Hill Farmer's Blues

It's definitely about an unfaithful wife and the husband/hill farmer's reaction.

At first, the farmer seems to be describing a normal trip into town, but the tone quickly gets dark. The second line of each verse makes it increasingly clear that the farmer is discussing his reaction to emotional pain ("For what I need" / "To fuel my fire" / "To have my fun"). In the last verse, he makes the unfaithfulness explicit ("Behind my back, Lord / You made a fool of me").

The last verse seems to imply that the farmer is going into Tow Law to be unfaithful, in turn, to his wife, even though he still loves her ("I'm going into Tow Law / To have my fun / Don't get me wrong you were the only one.") This idea is reinforced by his repetition of "Don't wait up for me."

As earlier comments have suggested, the "shopping list" helps to set a dark tone for the song as everything the farmer mentions buying is capable of doing violence. (ripsaw chain, weed killer, shotgun shells, razor wire) His command "Don't do jack" (i.e. don't do anything) is also threatening; he is commanding her to stay alone in the house while he goes into town to "have his fun." How much of his threat is physical and how much is emotional (or metaphorical) is not explicitly clear.

The song's violence is counterposed by the "So bad..." lyrics, suggesting that the farmer's innermost thoughts are of the weakness of hurt.

I personally think of the dog as having been exiled to the backdoor (outside) as a consequence of their fight. He tells his wife not to feed it, underlining how the dog is an innocent victim of the farmer's anger (or perhaps an ineffectual voice of reason). I'd be open to other readings here, though.

Tow Law is a small town in northeast England.

It was always my impression that this song was about a rural farmer who has been wronged in some way - my guess is he has an unfaithful wife - and is struggling to deal with the situation.

Any other interpretations?

Sorry for repeat posting, but I wasn’t happy with the formatting, I hope this reads better. Read this instead if it’s bigger!

I enjoyed your interpretation and also found the darkness too in some of the lyrics. Mark shows again great richness in this, another interesting character portrayal.

Firstly, the man telling her to leave the dog out the back because of the fight is interesting, as you pointed out [which didn’t occur to me]. A dog is a man’s best friend, almost an extension of him, and loyal and trusting [particularly so for a farmer]. The dog is thus an expression of his hurt: the man hurts - so will the dog. So it’s as if the man is choosing to be in the doghouse by telling her to ‘leave him [the dog] be’. The dog being left out the back is like a reversal of the sleeping on the sofa idea when a couple argue, but this time the man has license to take the initiative by telling her to leave the dog alone, since he’s the wronged one. The dog and the farmer are effectively unified in their contempt of resignation against the wife. Furthermore the shared hurt of the farmer and his dog is suggested as being something that the wife won’t understand: he says ‘leave him be’ and one would think that the dog would not want to be in her company anyway, whatever she does. By saying ‘leave him be’, he’s really saying ‘leave me be’, in a nice reversal of the bright way the likes of the Beatles and Louis Armstrong [‘how do you do/they’re really saying I love you’] expressed idealised sentiments — It is a blues song after all, this one.

The theme of loyalty is also in the fact that the man appears to have been so: ‘don’t get me wrong, you were the only one’. His indignation against her seems righteous and you can feel that the last thing he wants is to be made a fool of again by her having the cheek to get to have a relationship with the dog, in his absence, given what she’s done.

I like how you pointed out the dark theme, which I got listening to it. I find his shopping activities typical of a man, who would want to retreat to his work and routine in order to try to deal with his hurt. The items he buys such as ‘killer for the weed’, ‘razor wire’ and ‘shells’ are interesting. One might see a less likely vision of him engaging in a murderous revenge, than what is far more likely symbolic of his therapy: he may be repairing and/or building new fences with the ‘razor wire’ in order to protect his heart or is acting to fend off who might have tempted his wife. The retreat into his work includes cathartically shooting pests on the farm and killing weeds.

As to the less likely more literal interpretation, it occurred to me having been watching the Jodi Arias murder trial that the farmer could indeed have been wronged and is seeking to take revenge, like she did on her boyfriend Travis. Such a view highlights the way that writers like Mark sometimes takes inspiration from events in life, and portrays stories to not only give insights into interesting character perspectives, but also into the creative writing process itself.

