[ S | Introduction | Song Index | Updates ]
See You in Hell
The song:
Lessons of our many years finally learned.
- Source: Lost Songs booklet -
|
Sentry
The song:
Last year I did my first solo record which
was a lot of songs about the ocean, because that's what I'm in love
with. And sandwiched in the middle of all these songs about the ocean
was one about the desert.
- Source: Justin Sullivan at the Red Sky Coven Tour 2004 -
The feeling that it is war but nothing seems to happen might be inspired by Wilfred Owens poem "Exposure" (1918):
Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds
that knive us...
Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent...
Low, drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient...
Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
But nothing happens.
Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire,
Like twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
Northward, incessantly, the flickering gunnery rumbles,
Far off, like a dull rumour of some other war.
What are we doing here?
The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow...
We only know war lasts, rain soaks, and clouds sag stormy.
Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army
Attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey,
But nothing happens.
Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence.
Less deathly than the air that shudders black with snow,
With sidelong flowing flakes that flock, pause, and renew;
We watch them wandering up and down the wind's nonchalance,
But nothing happens.
Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces-
We cringe in holes, back on forgotten dreams, and stare, snow-dazed,
Deep into grassier ditches. So we drowse, sun-dozed,
Littered with blossoms trickling where the blackbird fusses,
- Is it that we are dying?
Slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires, glozed
With crusted dark-red jewels; crickets jingle there;
For hours the innocent mice rejoice: the house is theirs;
Shutters and doors, all closed: on us the doors are closed,-
We turn back to our dying.
Since we believe not otherwise can kind fires burn;
Nor ever suns smile true on child, or field, or fruit.
For God's invincible spring our love is made afraid;
Therefore, not loath, we lie out here; therefore were born,
For love of God seems dying.
Tonight, this frost will fasten on this mud and us,
Shrivelling many hands, puckering foreheads crisp.
The burying-party, picks and shovels in their shaking grasp,
Pause over half-known faces. All their eyes are ice,
But nothing happens.
- Source: Project Gutenberg -
Red
earth:
Perhaps an indication that the song is about Africa, like the song of that title?
[ Back to Sentry ]
|
Seven Times
Seven times
sun, seven times rain:
Seven
is a significant number in many different cultures. I think there is a
weather proverb saying "after seven days of rain come seven days of
sunshine".
- Read more: Wikipedia entry on
Seven
-
There is also a German nursery rhyme, said when a child has hurt itself, that uses the phrase to indicate the passing of time:
Heile, heile Segen
Sieben Tage Regen
Sieben Tage Sonnenschein
Wird alles wieder heile sein.
(Heal, heal the pain
Seven days rain
Seven days sunshine
All will be fine) [my clumsy attempt to keep the rhymes]
|
Sheena is a Punk Rocker
The song:
A tribute to one of the "pioneers of dance
music", Joey Ramone, who died of blood cancer on April 15 2001.
- Source: Justin Sullivan, 28/04/01, Podium, Hardenberg - Read more: Wikipedia -
[ Back to Sheena is a Punk Rocker ]
|
Shot 18
The song:
The song treats the same topics as Vengeance
and The Hunt.
Thou shalt not kill:
Fifth commandment (a set of ten rules God personally gave Moses for all
Jews to obey. See also Ten Commandments).
Slate is cleaned:
To wipe the slate clean means to "forgive or forget past faults or
offences; make a fresh start".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
Christian
martyr:
Someone who dies rather than deny his Christian belief and is therefore
worshipped by the Catholic Church. The first official martyrs
appear in the bible.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Teeth for teeth, eyes
for eyes:
Biblical quotation: "And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give
life for life, Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for
foot, Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." This is
often misinterpreted as an invitation for revenge, when really it is a
warning not to react disproportionately.
- Source: The Bible. Exodus, 21: 23-25 - Read more:
Wikipedia -
[ Back to Shot 18 | Back to Chinese Whispers ]
|
Singin' in the Rain
The song:
This song has been covered many times. The
most famous version is probably that by Gene Kelly out of the 1952
movie of the same title. NMA reference this song in Poison Street.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Singin' in the Rain ]
|
Sky in Your Eyes
The song:
"The
song 'Sky in your eyes' is about those kind of people who have climbed
mountains, or dive, or exploring weird places or jumping out of
aeroplane or go to war. They have these extreme experiences and the
banality of ordinary life is very difficult for them. But I am very
aware of this. There is a kind of material world and then there are
other worlds and I am sort of half in either".
- Source: Justin Sullivan interview with Rock-Interviews.com
-
Thousand yard stare:
The "limp, blank, unfocused gaze of a battle-weary soldier, but the
symptom it describes may also be found among victims of other types of
trauma".
