An Enchanted Place

It’s  Saturday and so time for another Saturday Songster post. This week’s track is ‘Fifteen Years’ by The Levellers.

The Levellers are an English band formed in 1988 whose music crosses the boundaries between rock, punk and folk. Their name is drawn from the seventeenth century radical democracy movement that was founded during the English Civil War and this very much reflects the band’s political stance.

I first heard their music in the early 1990s when my sister returned home from university with their second album, ‘Levelling the Land’, that she played constantly in the room next to mine. I was eleven years old at the time and they’ve been my favourite group ever since. I’ve now seen them live at least ten times! The song Fifteen Years is from that album.

Fifteen Years

I never was a violent man
Said the man in the bar with his head in his hands
He’s trying his best to understand the ’cause of his dismay
But the years of gin have broken him
They’ve left him cold where he’s fitted in
But it’s too late now to turn around and find another way

And the lights in the late night lock-in
Have faded away when he gets in
The girl from fifteen years ago
Has packed and gone away

That’s never how it used to be, what happened to all that energy
You took one too many liberties, I’m tired of being afraid
So after the fight she took flight hiding swollen eyes and a wounded pride
The best years of her life denied is sold for liquid shares

And the lights in the late night lock-in
Have faded away when he gets in
The girl from fifteen years ago
Has packed and gone away

And the victims of their world
Are advertised on posters
Just a beach and a pretty girl
You just take this potion

It’s another week till his check comes through
He’s got a fiver left to spend on food
The doors of the bar are open and he breaks another rule
But he sits on the stool that bears his name
He’s got a favorite glass an’ is called the same
He’s never been kept waiting, ’cause he pays the landlord’s wage

And the lights in the late night lock-in
Have faded away when he gets in
The girl from fifteen years ago
Has packed and gone away

The lights in the late night lock-in
Have faded away when he gets in
The girl from fifteen years ago
Has packed and gone away

Lyrics from Lyricsmode.

If you’d like to know more about The Levellers or would like to check out more of their music, you can visit their website here.