ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, October 18, 1996 TAG: 9610180018
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KAREN MATTHEWS THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
The title of Billy Bragg's new album, ``William Bloke,'' deftly sums up the British rocker's appeal: He's a cockney poet - or what Americans would call a regular guy.
``I'm trying to be the mystical, radical poet in a soccer jersey,'' Bragg says.
``I think it's important to realize you can be part of that tradition and still be a working-class bloke. You don't have to have gone to university and have a Ph.D. in English lit.''
The rocker with a political edge and an ear for love songs was in New York recently promoting ``William Bloke,'' his first LP since 1991's ``Don't Try This at Home,'' and preparing for a U.S. tour with Robyn Hitchcock.
He sat in an interview at the offices of Elektra Records looking somewhat ascetic in a gray shirt and gray jacket. A cap of inch-long hair completed the look.
``It's poor, pitiful, Puritan me,'' said Bragg, 38. ``When it's longer the gray shows up more, and I'm buggered if I'm going to bloody dye it.''
When he performs, Bragg's earnestness is leavened with fun. At a New York concert several years ago, Debbie Harry and the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy joined him for Dee-Lite's gleeful ``Groove Is in the Heart.''
But in interviews, Bragg tends to lecture, as if striving, in the words of one of his songs, to save the youth of America.
``There are things in America that really do look - outside, in the rest of the world, that really do look medieval,'' he said. ``In our society someone who has a lot of guns in his house is a nut case. In your country he's a patriot.''
Two cuts from ``Don't Try This at Home'' got U.S. radio and MTV play: ``Sexuality'' with its universal theme, and ``You Woke Up My Neighbourhood'' with guest vocals by Michael Stipe.
It's hard to see ``Upfield,'' the first single from ``William Bloke,'' as an American hit. The title is a soccer reference and the chorus, ``I've got a socialism of the heart,'' expresses a sentiment largely absent from commercial airwaves in the United States.
Other songs on the new album include ``Brickbat,'' which talks about Bragg's home life with his companion and their young son, and ``Northern Industrial Town,'' a cautious ode to peace in Belfast.
In ``A Pict Song,'' Bragg has set to music a Rudyard Kipling poem about Britain's early inhabitants and their border wars with the Romans.
``It's rather ironic that we who went off to colonize the world, with the help of Mr. Kipling were ourselves colonized by the Romans,'' he said. ``That irony, I thought, was great.''
In ``Red to Blue,'' Bragg chides a friend for losing his principles and wonders, ``Should I vote red for my class or green for our children?''
``I'm trying to challenge my contemporaries to rage against time passing,'' he said.
It's a big job, apparently.
``The new leadership of the Labor Party have moved so close to the center over the last three months that they've allowed me to sum up my socialism in a sound bite.
``And I've spent a lot of time patiently, ideologically, historically putting my political beliefs into context for Americans - not for any reason other than you live in a nonideological society so I would expect to explain a bit about socialism.
``And I've tried saying, `Well, you know, it's like a car-pool lane. That's socialism. It's like a library.' Well I don't have to do that. Fortunately, the leadership of the Labor Party in Britain has now made it possible for me to sum up my radical socialist belief in one handy sound bite. All I have to say now is, `I believe that rich people should pay more tax than poor people.'''
In ``The Space Race Is Over,'' Bragg gazes at the moon with his son, Jack, who will be 3 in December.
``I look up at the night sky and think, `Wow, suppose we are the only people out here?''' he said. ``Wouldn't that be fun. 'Cause then we'd have to take responsibility for everything. No aliens can come save us.''
LENGTH: Medium: 79 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. British rocker Billy Bragg has a new album and aby CNBtour after a five-year layoff. color.