo help us across the wide ocean,
For all kinds of work we are fit;
Dear friends, with the wildest emotion,
We cry, “Con yo help us a bit?”
We are willing to work – oh! how willing! –
But work can no longer be had.
And gone is our very last shilling,
And hunger is driving us mad.
Ah! think on our sad desolation,
And say con yo help us to flit
From wretchedness, woe, and starvation –
Con yo help us, dear sisters, a bit?
To you, oh our sisters, we’re crying
Con you spare some help from your store?
Alas! we are starving and dying,
And your eyes shall behold us no more.
Ah! say con yo revel in riches,
Or peacefully sleep on your bed,
While thousands of Lancashire witches
Are begging for morsels of bread?
Is it true – the fine tales they are telling
Of rivers and mountains of gold?
And that in the land where you’re dwelling
Is room for the young and the old?
That there, in contentment reclining,
Each man neath his fig-tree may sit,
While we with grim hunger are pining?
Oh! try, “Con yo help us a bit?”
|
||||
2. |
Weeping
02:58
|
|||
|
WEEPING? Yes! few eyes are tearless,
Gloom is spreading over all,
See the lordly mansion cheerless;
View despair in homesteads small.
Weeping lovers meet in sadness,
Weeping fathers, weeping wives,
Children, too, forget their gladness;
Poverty chills all their lives.
War, and death, and desolatoion,
Ever saunter arm-in-arm,
Mists and fogs o’erspread the nation;
Life seems losing every charm.
Weeping singers sing of sorrow
In the streets of every town;
Those at home can beg, or borrow,
They must keep gaunt hunger down.
Weeping bandsmen blow for hours;
Miles on miles afar they roam;
Frost and hail, and chilling showers
Check them not – they play for home.
God of Hosts! look down upon us,
Help the sorrowing sons of toil;
Shower thy blessings gently on us,
Or bid us kiss the rod and smile.
If it please thee, gracious Father,
Stay the war and grant us peace;
Thou, who mak’st the tempest gather,
Thou can’st bid fierce passions cease.
Then shall weeping turn to gladness,
And ourselves the better be;
Joy shall yet come forth from sadness;
Hope shall spring from misery.
|
||||
3. |
Sheffield Rules
03:13
|
|||
|
For the brothers and sisters of Lancashire
Who are starving outside their shut mills
We’re gonna have a football match
And we’re playing Sheffield Rules
We’re hiring out the cricket ground
Marking out rouges and goals
We’ve got blue and red flannel caps
And we’re playing Sheffield Rules
Your cousins in the town of steel
Weep at how empty you’re spools
We’ll send the takings o’er to you
When we’ve played by Sheffield rules
On matchday many came to see
The Hallam and Sheffield crews
Exhibit this new football game
And play by Sheffield Rules
Major Creswick and Water--fall
They had a bit of a set--to
And Waterfall right lamped him one
That’s against the Sheffield Rules
There were letters to the paper then
About whose crime had been whose
And the fighting fair o’er--shadowed all
The beauty of Sheffield Rules
Perhaps a simple football game
Can’t do much to impr--ove
But we did the best that we could do
And we did it by Sheffield Rules
|
||||
Mother of Order England, UK
Mother of Order were Cath Rogan and the late Martin Hall. Born from shared politics, shared concerns and a general anarcho-
syndicalist outlook on life.
They write and sing songs of industry and songs of love.
Their first album, Warp and Weft is songs of and about the Lancashire Cotton Famine.
They also have a repertoire of bawdy folk songs and modern material with a folk twist
... more
If you like Mother of Order, you may also like:
Maer, from Switzerland, debut with a haunted (and haunting) folk song that will warm you heart as it sends shivers down your spine.
go to album
The Toronto-based sextet make moody, cinematic sounding music that blends psych-folk and post-rock.
go to album
Space Bath
by Sami Freeman, feat. James Jackson, Beaunoise, Mia Pixley
A gorgeous journey through a kaleidoscopic array of sonic approaches melted together that feels old and new at the same time.
go to album
Here in the Pitch
by Jessica Pratt
On her fourth album, Jessica Pratt blends up 60s pop and bossa nova into a spooky mix of soft psychedelia.
go to album
Will I Still Bloom?
by Half Dream
Heartland indie rock that’s like Angel Olsen at her fuzziest fronting a gnarlier Mazzy Star.
go to album
The Melbourne singer-songwriter's captivating debut balances dreamy indie folk with driving, emotional rock.
go to album
The Valley Of Vision
by manchester orchestra
The rock band embraces emerging technologies to create an immersive, forward-looking soundscape.
go to album
