Up in the morning and out to schoolJust because you’re better than me
Doesn’t mean I’m lazy…
Just because you’re going forwards
Doesn’t mean I’m going backwards
If you look the part you’ll get the job
In last year’s trousers and your old school shoes
The truth is son, it’s a buyer’s market
They can afford to pick and choose
Just because you’re better than me
Doesn’t mean I’m lazy…
Just because I dress like this
Doesn’t mean I’m a communist
The factories are closing and the army’s full
I don’t know what I’m going to do
But I’ve come to see in the Land of the Free
There’s only a future for the Chosen Few
Just because you’re better than me
Doesn’t mean I’m lazy
Just because you’re going forwards
Doesn’t mean I’m going backwards
At twenty one you’re on top of the scrapheap
At sixteen you were top of the class
All they taught you at school
Was how to be a good worker
The system has failed you, don’t fail yourself
Just because you’re better than me
Doesn’t mean I’m lazy
Just because you’re going forwards
Doesn’t mean I’m going backwards
All year my son Olly had been moaning at me that I’d chosen to take him to the Rythm Festival rather than V or Glastonbury or any other trophy festival.
The Friday night line up was Wreckless Eric (happily accompanied by his new love and wife Amy Rigby), the Damned, Billy Bragg and Ade Edmundson and the Bad Shepherds.
Olly was amused by Wreckless , annoyed by his dad jumping about by the Damned and asleep for Ade and his Shepherds. He’d been dreading Billy Bragg who he had down as a country boy folk singer as far removed from his favoured R’n’B artists as he could get.
We were close to the stage when Billy opened with “to have and to have not”- within a couple of bars Olly had disappeared, I saw his mop of blond hair heading for the stage and followed.
Three quarter of the way through the set he spotted me behind him and came back and gave me a hug.
I like Billy Bragg Dad. I like that first song he did.
Sometimes you don’t have to say anything- the love is just so big.
