Skinny Lister are like Seth Lakeman (and many other bands but they’re folk) – you know what you’re getting before a single track airs: upbeat and life-affirming songs about carousing, drinking (from flagons), life at sea and in love, all meant to be played in rousing fashion live.
It opens with a salty singalong and accordion with “Yorkshire Belle”, which appears to be about a boat, “Dignity” style, except in Yorkshire, and she sank in the war. She is real, and sails from Bridlington to Flamborough Head.
“Set Us Straight” is a drinking song, the setting being a solid weekend drinking of the narrator, a bottle to wake up and a couple on the way to the pub, where they leave “every barrel empty / half a squillion quid gone up the spout” before going to work on Monday, where only a swift one will set them straight. The point of the song appears to be singalong, a rapidly delivered semi-tongue twister “We’ll smuggle a double in just to set us straight”, the closing refrain.
The title track is not a drinking song but contains the line “Been drunk for so long that I’m sober” but it’s about a man who is so seasick for lost love he ran away to sea. “Plough On” is a song of fighting adversity from the Frank Turner songbook.
“Tumbling Into Something” shows the band can write gentle, non-drinking songs, a gentle acoustic track with piano and acoustic guitar (the later “Everything” is similar).
But the reflective mood doesn’t last: “Bristol Bound” is a kick drum-led nautical tune about drinking ITALICS and being in sea, followed by “Drinking Song” (sample lyrics “Fill a flagon with something strong / what could possibly go wrong?” and “What we need right now is another drinking song”).
“Back Into The Battle” nicks the beat from “We Will Rock You”, while closer “Glass To Our Days” is a proper album closer, slow and an arms-linked singalong, recommending a more philosophical approach to drinking, a single glass while toasting loved ones and the joy of life.
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