We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Star of the West

from A Yard of Ale by Stuart Forester

/
  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    A Yard of Ale is the second album by Stuart Forester released on Melonstone Records, May 2013. Ten original songs plus an interpretation of the traditional English folk ballad The Factory Girl and a cover of the Mike Waterson ode to the ragged glory and ultimate decline of the UK fishing industry, Cold Coast of Iceland.
    'You feel as though you’ve been listening to these songs and this voice for all your life.' Dai Jeffries, R2 Magazine.
    Comes shrink wrapped in full colour artwork gatefold card digipak with 12 page lyric booklet and full colour artwork on the cd itself.

    Includes unlimited streaming of A Yard of Ale via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      £12 GBP or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      £1 GBP  or more

     

lyrics

Star of the West 5.31 Stuart Forester

Inspired by the recollections of the drinking and brawling years of a good friend of mine from Hull and a particular favourite pub of his, long since demolished to make way for a shopping centre.

I packed up me troubles and headed for more when I got out of borstal in late ‘64
Everthorpe prison never taught me no lessons, those old stone cold walls never did me no good
There was a place that I would go when I was a free man with coppers to spend
There was tar on the ceiling and blood on the floor, it was like coming home when you walked through the door

The Star of the West shines bright in my mind
The things I could tell you I was hard in me time
I’ve got scars I could show you and some that I can’t
The Star of the West still shines in my mind

Monochrome memories of Saturday nights, black and blue brawls in Henry’s at midnight
I loved every minute and I drank to them all, those sailors and squaddies and dockers and whores
We’d go out on Friday with a fiver and smokes and come round on Sunday battered and broke
But I was a free man at least for a while and while I was free I was drunk all the time

The Star of the West shines bright in my mind
The things I could tell you I was hard in me time
I’ve got scars I could show you and some that I can’t
The Star of the West still shines in my mind

There was a woman back in those days, a mother and lover she worked for her pay
They said I was mental they said I was mad, but she was the best woman I ever had
And these faded old pictures all over my skin remind me of people and places I’ve been
And I’ve been round a few times and I’ve mended me ways, but the best times that I had were those nights and days

The Star of the West shines bright in my mind
The things I could tell you I was hard in me time
I’ve got scars I could show you and some that I can’t
The Star of the West still shines in my mind

credits

from A Yard of Ale, released May 1, 2013
Written by Stuart Forester
Stuart Forester - Guitar & Vocals

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Stuart Forester Scotland, UK

Stuart Forester is an English acoustic roots songwriter in the folk tradition who has quite some stories to tell. Born in Cumbria but raised from a a few months old until the age of three in trailer homes in Canada he grew up in Hull, East Yorkshire and then spent many years in London. He now lives in rural Aberdeenshire, Scotland where his latest album The Good Earth was recorded. ... more

contact / help

Contact Stuart Forester

Streaming and
Download help

Report this track or account

If you like Stuart Forester, you may also like: