CrowLore

opening track of the new BARD COMPANY album ' NORTHERN POWERHOUSE'

BARD COMPANY: This Machine Kills Fascists

BARD COMPANY: WORKER'S SONG

a rights of passage for young men (and women) growing up in Wakefield - a pint in every pub on the mile walk from the bottom to the top of westgate - ah - the (lack of) memories

The Westgate Run

A cover version of the Motorhead song 1916 from the album of the same name - first release from a new THE CROWS OF ALBION album commemorating the Great War - all the other tracks will be original compositions. Due Autumn 2014

1916

A Cover of THE MEN THEY COULDN'T HANG song THE COLOURS. From the new BARD COMPANY album 'WE'RE REVOLTING!' - release date NOVEMBER 2023
https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/bard-company-were-revolting

BARD COMPANY: THE COLOURS

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/bard-company-were-revolting

BARD COMPANY: WE'RE REVOLTING

BARD COMPANY: MORE IN COMMON

a tribute to the words of Joe Strummer
https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/bard-company-were-revolting

BARD COMPANY: THE FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/screaming-blue-murder

THE BAYONET IN THE SHED [2024]

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/screaming-blue-murder

USMF


When the KKK and the Kremlin
Are sharing their vodka and rye
When redneck white supremecists
are making Lady Liberty cry
When The land of the free is walled in
So pesky Mexicans can’t get by
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die.

When the Whitehouse houses a bigot
A misogynist ‘locker room’ fly
When a multi-billionaire
Stands for momma’s apple pie
When a name shines on a tower
That reaches up to the sky
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die.

When a straw thatched Umpa-Lumpa
Pedals the conspiracy lie
When a tax dodging privileged hypocrite
Tells workers he’s their kinda guy
When a bully is sitting as president
And parents tell their children why
That’s the day the rest of us
Watches America die



Lady Liberty Weeps

In a Minnesota precinct
On a Minnesota street
The day starts like any other
For the Baton Rouge elite
In the land of the brave
In the land of the free
A cop with a pistol
Shoots liberty
A man reaches for a wallet
With a target on his back
Red white and blue
All the patrolman sees is black
Where the gun is law
The sheriff of the west
Has immunity to kill
Wearing a star on his chest
And this is the country
Who sets itself above
The rest of the world
And preaches peace and love
But it can’t control the forces
It creates to protect
And it can’t control the hatred
It chooses to elect
Where every stand off
Is resolved by the gun
And red neck lobbyists
Believe the lies they have spun
Now in Dallas Texas
There are cop killers on the street
The day ends like any other
The cycle is complete



Safety Off

The FBI and the CIA got ‘em
Good ‘ol boys in the KKK got ‘em
Even Doris Day got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

Kids in their daddies cars got ‘em
Rednecks in Dallas bars got ‘em
Sheriffs with tin stars got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

The white and black and brown got’ em
Old folks in mid-west town’s got ‘em
Even the Whitehouse clown got ‘em
But it don’t  make ‘em safe

Clint Eastwood and John Wayne got ‘em
The holy and insane got ‘em
I’ve heard that Citizen Kane got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe


Shopkeepers in their stores got ‘em
Vets returning from their wars got ‘em
Pimps and two bit whores got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

The Washington Post and Fox got ‘em
Randy high school jocks got ‘em
Snipers in tower blocks got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

Heroes on TV got ‘em
The brave and the free got ‘em
Babies on their mamas knees got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

The Waltons and the Brady’s got ‘em
The good guys and their ladies got ‘em
Tupac and Slim Shady’s got ‘em
But it don’t make ‘em safe

Every Independence day got ‘em
Every bullet that goes astray got ‘em
The whole of the USA got ‘em
And they’re never gonna be safe

BODY COUNT

16/10/91 
23 Dead – Luby’s Cafeteria – Killeen Texas

4/12/12
27 Dead – Sandy Hook Elementary – Newtown, Connecticut

16/4/07
32 Dead – Virginia Tech – Blacksburg, Virginia

12/6/16
49 Dead – Pulse Nightclub – Orlando, Florida

1/10/17
58 Dead – Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas

AND COUNTING…..

