‘Unknown man with my step-grandfather’ Photograph Long Wittenham 1920s. Aubrey my step-grandfather is on the right. This song goes way back. Probably mid 1980’s in first version . This 1995 rendition…
Category: Story Behind the Song
These Three Rooms – The story behind the song
A love song to poverty or those three rooms in South Edinburgh..our tiny flat…we somehow survived two years in and were still together. It took Oxford and a bigger flat and more…
The Ballad of The Orange Tree – The story behind the song
This entire series of songs are the most personal and autobiographical I have ever written. I have never delved so deeply into folk and personal stories as here a sign of the…
The rain pours through the roof – The story behind the song
Latest addition to the Black Tin Barns album on bandcamp. This song is about the slow decline and eventual closure of the British Leyland Rover factory in Cowley. My Uncle John…
My Little Town – the story behind the song
MY LITTLE TOWN There’s a road runs straight through my little town Half way down it there’s a picture house Now they’ve turned it into a bingo hall They don’t show films…





