Full album including word and PDF version of album notes and three bonus videos
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about
Danny Spooner was the first person I heard singing this song and it was during the 2012 Auckland wharfies strike. I learnt it straight away and have been leading it ever since: it’s not a song for one singer, it’s a song to get everyone to sing.
Even as a blind guy I’m always interested in what union banners are on marches: coming with your union shows a collective action. I’m also really interested in the small guilds and unions that came together to form the larger unions we know today. I remember being at a union college in the North East of England and spending a good couple of hours going round their collection of banners and badges.
John Warner, who wrote these words, is an activist and brilliant songwriter:
www.folkjohnwarner.com
I love that John’s ‘borrowed’ a hymn tune for this song: this is a long socialist and labour movement tradition. Joe Hill did it lots.
My Grandad always said that the ‘devil has all the best tunes’, but I guess that depends on who or what you think the devil is.
lyrics
In faded photo, like a dream,
A locomotive under steam
Rolls with the ranks of marching feet
And union banners on the street.
Chorus
Bring out the banners once again,
You union women, union men,
That all around may plainly see
The power of our unity.
I've seen those banners richly made
With symbols fair of craft and trade,
The union's names in red and gold,
Their aspirations printed bold.
Chorus
Boilermakers, smiths and cooks,
Stevedores with cargo hooks,
Declare their union strong and proud,
Rank on rank before the crowd.
Chorus
They won the eight-hour working day,
They won our right to honest pay,
Victorious their banners shone,
How dare we lose what they have won?
Today, when those who rule divide,
We must be standing side by side,
Our rights were bought with tears and pain,
Bring out the banners once again.
Chorus
Repeat Chorus
credits
from Bring out the Banners,
released March 11, 2019
Copyright – John Warner | Arranged – Paul Brown | Words – John Warner | Tune – Oxford or See Amid the Winter Snow by John Goss | Vocals – Paul Brown, Alice Eminson, Simon Eminson, Jack Penman, Helena May Brown, Nicola Owen, Rosie Holmes, Noel Armstrong, Jean Reid, Ian Bartlett and Karen Jones
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