Thursday was polling day and I voted at about 8.30am on my way to the station to get the train to work. I always vote in the morning on my way to work rather than in the evening on my way home from work (on the basis that I might not bother if I'm tired after work). Of course, it doesn't take a genius to work out who I would vote for - I'm a Geordie and we have long memories.
Imagine my delight when the results started coming through on Thursday evening and the first few results were from Sunderland and environs - southerners, of course, to a Geordie, and a traditional footballing enemy, but sufficiently northern to say 'yah-boo sucks' to the extreme southerners nearer the Equator, y'know, Birmingham and places like that. Then it went quiet for ages before results started dribbling in.
So,
we've had an election and now we face the aftermath of the election. And the last month was riddled with election fever that I couldn't join in with, so what did I do? I stimulated the economy of course, in my own small way. I seem to have bought a seemingly endless string of theatre tickets but not many gigs, more books to add the pile I have yet to read, DVDs and music. In other words, I seem to have reduced my living space at the expense of having more *things* in the house. Even digital downloads take up space, y'know. And today I added to it with the new albums from The New Pornographers and Adam Lambert (yes, some indie pop with some glitter-smashed pop).I can just about walk from the kitchen to the bedroom without knocking over piles of books and CDs (ok, a slight exaggeration there) but will my addiction end with the election fever? New books include 'American Gods' by Neil Gaiman (well, if he's going to be Mr Amanda Palmer I ought to see what he's about), 'Block Buster', a biography of The Sweet by Dave Thompson, and 'Storage Stories' by Jim Bob (autographed, of course). New DVDs include the boxset of the second series of 'Rhoda' with Valerie Harper (imported from America since Amazon UK doesn't stock it). Hard copy CDs include Evelyn Evelyn and Jason Webley's records along with Alice Cooper's rather splendid 'Billion Dollar Babies' (my original 12" album is long gone). Download albums include Bronski Beat's 'The Age Of Consent', Jim Bob's 'Goffam' and three Malcolm McLaren albums as well as the pop noted above and a range of other stuff.
I also have another addiction to confess - I'm doing so well at listing my sins I might as well get it all off my chest. I have fallen in love with Cushie Butterfield and, as you must know, she's a big lass (with no falsies in sight). But my love is unrequited. I can't find a decent YouTube version of the song to post and neither can I find the right image. In my head I have a very clear picture of what she looks like but can I find it online? No.When we went to see 'Oh What A Lovely War' last week the Geordie soldiers sang the start of the verse to 'Cushie Butterfield' and the song imploded my mind, bringing back memories from years ago when the song was used to advertise a beer in the late '60s or early '70s (either Newcastle Brown Ale or the Federation Brewery, I can't remember) and I just had to have the song. I found several versions online, none particularly good (there's a disgracefully trite one by erstwhile Geordie boy Sting who has surrendered his heritage for mullah if that song is anything to go by) and downloaded the least awful.
'Cushie Butterfield' is a really great song by George Ridley - or Geordie Ridley - who lived a tragically short life in the middle of the 19th Century and who wrote the classic 'Blaydon Races' (I grew up only a few miles from Blaydon so it's special to me). The main pub in Blaydon shopping centre was called the Geordie Ridley in his honour with another pub at the end of Scotswood Road being called The Cushie Butterfield (it closed years ago). I consider that a desecration of Cushie's name and have no doubt that she was based on a real woman that Mr Ridley knew, a woman bursting out of her dress with voluptuousness (the line 'She's like a bag full of sawdust tied round with a string' says it all for me).
Ms Butterfield was from Gateshead (well, she would be, wouldn't she?) and the chorus to the song sums her up:
She's a big lass and a bonny lass and she likes her beer
And they call her Cushie Butterfield and I wish she was here
And they call her Cushie Butterfield and I wish she was here
I need to do more research (and I *will* find a picture of her) but, for the time being, here are the words to this great song - there are versions of the lyrics in Geordie dialect but I'll give you the more standard English version. You don't mess with Cushie!
I's a broken-hearted keelman and I's over head in love
With a young lass in Gateshead and I call her my dove.
Her name's Cushie Butterfield and she sells yellow clay,
And her cousin is a muckman and they call him Tom Grey.
Chorus: She's a big lass and a bonny lass and she likes her beer
And they call her Cushie Butterfield and I wish she was here.
Her eyes is like two holes in a blanket burnt through
Her brows in a morning would spyen a young cow
And when t' hear her shouting Will you buy any clay?
Like a candyman's trumpet it steals my heart away
You'll oft see her down at Sandgate when the fresh herring come
She's like a bag full of sawdust tied round with a string
She wears big galoshes too and her stockings once was white
And her petticoat's lilac and her hat's never straight
When I axed her to marry me she started to laugh
Now none of your monkey tricks for I like ne such chaff
Then she started a blubbing and she roared like a bull
And the chaps on the quay says I's nought but a fool
She says the chap that gets her must work every day
And when he comes home at nights he must gang and seek clay
And when he's away seeking she'll make balls and sing
O well may the keel row that my laddie's in.
With a young lass in Gateshead and I call her my dove.
Her name's Cushie Butterfield and she sells yellow clay,
And her cousin is a muckman and they call him Tom Grey.
Chorus: She's a big lass and a bonny lass and she likes her beer
And they call her Cushie Butterfield and I wish she was here.
Her eyes is like two holes in a blanket burnt through
Her brows in a morning would spyen a young cow
And when t' hear her shouting Will you buy any clay?
Like a candyman's trumpet it steals my heart away
You'll oft see her down at Sandgate when the fresh herring come
She's like a bag full of sawdust tied round with a string
She wears big galoshes too and her stockings once was white
And her petticoat's lilac and her hat's never straight
When I axed her to marry me she started to laugh
Now none of your monkey tricks for I like ne such chaff
Then she started a blubbing and she roared like a bull
And the chaps on the quay says I's nought but a fool
She says the chap that gets her must work every day
And when he comes home at nights he must gang and seek clay
And when he's away seeking she'll make balls and sing
O well may the keel row that my laddie's in.
Don't you love Cushie?
2 comments:
There's a great painting of the Blaydon Races in the Shipley Art Gallery in Gateshead. A good 'likeness' of wor Cushie falling down drunk and all tied up in string is visible in the bottom right hand corner, I seem to remember..
Aha! thanks for the suggestion - I need to go a-Cushie Hunting in Shipley! But please don't suggest she was drunk - she was probably just (ahem) tired.
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