ameriKKKan trilogy (version 2.0) [2024]

Screaming Blue Murder [2024]

Sunset Over Lupset (August 1968) [2024]

The Devil Don't Own Me [2024]

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/crowlore

The Lazarus Curse [2024]

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/bard-company-raising-the-standards

BARD COMPANY: THE WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN [2024]

WINDSOR STREET [2024]

BARD COMPANY: WOMAN OF THE WINDRUSH

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/bard-company-northern-powerhouse

BARD COMPANY: WORKER'S SONG [2024]

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/still-in-the-war-boys

Canary Girl [2024 REMASTER]

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/here-there-be-demons

The Walkin' Man [2024 REMASTER]

The early Viking settlers to Wakefield in West Yorkshire, England
https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/wachefeld

WACHEFELD

the people, sounds, sights and memories of a night out on the town in Wakefield, West Yorkshire in the late 70's and early eighties
https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/wachefeld

MERRIE CITY SERENADE

https://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/album/wachefeld

THE WEEPING ANGEL

DREADNOUGHT

SPINNING JENNY

THE BLUE LADY

THE BEAST BENEATH THE BECK

CITIZENS

HOW DID IT GET SO LATE SO SOON

THE WESTGATE RUN (RE-RUN)

RHUBARB RHUBARB RHUBARB

DOWN IN THE HOLE

THE WHITE ROSE PRETENDER

LAILA  LIQUORICE

Armistice (Gods Of War) [2025 REMASTER]

There Are No Angels Here (alternate vocal) [2025 REMASTER]

AmeriKKKan Trilogy version 2.0 (Original Version)[2025 REMASTER]

The Bayonet In The Shed

He put it there in forty nine,
in a woodworm riddled drawer,
wrapped it in a greasy rag.
A remnant from the war.
On top of it he laid his medals,
nothing more was said
until the day my father 
took the bayonet from the shed.

We had pestered many times
and he had said ‘perhaps’
when we asked him if he’d killed
any Krauts or any Japs.
His eyes fixed on something far away,
as though searching for the dead,
but we found out what we wanted
when he took the bayonet from the shed.

He was a sergeant major
in the hell hole that was Burma,
where the Japanese snipers
would target you on a murmur.
He was proud of the campaign
and the boys that he had led
but he never ever talked
about the bayonet in the shed.

He didn’t hate all foreigners
and he said the greatest worker
that he had ever met in the war
was ‘good old Johnny Gurkha’.
That being brave wasn’t about killing,
he was happy when they fled,
then he went down the garden
and took the bayonet from the shed.

He was gone a short while
and when we saw him coming back
he was no longer marching proudly
along a heroes track.
We witnessed the aged warrior
return with heavy tread,
shoulders slumped in surrender
with the bayonet from the shed.

He moved the cloth reverently
and laid the medals by its side
and for the first time in my life
we watched as my father cried.
We sat with him and looked at it
and thought of bodies that had bled
after being introduced to
the bayonet in the shed.


(For Sergeant Major Kenneth Whiteley - 1920-1995 RIP)

The Bayonet In The Shed

There Are No Angels Here

WORDS/VOX: Ian Whiteley
MUSIC/INSTRUMENTATION: John Kettle

Scraping around the vipers nest,
flaming swords and thrusting spear,
black spiders scuttle to the feast
but there are no angels here.

The dragon crawls into their veins,
hallucinogenic ecstasy or fear.
The demon bares his fangs to bite
and still there are no angels here.

The first-born rounded up and caged,
harvesting the mothers tear,
the innocents are slaughtered.
Yes, there are no angels here.

No Seraphim, no Nephilim,
no Archangel seen far or near -
God’s army keep their powder dry.
There are no avenging angels here.

The dead will rise in Babylon,
false prophets will snipe and sneer,
the doubters branded heretics.
There are no longer angels here.

Tangled up in their own strings
the puppets and the puppeteer.
God is dead and Satan lives
because there are no angels here.

The fool sits in the house of white,
Apocalyptic portents appear.
Despite claiming the hand of God
there were never any angels here.

