The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

Eric Bogle




When I was a young man I carried me pack
And I lived the free life of the rover
From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback
I waltzed my Matilda all over
Then in 1915 my country said: Son,
It's time to stop rambling, there's work to be done
So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun
And they sent me away to the war

And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As the ship pulled away from the quay
And amidst all the tears, flag waving and cheers
We sailed off for Gallipoli

How well I remember that terrible day
When our blood stained the sand and the water
And how in that hell they call Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter
Johnny Turk, he was ready, he'd primed himself well
He rained us with bullets, and he showered us with shell
And in five minutes flat, we were all blown to hell
He nearly blew us back home to Australia

And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we stopped to bury our slain
We buried ours and the Turks buried theirs
Then it started all over again

Oh those that were left, we tried to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive
While around me the corpses piled higher
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head
And when I awoke in me hospital bed
And saw what it had done, I wished I was dead
I never knew there was worse things than dying

Oh no more I'll go Waltzing Matilda
All around the green bush far and free
For to hump tent and pegs, a man needs both legs
No more waltzing Matilda for me

They collected the wounded, the crippled, the maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The armless, the legless, the blind and the insane
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla
And when the ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where me legs used to be
And thanked Christ there was no one there waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity

And the Band played Waltzing Matilda
When they carried us down the gangway
Oh nobody cheered, they just stood there and stared
Then they turned all their faces away

Now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me
I see my old comrades, how proudly they march
Reviving old dreams and past glories
But the old men march slowly, old bones stiff and sore
Those weary old heroes of a forgotten war
And the young people ask "What are they marching for?"
And I ask myself the same question

And the band plays Waltzing Matilda
And the old men still answer the call
But year after year, more old men disappear
Someday, no one will march there at all

Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda with me?
And their ghosts may be heard as they march by the billabong
So who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda with me?


Written in 1971 by Eric Bogle.

The illustration to this post is a photograph of an artwork by Melbourne sculptor, Peter Corlett, entitled, Man in the Mud, from the Australian War Memorial collection.

No Man's Land.

Eric Bogle




Well, how'd you do, Private Willie McBride,
D'you mind if I sit down down here by your graveside?
I'll rest for awhile in the warm summer sun,
Been walking all day, Lord, and I'm nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the glorious fallen in 1916,
I hope you died quick and I hope you died "clean,"
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?

CHORUS:
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they sound the fife lowly?
Did the rifles fire o'er ye as they lowered ye down?
Did the bugles sing "The Last Post" in chorus?
Did the pipes play the "Flowers O' The Forest"?

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
And, though you died back in 1916,
To that loyal heart are you forever nineteen?
Or are you a stranger, without even a name,
Forever enshrined behind some glass pane,
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained,
And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame?

Well, the sun's shining down on these green fields of France;
The warm wind blows gently, the red poppies dance.
The trenches have vanished long under the plow;
No gas and no barbed wire, no guns firing now.
But here in this graveyard it's still No Man's Land;
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man.
And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.

And I can't help but wonder now, Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you "the cause?"
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain,
For Willie McBride, it's all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again.


One of Eric's best-known songs.

Leaving Nancy

Eric Bogle



In comes the train and the whole platform shakes,
It stops with a shudder, and a screaming of brakes,
The parting has come,and my weary soul aches,
I'm leaving my Nancy O

But you stand there so calmly determinedly gay,
And you talk of the weather and events of the day,
But your eyes tell me all that your tongue doesn't say,
Goodbye my Nancy O

CHORUS
And come a little closer,put your head upon my shoulder,
And let me hold you one more time,before the whistle blows.

My suitcase is lifted and stowed on the train,
And a thousand regrets whirl around in my brain,
And the ache in my heart is a black sea of pain,
Im leaving my Nancy O

And you stand there so calmly so lovely to see,
But the grip of your hand is an unspoken plea,
You're not fooling yourself,and you're not fooling me,
Good-by my Nancy O

For our time has run out and the whistle has blown,
And here I must leave you standing alone,
We have so little time and now the time's gone
Good-bye my Nancy O

And as the train starts gently to roll,
And as I lean out to wave and to call,
I see your first tears,trickle and fall,
Good-bye my Nancy O

Leaving Nancy was the first song Eric wrote for himself, about the pain as he left his mother Nancy at the train station when he was emigrating to Australia.

I first heard this song performed by Eric at the Rialto Theatre in Brisbane in the mid-1980s (before it burnt down).

