The first is well known and the second not so well known. The first gets played on the radio every Christmas and the other, well I'm not sure it's ever been played on BBC Radio - but I may well be wrong.
The first is Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney where Macca advocates love and not war. The video of the song features Paul as both a German and British soldier and was prompted by the Christmas truce. The lyrics are:
All 'round the world,
Little children being born to the world.
Got to give them all we can 'til the war is won,
Then will the work be done.
Help them to learn (help them to learn)
Songs of joy instead of burn, baby, burn.
Let us show them how to play
The pipes of peace,
Play the pipes of peace.
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh,
Ooh-ooh-ooh.
Help me to learn
Songs of joy instead of burn, baby, burn,
Won't you show me to play (how to play)
The pipes of peace, (pipes of peace)
Play the pipes of peace
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh.
What do you say? (what do you say?)
Will the human race be run in a day? (in a day?)
Or will someone save this planet we're playing on?
Is it the only one?
What are we gonna do?
Help them to see (help them to see)
That the people here are like you and me. (like you and me)
Let us show them how to play (how to play)
The pipes of peace, (pipes of peace)
Play the pipes of peace.
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh.
I light a candle to our love,
In love our problems disappear.
But all in all we soon discover
That one and one is all we long to hear.
The second is a much more complex and harsh song "Christmas Day" by heavy rock band Magnum.
Not a tree on the skyline
Nor a bird in the wing
Whispers frozen for all time
No man's land will be king
Left deserted a cold smile
From the way they've been served
Virgin mother and her child
Turn their face from the world
Just for a moment, they're only men
On Christmas day
There'll be no killing or fighting
On Christmas day
There'll be no thunder and lighting
On Christmas day
On Christmas day
Many years they'll remember
And they'll toast absent friends
On that cold day, December
They'll be back there again
And just for a moment, they're only men
On Christmas day
There'll be no killing or fighting
On Christmas day
There'll be no thunder and lighting
On Christmas day
On Christmas day
The wind blows cruel and hostile, on that deserted land
No shepherd sacrifice the lamb
While prayers of guilt and duty, race upwards to the sky
Collide in fearsome combat cry
Oh, the guns and the ships and the planes of every county
For the wins and the gains, what a price, it's much too high
Don't look away and wonder, this savage poetry
Is set to drag you under with arms of jealousy
The sun won't rise up shining, on fields of evergreen
Shot down by a crossfire with a scream
The seasons change so slowly and bring on winter's song
Till no-one knows where they belong
Oh, the guns and the ships and the planes of every county
For the wins and the gains, what a price, it's much too high
Don't look away and wonder, this savage poetry
Is set to drag you under with arms of jealousy
On Christmas day
There'll be no killing or fighting
On Christmas day
There'll be no thunder and lighting
On Christmas day
On Christmas day
On Christmas day
I light a candle to our love,
In love our problems disappear.
But all in all we soon discover
That one and one is all we long to hear.
This song looks more at the cost of war. Two songs with similar meanings but from two very different genres.
* * *
Yesterday I walked almost 10 miles - to Wymondham and back and around Wymondham. Then in the evening it was an important parish council meeting and I walked back from that. Keeping the miles up.
The meeting had a presentation from a company wanting to put a care village on land on the edge of the village. I tried to make as many people aware of the meeting as possible because we just cannot have another major development in the village without the corresponding facilities to go with them.
So what happened at the meeting? There were over 40 members of the public there and I will give you my thoughts on what happened tomorrow.