As for the dog. The song is called the Blues. In the old Blues tradition the expression "a back door affair" means adultery. The dog at the back door should guard his wife from infidelity.

I don't want to step on anyone else's interpretation, but for me this is absolutely not a song about the betrayal of on affair. For me, the "behind my back Lord, you made a fool of me" is an aside directed to God / a higher power.

This is a man who has lost his entire livelihood - his flock/herd, in the foot & mouth epidemic. He's going through the motions of being a continuing farmer, going to Tow Law to pick up what he needs, but in the end he's going to be drowning his sorrows by drinking, possibly killing himself. The 12 bore shotgun - did he just have to shoot his flock/herd? The razor wire - was that to contribute to the protection of the burial site just by the town? Killer for the weeds - weeds that would spring up because there was no longer a flock to eat them and keep them down?

Tow Law has/had a population of around 2000. Not a big city where you can meet someone new in a bar and have a fling. If he was going to be unfaithful, it would take time to strike up such a relationship, with someone likely known to his wife, and he's explicitly said he's never been unfaithful. "Have my fun" is melancholic.

I feel he's always done the right things, what was expected of him. God still fucked him. So bad, so bad. He's apologising to his wife, he can't go on any longer.

The dog has picked up something is wrong, perhaps they've argued; perhaps the dog is itching to herd the flock which no longer exists. Leave him be. Don't wait up for me.

As for the dog. The song is called the Blues. In the old Blues tradition the expression "a back door affair" means adultery. The dog at the back door should guard his wife from infidelity.

I love the album as a whole and this song is one of the really good ones; I love how minimal, simple and yet exquisite Mark's solo albums are.

Mark Knopfler himself suggest it's about the hard work being a farmer in a time of foot-and-mouth disease which was plagueing UK at the time and many farmers commited suicide because of the economic ruin the disease brought along with it.

I agree that it sounds like a man being unfaithful to his wife - and who may have been cuckold'ed himself.

But it could also just be a cynic farmer who is doing practical things in the face of hardship.

"I'm goint into Tow Law - to fuel my fire" suggest that he's escalating something. He's fuelling his fire, not extinguishing it. Could be he's just in the pub feeling down with his compatriot farmers.

Also, it seems to be the Lord who's making a fool of him. Not his wife. This could be a reference to the disease making it into his stock - a force of nature or circumstance, over which he had little control (divine intervention), but makes him look foolish.

Besides - a chain for the rip saw? A rip-saw is a regular saw. He mean chain saw?

The lyrics need to be seen on the context of the geography of Tow Law, which is a town in County Durham, where they have their own language, words and meanings. Mark Knopfler has already said that the context of this song is the problems that arose with small farmers during the foot and mouth epidemic. Many lost their entire stock of cattle and the were many suicides of small famers throughout the UK.

As I read it, this song is full of the imagery of a Durham farmer who is likely to commit suicide.'Chain for the ripsaw' is a metaphor - as someone has already mentioned, you don't use chain for a ripsaw - these are images. The same with 'killer for the weed' a metaphor for the depths of despair that this farmer has reached.

"Going into town to fuel my fire' shows his resolve to end it all with 'shells for the twelve' - that's a twelve-bore shotgun, and 'razor wire' another metaphor. 'The dog's at the back door. in Durham a 'dog' is a bottle of ale, so this could refer to the fact that the farmer has alleviated his sorrow with drink but 'leave him be' it did no good. 'Don't do jack and don't wait up for me' - don't try to stop me.

'I'm going into Tow Law to have my fun' - a metaphorical twist on what he really intends to do. Now read the next three lines as one phrase 'Don't get me wrong, you were the only one behind my back, Lord, you made a fool of me.' a double reference to the lack of help from the government and his god.

Overall, a sad and bitter song reflecting the realities of a small UK farmer's life (and death) during this appalling time.

I thought it sounded cooler when I thought the lyrics were "going into town, lord." Tow Law sounds weird.