Billy Bragg: England, Half-English

Billy Bragg: England, Half-English

2002

Elektra Records

Format I Own it on: Compact Disc

Track Listing: 1. St. Monday  2. Jane Allen  3. Distant Shore  4. England, Half English  5.NPWA (No Power Without Accountability)  6. Some Days I See The Point  7. Baby Faroukh  8. Take Down The Union Jack  9. Another Kind Of Judy  10. He'll Go Down  11. Dreadbelly  12. Tears of My Tracks


 This one tends to get slammed somewhat, but I enjoy it...Maybe it's the circumstances under which I first heard it...I was severely broke at the time, after first moving from Michigan to Arizona, and worked a series of extremely low-paying jobs...I lived in a tiny apartment with no furniture to speak of, but eventually things were starting to turn around a bit...I  had eaten nothing but Ramen for a year straight, but  this particular week I found myself with a little bit of extra money!

That day I went and bought a 6 pack of beer (which I also hadn't had in a very long time), stuff to buy sandwiches and a new album to listen to (I didn't have a computer to hear new stuff back then...I never had a computer until the mid-2000's....). I hadn't heard a single shred of new music in about a year (which is insane if you know me, I'm a compulsive listener), so I sat on the floor of my apartment, a big ass sandwich in one hand, a beer in the other, and Billy Bragg on the boombox...I can clearly remember saying to myself, out loud, "Life is good."

I listened to it non-stop, night and day for about a year straight...So yea, this record is a bit special to me...This has a lot in common with the more fleshed-out and diverse albums Billy Bragg was putting out around this time... Most of the tracks are done in a full-band arrangements, however, the album really shines when it's just Billy and his guitar...

"Take Down the Union Jack" is just plain great...Its stripped-down defiance would fit in just fine on "Brewing Up With Billy Bragg" if the song didn't drop modern references:

"Take down the Union Jack, it clashes with the sunset,
And pile all those history books, but don't throw them away,
They just might have some clues about what it really means,
To be an Anglo hyphen Saxon in England.co.uk..."

"Tears of My Tracks" is similarly guitar and vocals, but the tone is completely different...He sounds  joyous on this song...Singing about selling all his albums and getting satisfaction from the fact that his dusty old room is now full of fresh air and someone else is enjoying the records now...

"Somebody owns all my albums now
They probably don't even wonder how
my name got written on the sleeves..."

I opened the window
I let in the sun
My record collection has ended
For someone else's just begun..."

An interesting topic  that I don't know has ever been covered in a song before...I can't imagine selling all my records...or anybody buying them for that matter...



"Wow! I've never seen so many Genesis and Kiss records in one place!"

Not every song is great, but for every over-worked clunker like "NPWA" there's something wonderful like the bouncy brit-pop number "St. Monday," so it all evens out in the end...I like this disc...

So let's make ourselves a sandwich and check out "St Monday" by Billy Bragg...Enjoy...