Cities as incubators for citizen’s agency Biographies of (Dis)Connection: the case of

Songs From Sheffield

Kate Unsworth Colophon

Cities as incubators for citizen’s agency Biographies of (Dis)Connection: the case of Sheffield

Appendix to P5 Report: Songs From Sheffield

Kate Unsworth 4423135

Department of Urbanism Faculty of Architecture TU Delft

27.06.16

Mentors: Luisa Calabrese, Chair of Urban Design Saskia de Wit, Chair of Landscape Architecture Klaske Havik, Chair of Methods and Analysis Cities as incubators for citizen’s agency Biographies of (Dis)Connection: the case of Sheffield

Songs From Sheffield

Kate Unsworth

Notes from a friendly city (or: Do you think they’ll mind that I’m southern?)

I’m dropping my t’s in an effort to fit in. I don’t think it’s working. Or that it suits me. I’m not sure anyone but me cares.

Each new conversation I have, report that I read Forms another little thread Woven between me, them, their city Making me more accountable.

I see the city through my own eyes But through theirs too. I am dazzled and overwhelmed But each day I am more in love. 6 Sheffield has produced an array of music stars, often known for their understated but witty character. The artists focussed on here are Pulp. , The Everly Pregnant Brothers, Richard Hawley and then a select assortment from other writers and artists, including poets. To finish, two famous recent films, set in Sheffield, are introduced.

What emerges from all is the sense of raw human existence and the peculiarities (and struggles) of everyday life. The humour is wry, self- deprecating, the attitude understated. These are not artists singing yet another love song, but who are not afraid to sing about the more mundane or difficult bits of urban life.

But I hope you have a song about Sheffield too - in the back is space for you to add your own...

7 8 Pulp

Pulp were an English punk band formed in Sheffield in 1978. They are most well known through their front man and lead singer, . They won the in 1996 and were nominated several other times, becoming reluctant figures in the movement.

Many of their songs focus on everyday life and dramas, blended with social and political commentary, often inspired by and reflecting on the city where they grew up.

The songs collected here are:

• Babies • Deep Fried in Kelvin • Wickerman • Sheffield: Sex City • Disco 2000

9 Fig XX: Stanhope Road, Sheffield Source: SheffieldHistory.co.uk

10 Babies (Pulp)

Well it happened years ago when you lived on Stanhope Road. We listened to your sister when she came home from school ‘cos she was two years older and she had boys in her room. We listened outside and heard her. Alright. Well that was alright for a while but soon I wanted more. I want to see as well as hear and so I hid inside her wardrobe. And she came round four and she was with some kid called David from the garage up the road I listened outside I heard her. Alright. Oh I want to take you home. I want to give you children. You might be my girlfriend, yeah. When I saw you next day I really couldn’t tell ‘cos you might go and tell your mother. And so you went with Neve and Neve was coming on And I thought I heard you laughing when his Mum and Dad were gone. I listened outside, I heard you. Alright. Oh I want to take you home... etc. Well I guess it couldn’t last too long. I came home one day and all her things were gone, I fell asleep inside. I never heard her come. And then she opened up her wardrobe and I had to get it on. Oh, listen we were on the bed when you came home, I heard you stop outside the door. I know you won’t believe it’s true, I only went with her ‘cos she looks like you. Oh I want to take you home...[etc.]

Stanhope Road is the street where Jarvis Cocker, lead singer of Pulp, grew up, in the south east suburbs of Sheffield.

11 Fig XX: Kelvin Flats, Sheffield c. 1980s. Source: SheffieldHistory.co.uk

12 Deep Fried in Kelvin (Pulp)

Oh children of the future ... conceived in the toilets at Meadowhall ... to be raised on the cheap cold slabs of garage floors ... rolling empty cans down the stairway ... (don't you love that sound?) ... whilst the thoughts of a bad social worker ran through his head ... trying to remember what he learnt at training college ... Lester said he wasn't allowed in here ... so why don't you get lost? ... and if you grow up ... then when you grow up, maybe ... maybe you can live ... live on Kelvin ... yeah you can live in Kelvin ... on the promenade with the concrete walkways ... where pidgeons go to die ... (a woman on the fourteenth floor noticed that the ceiling was bulging as if under a great weight. When the council investigated they discovered that the man in the flat above had transported a large quantity of soil into his living-room, in which several plants he had stolen from a local park were growing. When questioned, the man said all he wanted was a garden. When questioned, the man said all he wanted was a garden.) ... Oh God, I think the future's been fried ... deep fried in Kelvin ... and now it's rotting behind the remains of a stolen motorbike ... I haven't touched it, honest ... but there isn't anything else to do ... we don't need your sad attempts at social conscience based on taxi-rides home at night when exhibition opens ... we just want your car radio ... and those Reflux speakers ... now ... suffer the little children to come to me ... and I will tend their adventure playground splinters with cigarette burns and feed them fizzy orange and chips ... and then they grow up straight and tall ... and then they grow up to live ... on Kelvin ... yeah ... we can have ghettos too ... only we use air-rifles instead of machine-guns ... stitch that ... and we drunk driving lights ... in the end ... the question you have to ask yourself is ... are you talking to me ... or are you chewing a brick?

