Explainging Max Boyce

I’m a fan of Max Boyce. I have to be. I’m Welsh. The thing is, that people who are not from Wales don’t understand. He talks to a part of Welsh culture that doesn’t really exsist any more… that singing in the bar. The kind that probably died when they closed the Pits, so before my time. Yet it still there.. part of that love of Wales that is very hard to shift. To know, whereever I go in the World I will be WELSH, through and through. You cut me open and it’ll say “A present from Barry Island”. See… a joke that’s only funny if your Welsh.

It’s not that, in hindsight, perhaps the closing the Pits was a good idea, but not the way that it was done. Not stabbed in the back by some woman meglomaniac from England. It was this betryal that caused us to re-start the push for the Welsh Assembly. Yet you can’t talk about the closing of the Pits without feeling anger and sadness for a part of Wales that died. It makes no reall sense, probably in the cold light of day there are no men dying in collapses, there are not people suffering from Miners Lung. People don’t get the anger if their not Welsh. I suppose there is a generation growing up now who don’t understand.

Max Boyce sings about Rugby trips. He sings about Rugby Games. I don’t watch rugby often, infact, I’ve not caught a game in sevaral years. I’ve never been on a Rugby trip, beacuse well, I’m not the kind of person that got the rest of the culture that went with it. That isn’t necessary to understand Boyce. If you’ve ever been on the terraces, and cheered for Wales (if you havn’t, not even once, you may not be really Welsh. Try it sometime. Get someone to explain the rules of Rugby to you, watch Wales vs. England and sing Calon Lan and Cwm Rhondda with everyone else) then you know what it’s like. It speaks to something deep inside you. I can understand why people support Rugby, I’m just a practicalist. I don’t like the cold.

Again, that isn’t necessary to understand Max Boyce. His stuff is essentially Welsh Folk Music, at least, Modern Folk Music… it speaks to the Welsh about things we know, and most people know parts of a few songs by Max Boyce, like “Duw It’s Hard”, “Up and Under”, and of course “Hymns and Arias”. If you don’t know them, head to youtube and enjoy. What you’ll notice about most of his recordings is the people. There are people singing along. Normally by the second chorus people are joining in, loudly. It’s something that we do. A room full of the Welsh joining in the singing is quite something. You get it occasionally when you find a local pub and join in. People are normally friendly, and by the end of the night your outside with the smokers talking about this and that like you’ve lived there all your life. IT’s the reason why people don’t leave the villages. It’s because they have lived there all their life, and being part of that community is what most people long.

The thing about it is that there’s a naturall connection with Christianity. Not one about people actually going to Church, but about a belief that seems to be as much part of the Culture as Rugby. His track 10000 instant Christians talks to that, though a lot of the others talks about God just the same way as he talks about Dai.

I suppose it’s difficult to explain Max Boyce if you don’t know what it’s like to raise to the cry of “I’r Gad!”, or don’t know how to belt out “Hen Wlad Fy’n Nhaday”(first verse), or at least “Calon Lan”(first verse). You probably know “Cwm Rhondda”(at least the first verse ;)) or (as it is now more commonly known) “Bread of Heaven”. The kind of song that comes out with a few good-natured pints when the Welsh get together. Is it any wonder I’ve always wanted to sing?

I suppose if you still don’t get it, go and listen to some of Max Boyce. Try to imagine what it’s like to be there. If you love your country, that’s how the Welsh feel, that’s what Boyce is talking too.

What are you still reading for! Go!

~BX