2025 Competition Entry:

The Whisky Jar by Stephen Ellis

Genre

Folk

Artist

Website

Co-writer(s)

no

Performer(s)

Stephen Ellis – everything you hear, beginning to end, including recording and mastering etc.

Description

The song is a pretty accurate account of the first date my wife and I had eight years ago. I released it on January 7th this year, the 8th anniversary of that day. I considered waiting until the 10th anniversary but couldn’t find the patience! The Whisky Jar is a well-known bar among the singer-songwriter community in Manchester due to its fantastic Open Mic, she introduced me to it on that night.

Bio

Former front man of ’90s London indie hopefuls The Spectators, Stephen Ellis hit his 40s after two decades of musical quiescence with a headful of song – largely induced by his confused, but (mutually) liberating extraction from an ailing and failing marriage. The songs brim with melody and melancholy, musing on life lessons, love lost and middle aged angst. A dash of humour and a smack of self-derision stops the songs tipping over into sentimentality, but never take away from the candour at their core. In a world awash with male-singer-songwriter-piano-players, he doesn’t lay claim to uniqueness (think Gary Barlow meets Elton John in a dark space and a bad mood). But the voice is dirt swathed in radio-friendly velvet, and the songs are immediate and infectious in their simplicity. He cites Leonard Cohen, Scott Walker and Tom Waits as influences and describes his music as “infinitely more effective than selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.”

Stephen Ellis lives in Prestwich, Manchester and can be found “in and around” with piano in tow.

Lyrics

So they arrange to meet, for something to eat
El Capo, Manchester, 2pm on Saturday
He arrives a little early
She arrives a little late
Unravelling the scarf wrapped around her neck
It’s a cold and wet January day
He starts to stand, offers to take her coat
Then realises he has nothing else left to say
‘Shall we have starter?’
‘Shall we get some wine?’
‘Do you like to travel?’
‘Tell me about your kids’
He’s been single now, for quite some time?
The waiter arrives, they split the bill
She puts her coat back on to prepare for the chill
‘Shall we go for a drink, or do you need to get home?’
They’re standing in the doorway getting cold

‘So why don’t we go to the… Whisky Jar?’
Just around the corner from right we are
There’s a sofa made for 2
Yeah me and you
Right by the bar
And it’s really not that far
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar, in Manchester NQ

Stepping in to the bar and out from the cold
That’s brought a blush to her cheeks and the tip of his nose
Drunk on the vapours of an old fools hope
That arise from the mist and the murk of this city
The lights are down low, the music is slow
The chime of glasses and laughter, the room is aglow
‘What do you want to drink, the next round is on me?’
‘Straight, with no ice, Lagavulin 16’

Inside The Whisky Jar
Just around the corner from right we are
There’s a sofa made for 2
Yeah me and you
Right by the bar
And it’s really not that far
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar, in Manchester NQ

Sunk into the sofa, in the shadow of the room
Yesterday be gone forever, tomorrow be too soon
Cocooned in their whispers, in the silences that speak
Hushed like little children playing, hide ‘n seek
The Lightness of their bodies, slow thickness of the air
He leans toward her face, pushes her hair behind her ear

The Whisky Jar
Just around the corner from right we are
There’s a sofa made for 2
Yeah me and you
Right by the bar
And it’s really not that far
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar
The Whisky Jar, in Manchester NQ

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