The Kelvin Flats were demolished in 1995 due to social and building maintenance problems associated with the tower blocks. Meadowhall, the large out of town shopping centre, was opened in 1990.

13 Fig XX: The culverted sheaf Source: derelictplaces.co.uk

14 Wickerman (Pulp)

Just behind the station, before you reach the traffic island, a river runs thru' a concrete channel. I took you there once; I think it was after the Leadmill. The water was dirty & smelt of industrialisation Little mesters coughing their lungs up & globules the colour of tomato ketchup. But it flows. Yeah, it flows. Underneath the city thru' dirty brickwork conduits Connecting white witches on the Moor with pre-raphaelites down in Broomhall. Beneath the old Trebor factory that burnt down in the early seventies. Leaving an antiquated sweet-shop smell & caverns of nougat & caramel. Nougat. Yeah, nougat & caramel. And the river flows on. Yeah, the river flows on beneath pudgy fifteen-year olds addicted to coffee whitener And it finally comes above ground again at Forge Dam: the place where we first met.

I went there again for old time's sake Hoping to find the child's toy horse ride that played such a ridiculously tragic tune. It was still there - but none of the kids seemed interested in riding on it. And the cafe was still there too The same press-in plastic letters on the price list & scuffed formica-top tables. I sat as close as possible to the seat where I'd met you that autumn afternoon. And then, after what seemed like hours of thinking about it I finally took your face in my hands & I kissed you for the first time And a feeling like electricity flowed thru' my whole body. And I immediately knew that I'd entered a completely different world. And all the time, in the background, the sound of that ridiculously heartbreaking child's ride outside.

Continues on next page

15 At the other end of town the river flows underneath an old railway viaduct I went there with you once - except you were somebody else - And we gazed down at the sludgy brown surface of the water together. Then a passer-by told us that it used to be a local custom to jump off the viaduct into the river When coming home from the pub on a Saturday night. But that this custom had died out when someone jumped Landed too near to the riverbank Had sunk in the mud there & drowned before anyone could reach them. I don't know if he'd just made the whole story up, but there's no way you'd get me to jump off that bridge. No chance. Never in a million years.

Yeah, a river flows underneath this city I'd like to go there with you now my pretty & follow it on for miles & miles, below other people's ordinary lives. Occasionally catching a glimpse of the moon, thru' man-hole covers along the route. Yeah, it's dark sometimes but if you hold my hand, I think I know the way. Oh, this is as far as we got last time But if we go just another mile we will surface surrounded by grass & trees & the fly-over that takes the cars to cities. Buds that explode at the slightest touch, nettles that sting - but not too much. I've never been past this point, what lies ahead I really could not say. I used to live just by the river, in a dis-used factory just off The river flowed by day after day "One day" I thought, "One day I will follow it" but that day never came I moved away & lost track but tonight I am thinking about making my way back. I may find you there & float on wherever the river may take me. Wherever the river may take me. Wherever the river may take us. Wherever it wants us to go. Wherever it wants us to go.

The inspiration for Wickerman came from a trip down the Don on an inflatable boat. The river Sheaf which gave Sheffield its name, is culverted under the centre of the city.

16 Fig XX: The River Don at Attercliffe Source: author

17 Figure XX: View down to city centre from Park Hill flats

Source: author

18 Sheffield: Sex City (Pulp)

Intake Manor Park The Wicker Norton Freshville Hackenthorpe Shalesmoor Wombwell Catcliffe Brincliffe Attercliffe Ecclesall Woodhouse Wybourn [At this point, Candida starts talking...] Pitsmoor Badger Wincobank Crookes Walkley Broomhill Oh! [Candida, quoting from some book] "I was only about eleven when this happened. We were living in a big block of flats with a central courtyard. All the bedroom windows opened onto this court, and sometimes in the middle of the night, in that building it sounded like a mass orgy. I may have only been eleven, but no-one had to tell me what all that moaning and yelling was about. I'd lie there mesmerised, listening to the first couple. Invariably, they'd wake up other couples, and like some kind of chain reaction, within minutes the whole building was fucking. I mean, have you ever heard other people fucking, and really enjoying it? It's a marvellous sound. Not like in the movies, but when it's real. It's such a happy, exciting sound."