There Are No Angels Here

WORDS/VOX: Ian Whiteley
MUSIC/INSTRUMENTATION: John Kettle

Screaming Blue Murder

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the state of the nation
and how we blame our ills
on Muslims and immigration -
talking about people
as though they’re an infestation.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the Banker’s greed
and the people on the street
who we can’t seem to feed -
the way that we trample
on sexuality and creed.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the whole disheartening mess
of the education system,
transport and the NHS -
and how we’re going to get out of it
is anybody’s guess.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at the neo-Fascist’s rise,
about how we’re indoctrinated
by Tory owned newspaper lies
and the way we look away
when an industry dies.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
that the rich are getting more
while zero hour contracts
are hammering the poor
and the way we still find money
to support another war
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at intolerance and hate,
about the way you can’t criticise
a Persecution State
without being dragged into
an anti semitic debate.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
for all of the bluster and fuss
caused by unsupported facts
on the side of a bus -
how just one third of the country
somehow speak for all of us.
I’m screaming Blue Murder.

I’m screaming Blue Murder
at what this government’s done
to the weak and vulnerable,
to the poor man and his son -
and as they stand accused
with their guilt ridden smoking gun
I’m screaming Blue Murder

My heart is on the left
and my blood is red.
Austerity doesn’t work,
it has to be said.
Our ethics and our values
are morally dead.
I’m screaming Blue Murder

Screaming Blue Murder

Raising The Standards (With Banners Held High)

You said that you wanted a land fit for heroes,
a place to call home that they’d show off with pride
but somewhere along the way you forgot
the reasons they fought and the reasons they died.

They thought they were fighting for honour and justice,
suppressing the tyrants and saving our land -
but returned to a country that punished the workers
for banding together and making a stand

So your songs are all dirges to the heroically fallen,
your words are all platitudes for their loss of life.
Your actions speak louder than all of your promises,
where lies are pandemic and betrayals are rife

Cause they died in the trenches with promises, hollow,
driving them forward and ringing in their ears
while you pocketed money that should have been spent
making jobs for survivors and easing their fears

Now we march all together and sing for the future,
while honouring those who we lost in the past
and we still want to believe all the promises made
as our young men were slaughtered, dismembered and gassed.

Prosperity offered like chocolate at Christmas.
Peace in our times and everlasting hope -
all that they got were more broken dreams,
more pointless wars, more money for old rope

The bosses got fat on the toil of their workers,
the bankers got fat on their interest rich loans
and the man who came back from the war that he fought in
was treated no better than their graveyards of bones.

So bang the drum comrade and never forget
that if silence is demanded then shout and be loud
and don’t let this government try to sell history
as though it is something for which we should be proud.

A century has passed and they’ve destroyed the mines,
they’ve doused the steel furnaces, grounded the docks,
left northern communities suffering and reeling
in their self proclaimed, privatised school of hard knocks.

There are still poor people living in poverty,
food banks are prevalent, folk on the street,
they cannot look after the homeless and feeble,
the old cannot pay for their lighting and heat.

From the mud of the trenches they came back home
Their future was as grey as the clothes on their back
They demanded we give them something to cling to
 A future of light in their visions of black.

England’s green fields, the red of the blood,
The gold we were promised, the blue of the sky
These are the colours we raise as our standard
Marching together, with Banners Held High.

BARD COMPANY: RAISING THE STANDARDS (WITH BANNERS HELD HIGH) [DEMO]

Messiah Of The Fields

They left me hanging on a cross
The saviour of the summer crops
Just rag and straw so no great loss
My blood is in the wheat and hops

I faced the black and vicious hoard
Their coal cruel eyes and sharpened beaks
I am the ragged overlord
Who scares the crow yet never speaks

They pray to me to save their soils
From dark boned devils of the sky
In sun heat this messiah toils
To force them to take wing and fly

My Judas is the winter wind
That cuts me with a subtle knife
God save me father I have sinned
I wished for an extended life

A sackcloth head, a straw frayed cuff
The prince of summer crucified
Facing the elements is tough
This ditch is where I lived and died

Yet when the Spring returns the blood
To ravaged fields of snow and frost
I will drag myself from thawing mud
And resurrected heal what we have lost