Little Gomez

Eric Bogle




Oh, I used to have a doggie and I called him little Gomez
Because he was a Mexican Chihuahua
Though there wasn’t much to him what there was all cojones
In fact he was a randy little fella big dogs, small dogs were all the same to him
The canine equivalent of Errol Flynn
At the drop of a sombrero he’d jump up and get stuck in
Taking Gomez out for walkies was embarassin’

I remember one day in the park his tally rose by four
An enviable score he was amassing, two very patient poodles and an Irish Labrador
And a wombat who just happened to be passing
I tried every way to curb his carnal appetite
I kept him on a leash by day, I locked him up at night
I even put some bromide in his chunky meaty bites
But the only thing that might have worked was Kryptonite

Then came the fateful day when he tried to consummate
A liaison with a Saint Bernard from Dublin
And although he was quite clearly fighting well above his weight
He didn’t let that minor detail stop him
He nearly pulled it off, oh, what an acrobat!
But the bitch got bored and down she sat
Well, they say that after making love you sometimes feel quite flat
I’m sure that little Gomez would agree with that

I buried Gomez in the park, his happy hunting ground a sad but fitting finale
Though I had to make a grave that was very flat and round
‘Cause he looked like squashed tamale
But oh, how I missed my wee Chihuahua chum
I went down to the pet shop to find another one
I went there feeling happy, but I left there feeling glum
Because the man behind the counter loved corny puns

And he said “Yes, we have no Chihuahuas we have no Chihuahuas today
We have Alstations, Dalmatians, fruits of all flirtations,
An alpine Pekinese in a toupee
But yes, we have no Chihuahuas we have no Chihuahuas today”


The first song I ever sang with Martin Pearson, shortly before we met in Kuranda in 1990. We eventually formed Never the Twain releasing two albums and the double album from which this track originated: The Almost Legendary Wine Bar Breakfasts, Vol 1 & 2, made up of recordings of our breakfast show at the Troubadour Winebar at the Woodford Folk Festival in 2003.

NB. While these albums are no longer available for sale, downloadable mp3s of all the tracks from all three albums are available here. Enjoy.

The illustration for this post features Jayne Mansfield and her pet chihuahua from Life (March 1956). The search for an illustration brought to me to a site advertising one of the weirder products available to the world today: the Hotdoll. While I advise bracing yourself before investigating this product further, I also recommend this promotional video. The juxtaposition of music and what might be termed "soft-paw porn" photography is, I believe, magnificent. Surely this is the purpose of the internet.

Leaving the Land

Eric Bogle



It's time to go now, Jenny, no need to close the door
What if the dust gets in the house, it doesn't matter any more
You and the dust have been at war for far too many years
Now the war is over, Jenny dear


CHORUS:
Leaving the land, leaving the land
Leaving all I've ever been and all the things I am
Leaving the land


Remember when I brought you here those long bright years ago
For all that time you've been my heart and this land has been my soul
The long bright days are over now but still the heart beats on
But Jenny dear, the soul is gone

And all I see around me sings to me of the past
Four generations loved this land, never thought I'd be the last
All that toiling all that dreaming, birth and death and toil and pain
it was all for nothing, all in vain

It's time to go now, Jenny, drive quickly down the track
We'll never see what lies ahead if we keep on looking back
Behind is just an empty house, old memories and ghosts
And our small dreams, gathering dust


A classic from Eric Bogle.

The illustration to this post is Red Landscape by Russell Drysdale

Now I'm Easy

Eric Bogle




For nearly sixty years I've been a cocky
Of droughts and fires and floods I've lived through plenty
This country's dust and mud have seen my tears and blood
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

I married a fine girl when I was twenty
But she died in giving birth when she was thirty
No flying doctor then, just a gentle old black gin
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

She left me with two sons and a daughter
And a bone-dry farm whose soil cried out for water
So my care was rough and ready but they grew up fine and steady
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

My daughter married young and went her own way
My sons lie buried by the Burma Railway
So on this land I've made my own I've carried on alone
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

City folks these days despise the cocky
Saying, with subsidies and all we've had it easy
There's no drought or starving stock on a sewered suburban block
But it's nearly over now, and now I'm easy

Fine Young Men

Words: Eric Bogle
Music: John Munro



They told all the fine young men
“When this War is over
There will be peace
And the peace will lost forever"
ln Flanders fields, at Lone Pine ond Bersheeba
For King and Country, for honour ond duty
The young men fought ond cursed ond wept ond died

They told all the fine young men
“When this War is over
There will be peace
And the peace will lost forever"
Tobruk ond Alamein, Bhuna ond Kokoda
ln a world mad with War like their fathers before
The young men fought and cursed and wept and died

For many of those fine young men
All the wars are over
They’ve found their peace
lt’s the peace thot losts forever
When the call comes agoin they will not ansvver
They’re just forgotten bones lying for from their homes
As forgotten as the cause for which they died
Ah, young men, can you see now why they lied?


A great song from the pen of Eric Bogle, a Scot who found his home in Australia and has written some of the best-known and loved Australian songs.