HDY Work with Casey Bailey to Create Dear Brum Love Letter to the City
28th June 2022
As Birmingham gears up in time for the Commonwealth Games 2022, we partnered with Birmingham City Council to visually bring poet laureate Casey Bailey’s love letter to Brum, to life.
Our studio team art directed and produced the final version of the film.
Dear Brum,
Of course I’m here writing you again
The marrow in my bones, the fire in my pen
You are the music in my accent, the reason that I sing
Placed like the main attraction, the middle of everything
It’s so appropriate that we sit in the centre of the land
A place that so many can reach but few can understand
You have to really breathe it in, walk amongst these people
In this so called the second city, we are more than just a sequel
Original in every way the light that never fades
And yes you heard the games are coming, but my city doesn’t play
So let the flags stream through, but we’ve had a preview
In the city that is home to so many day to day
It hasn’t always done us proud, home of Enoch’s speeches
Rivers couldn’t wash the blood, you can’t dust or clean it
It’s legacy lives on, and we’ve definitely moved on
But life is not always a beach, in the city of no beaches
We’ve had our dark Sundays, but Monday brings dawn
So we survive the black sabbaths, where Ozzy was born
Iommi, Ward, and Butler making every song special
Down the road from Iron Bridge, we were forging heavy metal
Where Rowland Hill invented stamps, Where Jaykae makes grime
A place with so much heritage, yet somehow in its prime
Just look at chamberlain square, clock tower rising in the air
And you don’t even have to stare for you to see that it’s our time
And time is precious, with the beauty and the pain that it delivers
Glass buildings rise around me I’m reflecting in these mirrors
When I think of what I’ve lost in this city I get shivers
Shivers, I get shivers
But if I’m the town hall roof then the city is it’s pillars
The expertise at the QE cannot be overstated if you understand it
There’s a reason why Birmingham’s the place where Malala landed
When she arrived her life was on the edge let’s not understate it
Fought for girls education then in Edgbaston , she was educated
Proud, that’s the way my city makes me feel
Loud, about achievements that you won’t believe are real
Clouds, can hammer us with rain and make the river swell
But the storm is water off a duck’s back on these Brum canals
I am Leon Priestnall’s words, Jamelia’s superstar
There’s an Annotomix Fox spray painted on my heart
The art, just like the people round here, is eclectic
Putting on a show for years, go and check in The Electric
Respect it, the special kind of story that we write
Give it credit and that’s by the order of Stephen Knight
Keep running, it’s just another lap of Alexander Stadium
Go for gold on the podium,
Be Bold, Be Birmingham.
