Thanks to Lesley for putting up this video of another new song, Sleeping Giant from the album Palace Of Tears.

This song is about my Scottish roots. I have been lucky enough to go to Scotland every year of my life although now it is often for funerals. My family there live on the Cowal peninsula of Argyll and their houses are all by the sea, looking out to some of the islands of the Inner Hebrides The island of Arran has some high mountains and when the sun goes down, the silhouette forms the outline of a sleeping giant, it’s called the Sleeping Warrior.

There are a couple of paraphrased quotes in the song. ‘Now all these years and their players have vanished it is as though they never existed’ was from Baha al-Din ibn Shadadd, writing in the 13th century at the end of his biography of Saladin. The other is the famous Scottish toast ascribed to Robert Burns. ‘Here’s tae us, wha’s like us? Damn few and they’re a’ deid’

I dreamed I saw a giant asleep upon the land
The brown hills of the Highlands he cradled in his hands
And I dreamed the giant had a smile upon his face
For all the loves he thought he’d lost had never gone to waste

No, they all came back to forgive him
And to his great surprise
They understood his passions
From the fire in his eyes

He left his giant footprints all over their white sand
But they forgave his foolish ways and all that he had done
When he loved he loved them truly and never meant to part
And when he cried, he cried a river, with all his giant heart

Now all these years and their players have passed away
Like so many dreams of the hills of our childhood days

He turned to face the morning, that way his journey lies
He reached for the horizon, where the sun would rise
And I dreamed the giant was never more to wake
His lover was the sky now, she’d help him on his way

And I watched until the dawn came
And I saw him melt away
Till all that’s left was the outline
Of the hills of our childhood days

And we’ll drink a glass to friendship and to home
We used to say wha’s like us, damn few, and they’re all gone

Now all these years and their players have passed away
Like so many dreams of the hills of our childhood days