The city is a woman Bigger than any other Oh, sophisticated lady Yeah, I wanna be your lover (not your brother, not your mother, yeah) The sun rose from behind the gasometers at six-thirty a.m. Crept through the gap in your curtains And caressed your bare feet poking from beneath the floral sheets. I watched it flaking bits of varnish from your nails Trying to work it's way up under the sheets. Jesus! Even the sun's on heat today; the whole city getting stiff in the building heat. I just want to make contact with you Oh that's all I wanna do I just want to make contact with you Oh that's all I wanna do Ow Now I'm trying hard to meet her but the fares went up at seven She is somewhere in the city somewhere watching television Watching people being stupid, doing things she can't believe in

19 Love won't last 'til next installment Ten o' clock on Tuesday evening The world is going on outside, the night is gaping open wide The wardrobe and the chest of drawers are telling her to go outdoors He should have been here by this time, he said that he'd be here by nine That guy is such a prick sometimes, I don't know why you bother, really. Oh babe oh I'm sorry But I had to make love to every crack in the pavement and the shop doorways And the puddles of rain that reflected your face in my eyes. The day didn't go too well. Too many chocolates and cigarettes. I kept thinking of you and almost walking into lamp-posts. Why's it so hot? (Peace garden!) The air coming up to the boil; rubbing up against walls and lamp- posts trying to get rid of it. Old women clack their tongues in the shade of crumbling concrete bus shelters. Dogs doing it in central reservations and causing multiple pile-ups in the centre of town. I didn't want to come here in the first place But I've been sentenced to three years in the Housing Benefit waiting room. I must have lost your number in the all-night garage And now I'm wandering up and down your street, calling you name, in the rain Whilst my shoes turn to sodden cardboard. Where are you? [Candida:] (I'm here!) [Jarvis:] Where are you? (I'm here!) Where are you? (I'm here!) Where are you? (I'm here!) Where are you? (I'm here!) Where are you? (I'm here!) Where are you? That's all I wanna do. I'm still trying hard to meet you, but it doesn't look like happening 'cos the city's out to get me if I won't sleep with her this evening Though her buildings are impressive and her cul-de-sacs amazing She's had too many lovers and I know you're out there waiting And now she's getting into bed he's had his chance now it's too late The carpet's screaming for her soul, the darkness wants to eat her whole Tonight must be the night it ends

20 Tomorrow she will call her friends and go out on her own somewhere Who needs this shit anyway? And listen I wandered the streets the whole night crying, trying to pick up your scent Writing messages on walls and the puddles of rain reflected your face in my eyes. We finally made it on a hill-top at four a.m. The whole city is your jewellery-box; a million twinkling yellow street lights. Reach out and take what you want; you can have it all. Gee it's so hot tonight! I didn't think we were gonna make it. It was so bad during the day, but now I'm snug and warm under an eiderdown sky. All the things we saw: everyone on Park Hill came in unison at four-thirteen a.m. and the whole block fell down. The tobacconist caught fire, and everyone in the street died of lung cancer. The grunts from the T-reg Chevette; you bet, you bet, yeah you bet. Mmmmm. Yeah. All I wanna do is make contact with you. Tomorrow, are we gonna? That's all I wanna do... I was trying hard to meet her but the fares went up at seven She was somewhere in the city somewhere watching television Watching people being stupid doing things she can't believe in Love won't last 'til next installment ten o'clock on Tuesday evening The world was going on outside The night was waiting open wide The wardrobe and the chest of drawers were telling her to go outdoors He should have been there by that time, he said that he'd be there by nine That guy is such a prick sometimes Yeah Jesus! Oh baby babe I wanna I wanted to tell you that there's nothing There's nothing to worry about because we can we can we can we can get it together oh yeah Oh we got it together tonight yeah we made it.

