Featuring: Brian Johnson
Songwriter: Jo Lawry Julian Sutton Kathryn Tickell Peter Tickell Sting
Producer: Rob Mathes Sting
[Verse 1]
My first day in the shipyard, the gaffer says to me
"I want you to go to the store lad and get a few things, you see?
Now here's a list, can you read lad? Can you read it back to me?
And me and the boys will listen while were having our morning tea"
Now reading was my pride when I left school at fourteen
There wouldn't be no problem here, I'd show them I was keen
But when I starts to reading, they just couldn't hold their mirth
Hugging themselves and spluttering like they was giving birth
[Chorus]
"First off a brace of sky hooks and a packet of nail holes neat
And then three cans of tartan paint, and that's my task complete"
The gaffer pats me on the head and sends me on me way
He says, "Don't come back empty handed lad, or I'll have to dock your pay"
[Verse 2]
So I gets to the store all nervous and the quartermaster's there
I pulls the list out of me pocket and I starts to read all square
Well I hadn't barely finished when the store-man's face turns red
He gives me such an evil look I thought I'd soon be dead
[Chorus]
[Verse 3]
I gets back home that evening and me mother says to me
"How was it son? How was your day? Sit down and have some tea"
I told her of the list I'd read and the trouble I was in
I couldn't go back tomorrow or the gaffer'd have me skinned
[Chorus]
My first day in the shipyard, the gaffer says to me
"I want you to go to the store lad and get a few things, you see?
Now here's a list, can you read lad? Can you read it back to me?
And me and the boys will listen while were having our morning tea"
Now reading was my pride when I left school at fourteen
There wouldn't be no problem here, I'd show them I was keen
But when I starts to reading, they just couldn't hold their mirth
Hugging themselves and spluttering like they was giving birth
[Chorus]
"First off a brace of sky hooks and a packet of nail holes neat
And then three cans of tartan paint, and that's my task complete"
The gaffer pats me on the head and sends me on me way
He says, "Don't come back empty handed lad, or I'll have to dock your pay"
[Verse 2]
So I gets to the store all nervous and the quartermaster's there
I pulls the list out of me pocket and I starts to read all square
Well I hadn't barely finished when the store-man's face turns red
He gives me such an evil look I thought I'd soon be dead
[Chorus]
[Verse 3]
I gets back home that evening and me mother says to me
"How was it son? How was your day? Sit down and have some tea"
I told her of the list I'd read and the trouble I was in
I couldn't go back tomorrow or the gaffer'd have me skinned
[Chorus]
more tracks from the album
The Last Ship
- The Last Ship
- Peggy’s Song
- Jock the Singing Welder
- Show Some Respect
- Sky Hooks and Tartan Paint
- Hadaway
- It’s Not the Same Moon
- The Last Ship (Reprise)
- So to Speak
- I Love Her But She Loves Someone Else
- What Have We Got?
- Ballad of the Great Eastern
- Practical Arrangement
- Language of Birds
- And Yet
- Practical Arrangement (Full Original Duet)
From the album
- The Last Ship (2013)
Sting popular songs
- Shape of My Heart
- Englishman in New York
- Desert Rose
- Fields of Gold
- Fragile
- Russians
- It’s Probably Me
- If I Ever Lose My Faith in You
- Brand New Day
- Seven Days
- Mad About You
- A Thousand Years
- Soul Cake
- I Can’t Stop Thinking About You
- If You Love Somebody Set Them Free
- All This Time
- When We Dance
- If It’s Love
- The Last Ship
- Fortress Around Your Heart
- Children’s Crusade
- Moon Over Bourbon Street
- Synchronicity I
- Giacomo’s Blues