This is the second of four in-depth blog posts for Folk Radio UK about songs from my new album “Esteesee”, an album inspired by the life and work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834).
Track 11: Mother You Will Rue Me (featuring Steve Knightley)
I’m writing these blog posts from my kitchen table, the place where most of my songs are written, including this one. So, here we go:
When he was 8 years old Coleridge ran away from home following an argument with his older brother Frank in which Coleridge lunged at him with a knife. Having written a number of songs about my own childhood flight from home there was no way I could ignore this episode of Coleridge’s life.
I think it also goes some way to revealing his passionate impulsiveness, his darker brooding nature and his absolute stubbornness.
After lunging at Frank with a knife Coleridge’s Mother returned to the room, and fearing he’d be flogged Coleridge fled and hid at the bottom of a hill by the river Otter, reading prayers from a shilling book, hiding beneath a thorn bush and watching the calves in the field.
The town crier was called in to rally the search party, and knowing full well the whole of the town was looking for him, Coleridge ended up sleeping in that field all night. In later years Coleridge confessed to thinking with “inward and gloomy satisfaction” how miserable it must have made his Mother.
That’s where the tone of the song came from.
This song is Coleridge lamenting from beneath a thorn bush, in the cold and the damp. Coleridge wrote in one of his letters “I felt the cold in my sleep, and dreamt that I was pulling the blanket over me, & actually pulled over me a dry thorn bush, which lay on the hill”.
There’s some speculation that it was this night he spent out in the cold that led to pneumonia that led to being given laudanum that in turn led to his later addictions in life…. so perhaps it may be that this single event led to the creation of Kubla Khan, The Ancient Mariner and everything else that followed?
Although the first demo I recorded of this song (sitting at my kitchen table) had me singing the lead vocal I always knew I wanted the voice of Coleridge to sing the main part. I wanted a gruff male voice full of character and grit and raw emotion. The path to finding the male vocalists on this album was full of twists and turns, but eventually Rob asked me to put all other considerations and instruments aside and just think about the perfect voice for just this one song. I half-jokingly said Steve Knightley… and then sent him an email and was floored when he replied saying he’d love to have a go at the lead vocals!
As an ex-teacher Steve Knightley was the first academic to hear the project… I was so nervous the day he came into the studio, but that nervousness eventually passed and we recorded this track (and the others that Steve does backing vocals on). Since then I’ve had the pleasure of joining Steve in his studio to record some backing vocals for the next Show of Hands album.
The drummer on the track is Jo May; she plays this fantastic rope tension snare drum with a wonderful sense of timing. This song is so full of emotion and feeling that nothing is ever quite on the beat. Lukas Drinkwater plays the double bass – and bows it alongside Archie Churchill Moss on the diatonic accordion for that mournful drone.
There’s one final part of this story of Coleridge’s that I haven’t told though, I omitted the reason for the argument from the album inlay because I felt it took away from the seriousness of the track:
Do you know what they were arguing about? Cheese on toast! The 8-year-old Coleridge wanted his cheese sliced for his toast so that it could be toasted, something his mum did for him despite the (obviously rather serious) issue of the cheese being crumbly. Coleridge left the room for a moment and his brother Frank – for no reason other than to annoy him – crumbled his cheese up. A brotherly fist-fight followed before Coleridge seized a knife and when running at him!
Never again will I hear my children arguing at the table and feel quite so confident it won’t lead to anything serious!
Lyrics:
On a hill in the valley where the Otter flows
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)
A chill and child and calf doth low
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)Where only a torrid thorn warms my bones
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)
And the prayers of a shilling book make my moan
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)All for to cause to grieve Mother I escape thee
Run from my brothers and deceive all of Ottery
Frozen and motionless Mother you will find me
All for to cause to grieve none of you will bind meYou call on the crier for to call me home
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)
And the blade of a rotting tale sealed unknown
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)
On a hill in the valley where the river flows
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)
A chill and child and calf doth low
(All for to cause to grieve Mother you will rue me)All for to cause to grieve Mother I escape thee.
Run from my brothers and deceive all of Ottery
Frozen and motionless Mother you will find me
All for to cause to grieve none of you will bind me.
By: Ange Hardy
Esteesee is released on 24th September 2015 via Story Records (pre-order it here)
‘Esteeesee’ Album Tour & Launch
Along The Coleridge Way
OCTOBER
3rd: Nether Stowey
4th: Halsway Manor – ALBUM LAUNCH!
6th: Holford & District
7th: Bicknoller
8th: East Quantoxhead
9th: Sampford Brett
10th: Stogumber
11th: Wheddon Cross
12th: Roadwater
14th: Luxborough
15th: Luccombe
16th: Porlock
17th: Brendon & Countisbury
18th: Lynmouth Pavilion Project
For details of all of Ange Hardy’s upcoming gig dates please click here.
Read all of Ange’s Posts here.