This one didn’t make it onto the Christmas album.
Shellshock
Sent back from the front to the children and me,
There’s a twitch around your mouth where your smile used to be.
Cramps and groans but no broken bones.
Oh my love.
Too haunted to speak and too angry to eat,
You’re clinging to the bed as I change the wet sheet.
Strange yelps and moans but no broken bones.
Oh my love.
Are they old friends that you stare at all night?
Or the enemy impaled, rising up for a fight?
So many unknowns but no broken bones.
Oh my love.
I must endure and pretend to be glad
For these daughters and this son who can’t fathom their dad.
Broken men, broken homes, but no broken bones.
Oh my love.
One summer’s day and you’re off to the shed.
Here’s to regimental pride! Seven swigs till you’re dead.
Lying cold as the stones but no broken bones.
Oh my love.
Click here for a version recorded at home, November 2018
Click here for a version read by Lytisha Tunbridge
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Paul Carbuncle
“Excellent!”, “Immaculate!”, “Wonderful views!”, “We had to ask for more towels!”. These are just some of the comments made by lovers of folk music who have stayed in bed-and-breakfast accommodation in Paul Carbuncle’s home county of Kent. Now living in Nottingham, Paul has been playing scores of gigs to relatively ruly crowds at pubs and folk clubs in Notts and Derbyshire, on evenings which have been described enthusiastically as “Saturday” and “Wednesday” and sometimes “Friday”. The Midlands magazine “Folk Monthly” labelled him “bourgeoning”, back in the days before spell-check (2015). Since winning the Gate To Southwell Folk Festival Open Mic Competition this summer, Paul has spent much of his spare time sitting next to the telephone ready for stardom to call. When the call finally arrived, at tea-time yesterday, it came as a great joy to learn that he may have been mis-sold Payment Protection Insurance. In a recent interview with a lady who said she was from off of the telly, Paul deftly cleared up once and for all any mystery surrounding his chosen musical genre. “Some call it folk-punk,” he explained, “while others call it punk-folk. Either is acceptable. But over-blend it and you’ll end up with funk or polk, and I’m sure none of us wants that. It’s rather like mixing the grape and the grain... you’ve got to be careful not to end up with muesli.” Paul Carbuncle uses Jim Dunlop 1mm plectrums.
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Paul Carbuncle 