- Source: Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Sky in Your Eyes | Back to The Pack ]
|
Sleepwalking
The song:
Robert recorded this as a demo idea and wanted words written for it.
Justin wanted to leave it alone. In the end we got Ed [Alleyne-Johnson]
to put some violin on it and left it as an instrumental.
- Source: B-Sides and Abandoned Tracks booklet -
|
Smalltown England
The song:
This is basically about the same attitude as Poison
Street.
- Source: Robert Heaton in an
interview
with Chris Benn in May 1997 -
Rock the boat:
Do something that upsets the balance of a situation.
- Source: Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English
-
Incrowd:
"A small group of people perceived by others to be particularly
fashionable, informed or popular".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
Nothing ventured,
nothing gained:
Proverb meaning: "You can't expect to achieve anything if you never
take any
risks".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
Pint:
568 ml. Here: a glass of beer.
Bowling Lane:
There does not seem to be a street of that name in
Bradford; however, there are districts called Bowling, West Bowling
and East Bowling, to the south and south west of the centre, with a
Bowling Old Lane in West Bowling and a Bowling Back Lane in Bowling.
|
Snelsmore Wood
The song:
If you drive from here down to Southampton and you want to miss the
M25, you will go on something which is now known as the Newbury bypass.
I haven't actually been on it yet, but I think it's probably only a
matter of time before I find myself driving down it. And when I do,
somewhere under that road, in a place called Snelsmore Wood, is the
remains of my old long hair, that a security guard kindly pulled out
for me - bastard. I wanna sing this song as a dedication to a battle
that happened there three years ago.
- Source: Justin Sullivan, Red Sky Coven, 15/03/99, Hop and Grape,
Manchester -
Justin also mentioned on several occasions, how satisfactory it felt to join the Road Protest Movement, because then he knew his enemies and felt he was at the right place at the right time.
Killing is also about the Road Protest Movement.
Newbury is a
district and town in the county of Berkshire, to the west of London. Snelsmore
Common, The Chase, Enborne Road, Redding Copse,
Tothill and Andover Road were some of the places the
protesters had their camps, The Chase furthermore was a nature reserve.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Kennet Canal:
Probably the Kennet and Avon Canal, linking the rivers Kennet and Avon,
that flows through Newbury.
- Read more:
Wikipedia -
Yellow Jackets:
People wearing yellow jackets; very likely the workers felling trees or
building roads. They stand with the "Thick Blue Line", i.e. they are on
the same side as the police, against the demonstrants.
Thick Blue Line:
The
phrase 'thin blue line' commonly refers to the police. I guess, the
change to 'thick' indicates that here the police are too powerful.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Snelsmore Wood | Back to 1984 ]
|
Someone Like Jesus
The song:
I think it's a kind of key song and I think it's the best song that I
have written for over ten years. You know when you sometimes meet
people who are very good or when you are in a situation that is full of
love and good things and there is something in you and you don't know
what it is that makes you want to tear it all down or do something
really bad or something very destructive. The basic feeling of the song
is this darkness we all carry around with us and we don't know why. The
last verse is not about me, it's someone else's story.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German online music
magazine DocRock before the release of 'Eight' -
[ Back to Someone Like Jesus ]
|
Southwest
The song:
"Let it never be said that we can't do feel-good love-songs."
- Source: Justin Sullivan in Anthology
booklet -
Also, yet another song about the sea, like Big Blue, Happy to be Here, Marry the Sea, North Star, Ocean Rising, Sun On Water, Twilight Home and Wipeout.
A-roads:
Major roads in Great Britain that are not motorways.
- Read more:
Wikipedia
-
Pentire:
A coastal place in Cornwall, in the south-west of England.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Indian Summer:
Period of dry, unseasonably warm weather in late October or November in
the central and eastern United States. This autumn warm period also
occurs in Europe, where in Britain it is called All-hallown summer or
Old Wives' summer.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica -
|
Space
The song:
The biblical stories are a rejection of God.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German magazine Zillo
10/90 ; my translation -
Should the Devil
come:
Biblical reference: "[1] Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the
wilderness to be tempted of the devil. [2] And when he had fasted forty
days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. [3] And when the
tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that
these stones be made bread. [4] But he answered and said, It is
written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that
proceedeth out of the mouth of God. [5] Then the devil taketh him up
into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, [6]
And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for
it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in
their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy
foot against a stone. [7] Jesus said unto him, It is written again,
Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. [8] Again, the devil taketh him
up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of
the world, and the glory of them; [9] And saith unto him, All these
things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
[10]
Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written,
Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
[11] Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and
ministered unto him.
- Source: The Bible. Matthew 4.1-11 - Read more:
King
James Bible -
Quotation:
Stafford's quote is from a book I have at home. It is full if things
astronauts said when seeing the earth from outside. That's also what
the song is about: seeing all this beauty from outside.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German magazine Zillo
10/90 ; my translation -
Possibly (this is what a search for the quotation
turned up), the book is Kevin Kelley's The Home Planet (1988).
