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about

Written for the ‘The Works’ a programme about Wolverton Railway Works put together by Roger Kitchen at the Living Archive and broadcast by Three Counties Radio in 1995. The words to the song are firmly based on the spoken reminiscences of men and women who had worked in the workshops and offices of the Works.

lyrics

Worksong
words & music: Kevin Adams

You were there to work, you didn't dare stop
The foreman's office overlooked the shop
In his bowler hat and his starched collar shirt
You never saw the foreman with his hands in the dirt
And up at the top of the Golden Stair
The Superintendent in his stuffed leather chair
Just look busy if he ever walked through
You didn't bother him and he never saw you

But nothing stays the same-
Now management skills is the name of the game
And it's hands-on this, and first names that
And goodbye to the foreman's bowler hat.

The charge hand hammers out the piecework rates
Does his best for his family, his best for his mates
We could build anything in metal or wood
But we cost too much for our own damn good.
See that finish in the Royal Train?
You won't see anything as good as that again
Now the very same skills of the very same man
Are patching up panels on an old brake van

Nothing stays the same
Measured time is the name of the game
And the time study man puts his watch on me
And piecework rates are history

‘You've a job for life,’ said your old man
But he didn't reckon with the Beeching plan.
Now we don't build new, we just repair-
You start to think you could work elsewhere.
Twenty years later it's the same again
At the stroke of the minister's fountain pen,
Market forces, political fads -
Kicked out on the dole one thousand lads.

Nothing stays the same-
Economic theory, the name of the game
And it's streamline this and lose more fat
And it’s jobs for the boys for the bureaucrat.
Nothing stays the same
Privatisation, the name of the game
But it’s still true as it was back then
The strength of the works is the skill of the men.
The strength of the works is the skill of the men.
The heart of the works is the skill of the men.

credits

from All That's Changed vol 1, released June 1, 2009

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about

The Living Archive Band Milton Keynes, UK

An acoustic quintet with an emphasis on strong vocals to deliver both songs and the spoken word depicting the experiences of the people of North Buckinghamshire past and present. The inhabitants of the towns of Wolverton, Stony Stratford and Bletchley and of course the new city of Milton Keynes all have had something to say, and the Living Archive Band gives them a voice. ... more

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