Subscribe
now to receive all the new
music
Granfalloon creates,
including
9 back-catalog releases,
delivered instantly to you via the Bandcamp app for iOS and Android.
You’ll also get access to
subscriber-only
exclusives.
Learn more.
Written in 2014:
"This was not the song I had intended to write.
So difficult did I find sourcing a suitable subject that this week's song was very nearly about hot dogs. That's right. Hot dogs.
The initial inspiration for the topic of 'Someone who sells something' came from the song 'Soldier's Things' by Tom Waits. Listening to him crooning "Everything's a dollar in this box..." in his own gruff way made me want to write my own version of the song set in my own home of Manchester.
My choice was also an effort to stretch my observational writing as so far this '52' project has been very imagination based. I wanted to practise a different skill. Exercise a different side of my writing.
In my mind the song would be about some quaint street vendor... An old lady who sells buttons or some larger than life retired sailor who sells toys weaved from wicker.
Surprisingly I did not trip over either of those during my week spent yo-yo-ing as usual between Manchester and Preston. So I cast around for information, I asked friends, I posted Sudden Questions on the Internet looking for leads. Nothing seemed suitable. It all seemed too tacky. Or modern. Or normal.
Around this time it was bluntly pointed out to me that I "don't live in a f***ing Dickens novel..." and that my chances of finding anything like what I wanted were precisely zero especially with Wednesday's deadline fast approaching. A new approach was needed.
If I wanted to stay on the street vendor path, I would have to settle for someone food based... The Jacket Potato Man in Preston was one possibility and I love those jumbo hot dogs for a quid on Market Street in Manchester so much that yes, I very nearly wrote a song about hot dogs whilst wandering around the centre in desperation.
And then I stumbled onto St. Anne's Square.
Where past the fountain, behind the statue to the memory of the following, beneath the soldier bayonet aloft I spied Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe's brown and gold shop front.
"Purveyor of finest confectionery" it proudly boasted. I rambled round the shop surreptitiously taking notes and blurred photographs much to the suspicion of the staff. With growing excitement I scribbled down the names of all the tongue-twistingly, nostalgia inducing sweets and chocolates and mints and fudges they stocked.
Happy I had enough information to sit and write the song I ventured onto the Mr Simm's website in the hope of finding some history about Mr Simm and his family, when the shop was founded and if there were any interesting stories surrounding it.
I don't want to reveal any more here and it will diminish the impact of the first listen to the song so all I can say is listen to the song.
So it goes..."
lyrics
There there On St Anne's Square
Stands Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
Purveyor of finest confectionery
Everton mints and jelly beans
Liquorice whirls and clotted creams
Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
Blackjacks, Fruit Salads and Aniseed Twists
Gargantuan gobstoppers - big as your fist
Jazzles and Fizzers and Raspberry Ruffles
And Iron Brew fudge and Italian Truffles
Is life some romantic tale
Where mystery and beauty
And the underdogs prevail?
Where we'll be happy together
Happy together
Happy forever
At Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
(breathe) I imagine a man with Majeika hair
Mrs Simm and the twins - it's a family affair
She tends the penny sweets - sweet Cherry Lips
He makes his famous Black Death Sour Pips
Is life some romantic tale
Where mystery and beauty
And the underdogs prevail?
And they'll be happy together
Happy together
Happy forever
Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
Rhubarb and custards and Coldsfoot rock
Uncles Joe's Mintballs, cough sweets and pear drops
It all paints a picture, a quaint little scene
Of Olde but colourful and fantastic dreams
But life isn't some romantic tale
Where mystery and beauty
And the underdogs prevail
Where we'll be happy together
Happy together
Happy forever
Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
Mr Simm's was established in 2004
There are 90 locations from Ashford to York
Is it a penny sweet when it costs 50p?
The 'E's in the name were only added last week
Retro is fashionable and vintage is 'in'
Repackaged and sold to us as the whimsy
Of Mr Simm's Olde Sweet Shoppe (rights reserved)
It's between a mall and HSBC
And a Starbucks has opened up over the street
Cos life isn't some romantic tale
Where mystery and beauty
And the underdogs prevail
Where we'll be happy together
Happy together
Happy forever
Slugabed & Samuel Organ join forces to create glitchy pastoral soundscapes that feel uncannily modern and hauntingly medieval. Bandcamp New & Notable Nov 18, 2021
The instrumental ensemble Dt/IG straddles the line between folk and classical, stirring acoustics augmented by sumptuous arrangements. Bandcamp New & Notable Oct 29, 2023
The Oakland singer's latest album imagines the power struggle between man and nature as a slow, steady tempest of dark folk. Bandcamp New & Notable Nov 20, 2019