21 Figure XX: The Goodwin Fountain in 1965 with stretching off to the right. Source: picturesheffield.com

22 Disco 2000 (Pulp)

Well we were born within one hour of each other. Our mothers said we could be sister and brother. Your name is Deborah. Deborah. It never suited ya. Oh they thought that when we grew up we'd get married, never split up. We never did it although often I thought of it. Oh Deborah do you recall. Your house was very small with wood chip on the wall. When I came around to call you didn't notice me at all. I said let's all meet up in the year 2000. Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown. Be there at 2 o'clock by the fountain down the road. I never knew that you'd get married. I would be living down here on my own on that damp and lonely Thursday years ago. You were the first girl at school to get breasts. Martyn said that yours were the best. The boys all loved you but I was a mess. I had to watch them trying to get you undressed. We were friends but that was as far as it went. I used to walk you home. Sometimes it meant nothing to you cause you were so very popular. Ah Deborah do you recall. Your house was very small with woodchip on the wall. When I came around to call you didn't notice me at all. I said let's all meet up in the year 2000. Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown. Be there at 2 o'clock by the fountain down the road. I never knew that you'd get married. I would be living down here on my own on that damp and lonely Thursday years ago. Oh yeah, oh yeah. And now you've paid your money and you've taken your choice. I know we'll never meet again but I want you to know Want you to know that I remember every single thing. Ah do you recall. Your house was very small with wood chip on the wall. When I came around to call you didn't notice me at all. I said let's all meet up in the year 2000.

23 Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown. Be there at 2 o'clock by the fountain down the road. I never knew that you'd get married. I would be living down here on my own on that damp and lonely Thursday years ago. Oh what are you doing Sunday baby. Would you like to come and meet me maybe you can even bring your baby. Ohhh ooh ooh. Ooh ooh ooh ooh. What are you doing Sunday baby. Would you like to come and meet me baby you can even bring your baby. Ooh ooh oh. Ooh ooh ooh ooh. Ooh ooh ooh ooh. Oh.

The fountain that is referred to here is the old Goodwin fountain that used to sit at the top of Fargate, outside what is now the entrance to . It was where people would often meet before heading on a night out until it was demolished in 1998.

24 25 26 Arctic Monkeys

Arctic Monkeys are an English rock band formed in 2002 in High Green, a suburb of Sheffield. Their debut album was the fastest selling album by a bank in British chart history. They have won seven and won the Mercury Prize in 2006 for their debut album ‘Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not’.

Their music often reflects on the urban experience, often rooted in Sheffield itself. The lead singers Sheffield accent can often be clearly heard throughout the singing.

The songs collected here are:

• Red Lights Indicates Doors Are Secured • Fake Tales Of San Francisco • When the Sun Goes Down

27 Fig XX: A night out on Sheffield’s West Street Source: author

28 Red Lights Indicates Doors Are Secured (Arctic Monkeys)

Ask if we can have six in, if not we’ll have to have 2 You’re coming up our end aren’t you? So I’ll get one with you Oh won’t he let us have six in? especially not with the food He coulda just told us no though, he dint have to be rude

You see her in the green dress? She talked to me at the bar How come its already two pound fifty? We’ve only gone about a yard Dint ya see she were gorgeous, she was beyond belief But this lad at the side drinking a Smirnoff ice came and paid for her tropical Reef

And I’m sitting going backwards, and I didn’t want to leave I said, “It’s High Green mate, via Hillsborough please!”

Well how funny was that sketch earlier, up near that taxi rank Oh no you will have missed it, think it was when you went to the bank These two lads squaring up proper shoutin’, ‘bout who was next in the queue The kind of thing that would seem so silly but not when they’ve both had a few

Well calm down temper temper, you shouldn’t get so annoyed You’re acting like a silly little boy They wanted to be men and do some fighting in the street He said no surrender, no chance of retreat

And so why are we in a taxi? ‘Cause I didn’t want to leave I said “It’s High Green mate, via Hillsborough please!”

Drunken plots hatched to jump it, ask around are ya sure? Went for it but the red light was showing And the red light indicates doors are secured

Hillsborough and High Green are two suburbs in Sheffield.

29 Fig XX: Hunters Bar, looking down to the city centre Source: sheffieldhistory.co.uk

30 Fake Tales Of San Francisco (Arctic Monkeys)

Fake Tales of San Francisco Echo through the room More point to a wedding disco Without a bride or groom

There’s a super cool band yeah With their trilbies and their glasses of white wine And all the weekend rock stars in the toilets Practicing their lines

I don’t want to hear you (Kick me out, kick me out) I don’t want to hear you no (Kick me out, kick me out) I don’t want to hear you no (Kick me out, kick me out) I don’t want to hear you I don’t want to hear you

Fake Tales of San Francisco Echo through the air And there’s a few bored faces in the back All wishing they weren’t there

And as the microphone squeaks A young girl’s telephone beeps Yeah she’s dashing for the exit Oh, she’s running to the streets outside “Oh you’ve saved me,” she screams down the line “The band were fucking wank And I’m not having a nice time”

I don’t want to hear you (Kick me out, kick me out) I don’t want to hear you no (Kick me out, kick me out) Yeah but his bird thinks it’s amazing, though So all that’s left Is the proof that love’s not only blind but deaf

He talks of San Francisco, he’s from Hunter’s Bar

31 I don’t quite know the distance But I’m sure that’s far Yeah, I’m sure that’s pretty far

Yeah, I’d love to tell you all my problem You’re not from New York City, you’re from Rotherham So get off the bandwagon, and put down the handbook Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[x4] Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook

The fountain that is referred to here is the old Goodwin fountain that used to sit at the top of Fargate, outside what is now the entrance to Orchard Square. It was where people would often meet before heading on a night out until it was demolished in 1998.

