The Snitch: Fremantle Dockers’ elimination final was straight out of a blues song, with the heartache to match

The sky is crying, look at the tears roll down the street The sky is crying, look at the tears roll down the street I’m waiting in tears looking for my baby, and I wonder where can she be? They are haunting lyrics from one of my favourite Blues musicians, Elmore James. It’s a beautiful slow tempo 12-bar blues song in the key of C, inspired so legend says by a Chicago downpour during the recording session. Mrs Snitch and I regularly listen to Elmore’s Sky is Crying on vinyl and it never fails to put us in a state of melancholy when washed won with a Watenshi gin and tonic. He was known as the king of slide guitar, accompanied by the Broomdusters, JT Brown on sax, Odie Payne on drums, Johnny Jones on piano and, of course, ‘Homesick’ James on bass guitar. So good is this sad song, it’s been covered by such luminaries as Albert King, Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughan. I was singing it at around 9 o’clock last Saturday night. I’ll paint the picture for you. The Snitch, clad in fading denim and purple fedora, had just watched the Dockers go down to Gold Coast by the slimmest of margins. Looking out into the popping Swan, I half expected an alligator to float past, Mississippi Delta style, as the Fremantle hordes came to terms with their early September exit. It was a Blues kind of night. Imagine what Elmore James could have done with the material: the purple, the anchors, the heave-ho oh no! Throw in Nat Fyfe’s last game and it had everything a blues song needs. As if Dockers supporters were miserable enough. Mrs Snitch and I were among the thousands waiting in the rain at Optus Stadium railway station after the one-point loss. Bewildered, apoplectic, aged by false hope and the disbelief of what had just transpired. And what happened next? They played the Dockers theme song over and over. Just to remind us what could have been. It was enough to stir the soul of Elmore James from the grave. When we arrived home, I dusted off my trusty Les Paul copy and penned my own tribute to the night, in honour of Elmore. The sky is crying It’s crying purple rain I say the sky is crying Oooh yeah it’s crying purple rain And if we don’t kick one more goal, we’re all in for some more purple pain.