Messiah Of The Fields

White Witch Of Winter

Corvus the white witch
Once flew the sky on crow’s wings
And fed on battlefield dead
She ate the hearts of serfs and kings
But soon she lost the taste for flesh
And transformed into what winter brings
Her skin is cold to human touch
She feasts on other-worldly things

She turns snowflakes into blizzards
Freezes your blood and tears
She arrives with the cold north wind
laying ice upon your fears

She hates the crows for what they are
For she once fed on carrion too
She hates the way they cock their heads
And turn their coal black gaze on you
So when the black imps come to her
Requesting voices clear and true
She casts a spell that spites their wish
and in her soul a darkness grew

She hears the crows Kaw in distress
She walks the fields on winter nights
She floats through forests dark and bleak
And like the snow she, soft, alights
Upon the frosted fields of earth
Where she makes her stand and fights
The bitter crows of Albion
The age old war of blacks and whites

White Witch Of Winter

Apothecary

Beneath the ancient gallows tree
There sits an old apothecary
Where deep within its ancient rooms
Resides an old man selling ‘shrooms
That he has harvested from soil
Of graveyards where the serpents coil
And if the ache screams in your joints
Just follow where the way-marker points.

The place smells of dust and moist mildew
And the foul dark liquid he will brew
In copper pots and dirty flasks
Whose ingredients no one ever asks
But here the magic of the fey
Will help to take the pain away
So every year the weak and old
Will visit where new hope is sold

If this world becomes too much
If reality is hard to touch
Then take a slice of bitter ‘shroom
From the earth where sweet dreams bloom
The cost is just a piece of mind
So leave your hurts and cares behind
And visit on a winter’s night
To taste the harvest of delight

No one will hear your painless screams
With body healed but not your dreams
For they are cultivated by
The earth fruit that you dared to try
For every kiss there is a fist
Of something skulking in the mist
In the apothecary the old folk say
There is a devil’s price to pay

Apothecary

Prophecy

The crows tell of the walking man
Who travels fields by day and night
The walking man who’s not a man
Who strides between the dark and light

Soulless, cursed to stumble through
The endless hedgerows of the land
He wished for life but walks in death
He is the sweet prince of the damned

The hares and rabbits run from him
The fox and wolf walk by his side
He brings the plague and pestilence
And in his steps many have died

He had a life but wanted more
asked autumn’s witch to cast her spell
she gave him rebirth but the price
was tethered by the chains of hell

A prophecy of bone and blood
Of straw and dust and ragged pain
Alive under the summer sun
Stone dead below the snow and rain

the crows speak soft of what he is
he scares them as no other can
they fear the setting of the sun
the long shadow of the walking man

Be careful what you wish for child
For there are barbs in every rose
Each spell that’s cast must have a price
Here walks the nemesis of crows

Take heed of the warnings
What will be will be
The ragged man who walks the fields
fulfills the ancient prophecy

Prophecy (demo)

WORDS: Ian Whiteley
MUSIC: John Kettle

Crow Lore

We sit and watch the world go by
On fences long and oak trees high
The waxing moon the setting sun
We are the crows of Albion
We chronicle the human ways
Their restless nights and confused days
Mother, daughter, father, son
We are the crows of Albion

Yes – we are the crows
We are the crows
We are the crows of Albion

Our stories written down in books
Guarded well by crows and rooks
And no one knows what we have done
We are the crows of Albion
These simple etchings on a page
An almanac of human rage
A witch’s promise seldom won
We are the crows of Albion

Yes – we are the crows
We are the crows
We are the crows of Albion


This tome is writ in wise men’s blood
With beak and claw and ancient wood
Seen by no one read by none
We are the crows of Albion
Crow Lore for the young to read
And learn the lessons of our breed
The tales of ravens deftly spun
We are the crows of Albion

Yes – we are the crows
We are the crows
We are the crows of Albion
Yes – we are the crows
We are the crows
We are the crows of Albion

Crow Lore

Originally from Wakefield West Yorkshire - now living in Wigan, Lancashire.
Bard Company/Crows Of Albion vocalist and Performance poet
Albums/Tracks can be purchased at: http://thecrowsofalbion.bandcamp.com/

The Crows Of Albion / Bard Company

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