32 33 Fig XX: Screenshot from music video for ‘when the sun goes down’ Source: youtube/ Arctic Monkeys

34 When the Sun Goes Down (Arctic Monkeys)

I said, "Who's that girl there?" I wonder what went wrong So that she had to roam the streets She don't do major credit cards I doubt she does receipts It's all not quite legitimate

And what a scummy man Just give him half a chance I bet he'll rob you if he can Can see it in his eyes, Yeah, that he's got a driving ban Amongst some other offences

And I've seen him with girls of the night And he told Roxanne to put on her red light They're all infected but he'll be alright 'Cause he's a scumbag, don't you know? I said he's a scumbag, don't you know?

Although you're trying not to listen Avert your eyes and staring at the ground She makes a subtle proposition, "I'm sorry, love, I'll have to turn you down"

He must be up to something What are the chances? Sure it's more than likely I've got a feeling in my stomach I start to wonder what his story might be What his story might be, yeah

'Cause they said it changes when the sun goes down Yeah, they said it changes when the sun goes down They said it changes when the sun goes down Around here Around here

Look here comes a Ford Mondeo Isn't he Mister Inconspicuous? And he don't even have to say 'owt She's in the stance ready to get picked up

35 Bet she's delighted when she sees him Pulling in and giving her the eye Because she must be fucking freezing Scantily clad beneath the clear night sky it doesn't stop in the winter, no

and they said it changes when the sun goes down yeah, they said it changes when the sun goes down and they said it changes when the sun goes down Around here Around here Well, they said it changes when the sun goes down Over the river going out of town and they said it changes when the sun goes down Around here Around here

and what a scummy man Just give him half a chance I bet he'll rob you if he can Can see it in his eyes that he's got a nasty plan I hope you're not involved at all

This song is reportedly based on the prostituion found in the Neepsend district of Sheffield where the band had their recording studio.

36 Fig XX: Screenshot from music video for ‘when the sun goes down’ Source: youtube/ Arctic Monkeys

37 38 Everly Pregnant Brothers

From their bandcamp page:

“The Everly Pregnant Brothers were formed after a drunken dare by Pete Mckee and Richard Bailey. The success of the dare prompted the pair to draught in a bunch of disparate chaps who had three things in common, the love of beer, ukuleles and having a laugh. 5 Sheffielders with ukeleles and a big bloke with a lethal line in lyrics.”

A local band, their music works with existing, well known songs, reworking the lyrics to form comical tunes about all things northern, Sheffield, or just funny. For example, ‘No woman, no cry’ becomes ‘No oven, no pie’, and ‘Stuck in the middle with you’ turns in to ‘Stuck in the Lidl with you’...

The song featured here is:

• Hendos

39 Fig XX: Still from the music video for ‘Hendos’ Source: YouTube/ Everly Pregnant Brothers

40 Hendos (Everly Pregnant Brothers)

Fuck Worcester sauce, that shit's no good for you it tastes like fuckin glue and it’s just not Hendos

I came along, I wrote a song for you I put you on mi stew and you are called Hendos

O shit mi puddin's burned but what a crafty thing I've learned saved it with a drop of Hendos

I were skin, oh I were skin and bones until I got mi meat pie on and now I am a rather big chap...... I am fuckin fat twat. well we ran out, when we were havin stew what a dozy thing to do you cant run out of Hendos and so I went, I went around to t' shop I called in at Co-op to get some more Hendos

I were skin, oh I were skin and bones until I got mi meat pie on and now I'm on a fuckin diet!...... I'm on a fuckin diet!

Hendos I love a drop of Hendos I love a drop of Hendos I love a drop of Hendos......

Fuck Worcester Sauce That shit's no good for you It tastes like fuckin glue......

Based on the song ‘Yellow’ by ; Hendos is a savoury relish, similar to Worcester Sauce made in Sheffield (and not so much found elsewhere...)

