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  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Comes as a cd/dvd set in double jewel case with matching picture discs. Artwork features Penelope's "activist patch" coat with patches collected from activist campaigns all over the world that Penelope has played for and/or supported in 15 years of touring

    Includes unlimited streaming of Legacy: Two Decades of Topical Writing via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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      $35 AUD or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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  • Buy the Full Digital Album

  • Full Digital Discography

    11
    releases

    Get all 11 Penelope Swales releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Captains of Industry, Legacy: Two Decades of Topical Writing, Skin: Deep, Archive Vol. 2: Songs from the Borderline 1989-1992, Monkey Comfort, 'Archive': Demos, Out-takes and One-offs 1995-2000, Justifying your Longings to the Doctor, Homemade Wine, and 3 more. , and , .

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lyrics

Aunty Betty 

© Penelope Swales 1995
Ooh, insulation. A small room away from the ground, away from the sky. Ooh, 
insulation. Blankets over the windows, keep out the night, keep out the 
light. We don't live together, we live seperately and winter's coming. We 
don't live together, we live separately and hard times are coming. People 
create their own individual rooms, their own surrogate wombs. People say to 
each other "Won't you come up to my room?" People sit together - incense and 
candlelight. 
People talk together, sharing smoke, sharing wine. Oh, living in this city. 
Oh, it's like living in a labyrinth. The dripping corridors are the 
wet-brick walls and low-slung, oppressive sky. We're just creatures, small 
cave-rats, living in a labyrinth. Amid the putrid phosphorescence, shop 
windows, traffic lights, stalactites. Ooh, isolation. Houses on the 
outskirts of town. Ooh, endless frustration. McWilliams port, sorrows to 
drown. People live together, yet seperately, with their own kind. With 
people that live together, share their smokes, share their wine. Oh, living 
in a redneck town. Oh, it's like living in apartheid. The conciousness of 
your colour and your birth is reflected in everyone's eyes, black or white. 
And Aunty Betty said "I said to my nephews 'Come home, come live with me by 
the creek. Come home, come home to the Land.' but they're too drunk with 
anger to listen to me "Aunty Betty said "I've done my share of destroying 
myself." Yeah, Aunty Betty said " I know you care, 'coz I can always tell." 
Aunty Betty and I looked at each other over campfire, over breakfast. Over 
two hundred years of war and hate, and Aunty Betty said, she said "I love 
you, sis." Ooh, sisalation. Back in the city we seek natural ways to live 
unnaturally. Ooh, implementation. Sit 'round our bar radiator drinking 
herbal tea. We could live together, close to the ground, close to the sky. 
Be friends with the weather. Accept the wet, embrace the dry. Oh, we try to 
do it anyway. Sitting 'round a candle as if it were a campfire. Here in this 
hell our race has made. Plaster caves, concrete canyons, bitumen forest 
floor. We try to do it anyway, sitting 'round a candle as if it were a 
campfire. But you know, Aunty Betty said we could go visit her anytime, 
anytime, anytime. She said "We could live together, not seperately, but side 
by side. Be friends with each other - I don't care if you're black or 
white!" She said we could live together, close to the ground, close to the 
sky. Be friends with each other. Accept the rough, embrace the happy times. 
Aunty Betty said, Aunty Betty said, Aunty Betty said. And you know, if Aunty 
Betty said it, then it must be true.

credits

from Legacy: Two Decades of Topical Writing, released July 1, 2010

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Penelope Swales Boolarra, Australia

Penelope Swales has been articulating the human condition with passion and humour for 30+ years. She sings about politics, love, friendship, the unbreakable bond between us and dogs and the impact of the Internet on society. She won the 2019 Alistair Hulett Songs for Social Justice Award with “Cambridge Analytica”. “The Ides of March in Christchurch" was short-listed for the same award in 2020. ... more

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