Season 441: "What's My Line?"

For Season of the Ukulele 441 we are playing songs with an occupation in their title. Here's Ex Lion Tamer by Wire, played on concert ukulele with overdubs of Ashbory Ubass and secondary vocals.

great theme, val!

here's my best shot at a cover of "the chauffeur" by duran duran

i've gone blokey again but more deliberately than in my weather man song (which was mainly due to the number of syllables)
the bible is a very blokey document and this particular occupation - the tv evangelist - used to show that bias
some may be glad to know that the ladies are joining the show - look up Joyce Meyer as an example

Here's my first one. It's by Florence and the Machine. Got a few more cooking to take advantage of your new-fangled internet Val.



P.S. Paul posted a certain George Formby song on the Island that I think was meant for here

Just learned this one, will give it a whirl. Walking On The Moon, by the Police.

RAB11 said:

Here's my first one. It's by Florence and the Machine. Got a few more cooking to take advantage of your new-fangled internet Val.

Click to expand...

​Bring it on, Ryan ... I can cope!!!

Ahoy everybody and happy summer.
I did a lot of Merlin playing during my holidays but recorded none of it
I have been back for two weeks but failed to complete both a Flight of the Conchords ('rambling through the avenues of time' for the novelty songs & 'þjóðvegur 66' for last week but life got in the way)
The first thing I thought of for this season was a Dylan song (that I have yet to record) and then I thought of this Nick Cave song that mentions a few professions though it is not about professions (unless 'killer' is a profession...)
Here is my rendition of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds 'The Curse of Milhaven'

Here's another one from me. It's possibly the start of am experiment. When I saw the theme on saturday night I started writing a song. This morning this one from my past popped into my head as a possible candidate anyway. So by the end of the week we might be able to see how/if my songwriting has developed.

This was written in either late 2009 or early 2010, and was the second song I ever wrote and recorded. I was 18, had no knowledge of musical theory and had no life experience so I just told some random stories basically. I also had an even worse recording set up then than I do now, I was playing into a cheap webcam through Garageband, because I was young unemployed and felt I had to give it a try. The results were mixed.

Anyway, here is the song, which I've tried to keep as close to the original recording as possible. Played my Low G concert and the steel string electric, both through my new Laney micro amp which is a great bit of kit. For the video I fired up Forza Horizon 4 on my Xbox, a racing game set in a fictionalised version of Great Britain, which I thought was apt because having just moved back to the UK when I wrote the song I chucked a few place names into the lyrics with no idea as to their relative geography. I'm driving a Mercedes-Benz Unimog which is the closest thing to a Lorry I could get.



And here's a link to the original recording from 10 years ago. That was on my Epiphone Les Paul, unplugged for the rhythm, plugged for the solos.

https://soundcloud.com/rabb-music/ode-to-the-lorry-driver?ref=clipboard

This was a song released by Japan in 1982 (their most successful year) which deserved much more acclaim and appreciation than it received, charting at a relatively lowly 29 here in the UK. Some minimal piano additions, otherwise just me, my fave uke and a bit of reverb for good measure. Thanks for hosting this week Val!

Decided to play Engine Driver by the Decemberists. I really love this song. And I'm getting a video up before Sunday woohoo! My internet has been dodgy lately as well. We are the only street in the neighborhood that hasn't been upgraded to fiber optics yet. Here's hoping it happens soon. Video footage for this song comes from the Prelinger Archive.

I am so very sorry about this

A curiosity song recorded by the Beatles about a sailor and his encounter with Maggie Mae a lady who worked at night time.

SOTU 441 - "Operator". No, it's not the Jim Croce song, though that's a lovely tune that I may attempt sometime. This one is by the Dead from their iconic 1970 album "American Beauty," which might be my all time favorite record. It was written and performed by Ron "Pig Pen" McKernan, a great blues singer and harmonica player who sadly passed way too young. Sorry, no harmonica here but I urge you to check the original song out - it's a gem.

Feel bad being on the same page of the thread twice but here we are. Here's an original from this week.

It doesn't mention an occupation specifically, more talks about career expectations. Roughly a year ago I turned down a promotion that I'd spent two years working towards because the stress of it didn't seem worth it. I was faced with meaningless office jobs because it seemed that's all I could do and anything else wasn't worthy of my family's perception of me. Meanwhile my wife was stuck at home with a business degree she wasn't using being fed up of being a stay at home mum. So we decided to swap. I'm now working part time in a sushi kiosk with hours that suit school run times and my wife has started on her own career, and we're both much happier.

Yesterday I posted a quick video to Facebook of the main riff because I'm sure I've stolen it from somewhere. Nobody who commented could place it but the nagging feeling is still there. If anyone does know it please let me know.

Ahoy
Here is another one from me - a song about miners

This song by Graeme Miles is about the period in the 1950s/60s when the wages of agricultural workers (never very good at the best of times) fell way behind those of industrial workers with the inevitable consequences.