41 42 Richard Hawley

Richard Hawley (born 1967 in Sheffield) is an English guitarist, singer- songwriter and producer. He joined the band Pulp in their later years for a short time. He has been nominated for a Mercury Prize twice and once for a Brit Award. He has collaborated with the Arctic Monkeys among others.

Nearly all of his album titles reference a part of Sheffield, if not the songs themselves. However there are a few exceptions. There are two songs listed here:

• • Naked in Pitsmoor

43 Nostalgic impression of Coles Corner source: chrishobbs.com

‘Coles Corner’ today source: openbuildings.com

44 Coles Corner (Richard Hawley)

Hold back the night from us, Cherish the light for us, Don’t let the shadows hold back the dawn.

Cold city lights glowing, The traffic of life is flowing, Out over the rivers and on into dark.

I’m going down town where there’s music, I’m going where voices fill the air, Maybe there’s someone waiting for me With a smile and a flower in her hair

I’m going down town where there’s people The loneliness hangs in the air. With no-one there real waiting for me, No smile, no flower nowhere.

Cold city

Hold back

Hold back the night

‘Coles’ was the nickname given to Cole Brothers, the original name for the department store situated on the corner of Fargate and Church Street. It later moved to sit opposite the City Hall, which eventually became the national department store John Lewis. The original corner was known as a meeting place for lovers.

45 Figure XX: Burngreave Cemetery. source: http://static.panoramio. com/

46 Naked in Pitsmoor (Richard Hawley)

I left my life somewhere behind, my screwed up eyes don’t seem to shine Since the day you said goodbye, I just don’t seem to try, it’s true Oh it’s so true What have you done to me baby? I’m just wasted and wake in the morning and get up screaming

You gave your light to someone new, like an arrow runs away from you Cast your stone into the fire, now feet don’t walk and I’m so tired, it’s true So true What have you done to me baby? Oh these days just break me And now I’m wasted and wake in the morning and get up screaming

I left my life somewhere behind, my screwed up eyes don’t seem to shine Since the day you said goodbye, I just can’t seem to try, it’s true So true What have you done to me baby? Oh the days just break me What have you done to me baby? Don’t run from me lady

What have you done to me baby?

This song was supposedly written about him and his sister running around naked in the summer in Burngreave cemetery when they were children.

47 48 Other authors

Of course it is not just the big names that speak of Sheffield. Nor only with those making music in recent years. Stories of the city and where we live reside in all of us and have been told since human civilization began. Here are just a few more songs and poems that have been captured over time, speaking of Sheffield:

• Sheffield is a Wonderful Town O (Traditional, c.1830) • ‘Sheffield’ (by Edward Carpenter in ‘Towards Democracy, Part 4: Who shall Command the Heart?’, 1902) • Sheffield in a Trench (‘A Sheffield Lad’ in the Spectator, 2nd June 1917) • To tell each other new stories (Adrian Scott, on StoryingSheffield,com) (2015)

49 Figure XX: Demolition of the shambles, , source: picturesheffield.co.uk

50 Sheffield is a Wonderful Town O (Traditional, c.1830)

Ladies and Gentlemen all, I am ready at your call, To sing a little song, and I will not keep you long, On the sights of this wonderful town, O. Sheffield’s praise, tune my lays; All its fame shall be named, I’ll tell, don’t doubt it, all about it.

[Chorus] Hey down, ho down, derry, derry, down, For Sheffield’s a wonderful town, O.

For cultery so famed non with Sheffield can be named, Where the people all their lives, they make razors, scissors, knives, In this very wonderful town, O. Lots of files, all in piles; Stones go round, razors ground; Friday quick goes boring stick; Saturday get your pay, Then regale yourselves with ale. Next the market place survey when round comes market day, And there such sights you’ll see that with me you will agree That Sheffield’s a wonderful town, O. Lots of stalls against the walls; Make your rambles through the shambles; Beef and mutton, stuff a glutton; Butchers cry, ‘Who will buy?’ Dogs and asses, pretty lasses; If you gain Campo Lane, Neville’s Ale, bright and pale, You will find to your mind. In the church-yard all the people are gazing at the steeple, Where the man to point the spire’s each moment getting higher, To amuse you in this wonderful town, O.

51 6/18/2016 Print details report for : Print details report

Ref No: s11492 Figure XX:Titl eThe: Smokey The Smokey Industrial Lower Don Valley,showing River Don Industrial Lower Don Valley,Wor ks showing LRiverocat iDonon: WorksS heffield_Brightside (Sheffield,Pho tBrightside)ographer: Mottershaw Photography source: picturesheffield.co.ukCopyright © Sheffield City Council. All rights reserved.

