Workers Playtime http://www.fishpond.com.au/Music/Workers-Playtime-Billy-Bragg/0634457260627

Artist: Billy Bragg

• Personnel: Billy Bragg (guitar); Kenny Jones (acoustic guitar); Wiggy (guitar, background vocals); Martin Belmont (guitar); B.J. Cole (pedal steel guitar); Camilla Brunt, Donna Welchman (violin); Theresa Pamplin (viola); Julia Palmer (cello); Barb Jungr (harmonica); Dave Woodhead (trumpet, flugelhorn); Cara Tivey (piano, keyboards, background vocals); Bruce Thomas (bass); Danny Thompson (acoustic bass); Mickey Waller (drums); Tony Maronie (percussion); Jayne Creamer, Kaya Jenner, Michelle Shocked, Cara Tivey, Porky (background vocals).
  
• Personnel: Billy Bragg (vocals, guitar); Cara Tivey (vocals, piano, shakuhachi); Mark Duff (whistles); Lorraine Bowen (clarinet, recorder, accordion, piano, organ); The Christy Tyler Cory Band (brass); Charlie Llewellin (drums); Jim Sutherland (bodhran, percussion); Grant Showbiz, Dick Gaughan, Cor Cochion Caerdydd (background vocals).
  
• Engineers include: Peter Haigh, Charlie Llewellin, Step Parikian.
  
• This 2006 remastered edition of Billy Bragg's revered 1988 record, WORKERS PLAYTIME, features an entire bonus disc of demos, rarities, and live tracks hand-selected by the British alt-folk troubadour. Among the highlights are stripped-down versions of album songs such as "The Only One," a lovelorn ballad, and the restless "She's a Got New Spell," as well as a demo of the energetic B-side "Bad Penny" and a concert rendition of the Tim Hardin-penned classic "Reason to Believe."
  
• WORKERS PLAYTIME finds Billy Bragg continuing his proud tradition of mixing earnest tales of failed romance with unapologetically leftist political rants, a melange addressed rather humbly on the powerful, anthemic closer, "Waiting For The Great Leap Forwards." The album features notable accompaniment from frequent collaborators Cara Tivey on piano and the ever-present Wiggy on all matter of stringed instruments. It showed a new level of maturity and craftsmanship for Bragg, both as a songwriter and a performer.
  
• Opening with the bright, jumpy "She's Got A New Spell," WORKERS PLAYTIME displays Bragg's romantic side at its height. His lyrical wit is also at an apex, from the wordplay of "The Short Answer" to the soulful drama of the timeless-sounding "Valentine's Day Is Over." Political numbers are few, but potent--"Rotting On Remand" has a Tin Pan Alley feel and decries the desperate state of Britain's penal system, while Bragg is stripped to his sparest yet on the a cappella "Tender Comrade."
  

Q (3/00, p.126) - Included in Q Magazine's "Best Relationship Albums Of All Time" - "...At least some good came of the doomed, turbulent affair [with Mary]....The sound of Labour losing in '87."

Alternative Press (11/00, p.144) - Included in AP's "10 Essential Political-Revolution Albums" - "...On this collection of socialist songs...Bragg lends his voice to a century of hard-fought causes....His voice is perseverance; his guitar, simple victory."

Producer:	Joe Boyd; Wiggy
Format:	CD (0 Disc); Stereo
Country:	USA
Studio/Live:	Studio
Release Date:	17 October, 2006