The Container Drivers

Net cap. of five eight thousand pounds (1)
They sweat on their way down 
Report with customs bastards (2)
Hang around like clowns, they're

Uh-containers and their drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers 

Bad indigestion
Bad bowel retention
Speed for their wages
Sometimes torn short sleeves
Sometimes torn shirt sleeves, they're

Uh-containers and their drivers 
Uh-containers and their drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers   

Look at a car park for two days
Look at a grey port for two days
Train line, stone and grey
Train line, stone and grey, they're

Uh-containers and their drivers 
Uh-containers and their drivers 
Uh-containers and their drivers  

[Peel: elasties on their co-op jeans]
This is not their town
Big cigars come out of the ground (3)
Sweat on their way down 
Sweat on their way down, they're

Uh-containers and their drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers

F. Jack's a distant relation  (4)
Communists are just part time workers (5)
And there's no thanks 
From the loading bay ranks, they're
Uh-containers and their drivers 

Look at a car park for two days
Look at a grey port for two days
Train line, stone and grey 
RO/RO roll on/roll off (6)

Uh-containers and their drivers
Speed for their wages 
Uh-container drivers
Uh-containers and their drivers

SaveSave

1. It is a typical vocal quirk of MES to sound out abbreviations and numbers, and this apparently means "net capacity of 58,000 pounds." A "container" is a standardized shipping unit that can be stacked on ships and hauled via truck. The song positions itself in a rather extensive tradition of trucker songs, while at the same time lampooning the genre (cf. the huge snare build-up to the 3 second guitar solo), which comprises mostly country and rockabilly paeans to, or laments about, the trucking life. "Pinball Machine," which the Fall covered in 1989, is another such song, as is "White Line Fever," which the band recorded in 2005 (It is telling that the Fall seem not to have based their version of the latter song on Merle Haggard's sublime original, but on a version by Bud Brewer that MES got off a compilation of trucker songs).

You'll all be glad to know that the song will have no trouble at the weigh station, whose operator, Zack, tells us:

"Wikipedia tells us that the net load weight of a 40' container is 57,759 lbs, and for a 40' high-cube container is 58,598 lbs. The first line of the song checks out."

^

2. MES worked as a shipping clerk when he was nineteen. 

^

3. The "big cigars" are probably factory chimneys, as seen from a speeding truck.

^

4. This refers to "Fiery Jack," the protagonist of another Fall song. Like Fiery Jack, the titular drivers are probably best imagined as middle aged men devoted to hard living and prolific alcohol consumption. Also, although in interviews and writings MES always describes Jack as an alcoholic, the lyrics suggest he is a speed freak, and (particularly in the early 80s, an era before drug testing) truck drivers have long been notorious for their speed use. Even today, when legal limits have been placed on the amount of driving that can be done in a 24 hour period, it is well known that in order to make money truckers must drive much more than they sleep, making speed a particularly useful tool of the trade. However, drug testing now makes it difficult for drivers to ingest the substances that enable them to function beyond the normal threshold of human endurance; modern truckers sometimes substitute crack, which leaves the system much quicker and thus is less liable to be discovered in a drug test, for speed.   

^

5. I take this to be a suggestion that communists typically get jobs in order to organize the workers, and hence they spend as little time as possible actually working, and move on frequently. 

^

6. RO/RO or Roll ON/Roll Off ferries are ferries designed so that cargo vehicles can drive right onto them (as opposed to LOLO or Lift On/Lift Off ferries which load and unload cargo with a crane).

^

The Container Drivers: Fall Tracks A-Z

The Story of the Fall: 1980

Here is a list of trucker songs, but it is by no means exhaustive of the genre. Jimmy Martin's "Widow Maker," Little Feat's "Willin'," and Merle Haggard's "Movin' On" (as well as "White Line Fever" and "Pinball Machine") are a few notable omissions, and I'm sure there are others.