52

http://www.picturesheffield.com/frontend.php?action=printdetails&keywords=Ref_No_increment;EQUALS;s11492&prevUrl= 1/1 ‘Sheffield’ (by Edward Carpenter in ‘Towards Democracy, Part 4: Who shall Command the Heart?’, 1902) Where a spur of the moors runs forward into the great town, And above the squalid bare steep streets, over a deserted quarry, the naked rock lifts itself into the light, There, lifted above the smoke, I stood, And below lay Sheffield.

The great wind below over the world, The great soft southwest, making a clear light along the far horizon; The sky overhead was serenest blue, and here and there a solitary white cloud scudded swiftly below it. The great soft wind! How it blew in gusts as it would unroot the very rocks, eddying and whistling round the angles! The great autumnal wind! bearing from the valley below clouds of paper and rubbish instead of dead leaves.

Yet the smoke still lay over Sheffield. Suddenly it crawled and spread; Round the bases of the tall chimneys, over the roofs of the houses, in waves - and the city was like a city of chimneys and spires rising out of a troubled sea - From the windward side where the roads were shining wet with recent rain, Right across the city, gathering, mounting, as it went, To the Eastward side where it stood high like a wall, blotting the land beyond, Suddenly it crawled and spread.

Dead leaden sound of forge-hammers, Gaping mouths of chimneys, Lumbering and rattling of huge drawys through the streets, Pallid faces moving to and fro in myriads, The sun, so brilliant here, to those below like a red ball, just visible, hanging; The drunkard reeling past; the file cutter humped over his bench, with ceaseless skill of chisel and hammer cutting his hundred thousand file-teeth per day - lead poison and paralysis slowy creeping through his frame; The gaunt woman in the lens-grinding shop, preparing spectacle- glasses without end for the grindstone - in eager dumb mechanical haste, for her work is piecework;

53 Barefoot skin-diseased children picking the ash-heaps over, sallow hollow-cheeked young men, prematurely aged ones, The attic, the miserable garret under the defective roof, The mattress on the floor, the few coals in the corner, White jets of steam, long ribbons of black smoke, Furnaces glaring through the night, beams of lurid light thrown obliquely up through the smoke, Nightworkers returning home wearied in the dismal dawn - Ah! how long? how long?

And as I lifted my eyes, lo! across the great wearied throbbing city the far unblemished hills, Hills of thick moss and heather, Coming near in the clear light, in the recent rain yet shining. And over them along the horizon moving, the gorgeous procession of shining clouds, And beyond them, lo I in fancy, the sea and the shores of other lands, And the great globe itself curving with its land and its sea and its clouds in supreme beauty among the stars.

During the height of industrialisation in the 18th and early 19th century, air (and water) pollution was a serious issue in Sheffield - which lingered on as a reputation far longer than reality. The predominant wind from the south west meant that pollution was concentrated in the eastern and northern ends of the city, leading the more wealthy to live on the hills to the west of the city, starting a socio-economic spatial divide within the city that still persists today.

54 55 6/18/2016 Print details report for : Print details report

Figure XX: Second Ref No: y07011 Hallamshires in training - Title: Second Hallamshires in training ‑ posing for their photo during posing for their photo during trench‑digging trench-digging, 1916. Location: Sheffield Date: 1916/04/10 source: picturesheffield.co.uk Date 1900‑1919 Period: Notes: Image from Photographs from the Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 1914‑1917 vol. 2 (Local Studies 940.43 SSTQ)

Copyright © Sheffield City Council. All rights reserved.

56

http://www.picturesheffield.com/frontend.php?action=printdetails&keywords=Ref_No_increment;EQUALS;y07011&prevUrl= 1/1 Sheffield in a Trench (‘A Sheffield Lad’ in the Spectator, 2nd June 1917) What would I like to see? No fear! Not London - no, nor Windermere, Nor Paris with its sky so clear - Give me a look at Sheffield.

I have it in my mental eye - Its valleys, and its uplands high, Its smoke-cloud flung against the sky - The smoke that blackens Sheffield.

Its five small rills that slowly steal Past rolling mill and grinding wheel - Their very names can make me feel That I belong to Sheffield.

(O Loxley, Rivelin, Porter Sheaf! Flow onward to the Don, your chief! And ripple out your challenge brief - ‘Men must be free in Sheffield!’)

I know each tower and lofty dome That’s long made Sheffield air its home, And where some others, lately come, Have reared their heads in Sheffield.

I mark each street and winding lane - Oh, yes, they’re black! Oh yes, they’re plain! But let me tread them once again, And Heaven will shine in Sheffield.

And I can hear, as my luck may hap, The nickerpecker’s ‘tap, tap, tap’, The grindstone’s hiss, the tilts ‘rap, rap’, As if I was in Sheffield.

Aye, and the blunt old Sheffield speech As none else to my soul can reach - It knows not how to beg, beseech, The tongue that’s spoke in Sheffield.

57 Could I but see that smoke-cap thick, Meet swarfy-breeched Tom and Dick, And lads with scissors on a stick, I’d know I was in Sheffield.

But here we are! - ‘What for?’ You say? - To teach the Boche the time of day, And keep him far enough away From setting foot in Sheffield.

58 59 Figure XX: A fan celebrates a goal for Sheffield Wednesday source: dailymail.co.uk

60 To tell each other new stories (Adrian Scott, on StoryingSheffield,com) (2015)

I hear my voice on a recording and cringe: the flat vowels, the lack of bass notes, the overall effect of a dim northerner appals me. I know Hockney and Bennett have made the Yorkshire accent credible, but they hail from the more well-heeled parts like Leeds and Harrogate, the places where the BBC make Look North and from whence came the assured silk hats of Bradford millionaires.

I come from the steel-worked, Coal-mined, rougher-edged southern end of the county. Sheffield, city equated with grime and muck, the location for The Full Monty, where men had their work stripped from them, so they went the whole hog and took off their clothes for money instead. The bluff, well-scrubbed, working-class face of Brian Glover came from Sheffield; he played the vicious sports teacher in Kes, another film that showed our true colours: the grey brown domain of pits and pain, crucibles and winding gear.

Being bred in South Yorkshire was like putting on an overcoat that I began to grow into at my first football match, Man United against Sheffield Wednesday (five–four to us and

61 seventy thousand men moving and jeering, reeking of cigarettes and Bovril). I was given the run of the place as a kid, tuppence to anywhere on our brown and cream buses till we were deregulated. My reception teacher told me there was no r in bath, so say it right, lad. Born in London with a mother from Willesden, I had to fit myself to a northern idiom, a place where we mash our tea, a place I grudgingly and gratefully accept has reared me.

I have come to love this town with its sibilant Stannington and Shire Green, the earthy romance of Rivelin and Dungworth, as I declare her common beauty. The view of the world she has given me is not flat like my vowels but riven by seven rivers through seven hills, with valleys that cut deep into the heart of things, that taught us to make cutlery and silver.

We are an accumulation of villages punctuated by civic parks narrating a homely tale, where you expect to greet a friend on the street, where we call each other ‘love’. The nature of these folk is one of cheerful ordinariness, the flat-capped celebrants of cobbled streets and the pinnied mothers who kept the front room for best.

But what are we coming to now, Sheffield and me? We have cleared away the industrial debris and made of it Meadowhall; we even have a winter garden. What has become of the in this age of texts and Freeview?

62 Will call-centres and supermarkets offer the self-respect that our knives and forks in the hands of the world did?

We are building loft apartments and welcoming students, but where is our soul? We are still at the ragged end of our past and don’t quite know how to step into the future. It had better not be with big ideas, with projects that cost an arm and a leg; we already have enough white elephants wandering our sloping streets. Once we hauled gritstone wheels down from the moors to grind our steel into beauty. We should talk to each other at bus stops and in shops about what can be shined and sharpened today.

To tell each other new stories and in the telling rescue the worn things we still need and colloquially create the new hallmarks that read ‘Made in Sheffield’. So I will listen to your voices, overhear your chatter and your stillness; I will speak out about my city in my ready northern tongue and make a simple solid vow to tell your stories with the honesty I got from you

63 Fig XX: Screen shot from 1997 film ‘The Full Monty’ Source: evelinachildrenappeal. com

Fig XX: Screen shot from 2010 film ‘Four Lions’ source: mubi.com

64 Films

Another form of story is the film. One of the most famous to be set in Sheffield is arguably ‘The Full Monty’ (figure XX), a story of 6 unemployed steel workers who form a male striptease act to raise some much needed cash for themselves. Released in 1997, the comedy highlighted the struggle of individual lives affected by the large economic transition the city had been undergoing for the previous 20 years, but with classic northern humour.

More recently (2010), the black comedy film ‘Four Lions’ was also set in the city, following a group of home-grown (inept) terrorists from Sheffield who plan a suicide bombing attack on the London Marathon. A satire on ‘terror’, it again treated a serious, contemporary issue with a (black) sense of humour.

65 Your Songs of Sheffield

66 67 68 69 70 71