In an earlier version the quotation was read by a
man. Justin Sullivan explained,
"It was a professional actor whose name I have long since forgotten, a
friend of an associate of Joolz - done because I wanted a voice from
outside the band to read this section and I originally felt that it
should be a male voice. However we didn't love the result, so we asked
Joolz to do it as she is such an emotional reader. Of course I am
biased, so we left the final decision of which to use to Pat Collier,
our producer at the time. He also loved Joolz' version and so it was
chosen to be on the album. I had long since forgotten that there was
any other . . ."
- Source: Peter
Zych's New Model Army Site -
Thomas Stafford:
Born 17/09/1930. American astronaut who flew two Gemini rendezvous
missions (1965-66) and commanded the Apollo 10 mission (1969) - the
final test of Apollo systems before the first manned landing on the
Moon - as well as the Apollo spacecraft that docked with a Soviet Soyuz
craft in space in 1975.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica - Read more:
Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Space | Back to London ]
|
Spancil Hill
The song:
A traditional Irish song abut the
homesickness of an Irish immigrant. Spancil Hill is a real place in
County Clare at the west coast of Ireland.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
23rd June:
Midsummer Eve. The next day is Midsummer Day, celebration of the return
of summer. Each 23rd June the famous Spancilhill Horse Fair takes place.
Spirit of the Falklands
The
song:
I still think that a lot more could have been done at that time to try
and get a peaceful solution. Thatcher was set on a war, and just went
ahead with the unnecessary sinking of the Belgrano. It was like, sod
it, let's have a war. If anybody told me that they found the song
insulting because they'd had friends or relatives killed in the war,
I'd say I am very sorry but I still stand by every word of the song.
Because the song is, in fact, in sympathy with the people who died, not
an insult to them. It's a straight political song against the
politicians who sent those young guys out there. And I don't think that
all war is wrong, just that particular one was bloody stupid. I'm not a
pacifist by any means.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview
with the Melody Maker on 28th July 1984 -
The Falkland Islands War
was a brief undeclared war fought between Argentina and Great Britain
in 1982 over the control of the Falkland Islands and associated island
dependencies. Argentina had claimed sovereignty over the Falkland
Islands (which lie 300 miles [480 km] east of its coast) since the
early 19th century, but Britain had occupied and administered the
islands since 1833 and had consistently rejected Argentina's claims. In
early 1982, Argentina gave up on its long-running negotiations with
Britain over the issue and instead launched a military invasion of the
islands. Argentine troops invaded the Falklands on April 2 of that year
and easily overcame the small garrison of British marines there.
Argentine troops seized the associated islands of South Georgia and the
South Sandwich group (1,000 miles (1,600 km) east of the Falklands) the
next day. By late April Argentina had more than 10,000 troops stationed
on the Falklands. In response, the British government under Prime
Minister Margaret Thatcher declared a war zone for 200 miles (320 km)
around the Falklands and assembled a naval task force with which to
retake the islands. On April 25, while the British task force was
steaming 8,000 miles (13,000 km) to the war zone via the British-held
Ascension Island, a smaller British force retook Georgia Island. On May
2 the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano was sunk by a British
submarine as it approached the war zone, and further battles ensued
between the land-based Argentine air force and the British naval force.
Attempts by both the United Nations and the United States to mediate
the crisis at this point proved unsuccessful. Argentine air attacks
sank two British destroyers and two frigates but failed to prevent the
British from making an amphibious landing near Port San Carlos, on the
northern coast of East Falkland, on May 21. From this beachhead the
British infantry advanced southward to capture the settlements of
Darwin and Goose Green, after which they turned eastward to surround
the Falklands' capital of Stanley on May 31. The large Argentine
garrison there surrendered on June 14, effectively ending the conflict.
The British reoccupied the South Sandwich Islands on June 20. The
British captured about 10,000 Argentine prisoners during the war, all
of whom were afterward released. Argentina sustained about 700 men
killed, while Britain lost about 250. Argentina's ignominious defeat
severely discredited the military government and led to the restoration
of civilian rule in that country in 1983.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica - Read more:
Wikipedia -
I think it is also not completely irrelevant to mention that Margaret Thatcher's popularity in Britain was at a low point at the time Argentina invaded the Falklands. Starting a war once again proved to be an efficient method to distract attention from national problems and regain popularity.
Fight
the good fight:
"Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto
thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many
witnesses." is a biblical quote (1 Timothy 6.12), which also inspired
this hymn by J. S. B. Monsell (1811-75):
Fight the good fight with all thy
might;
Christ is thy Strength, and Christ thy Right;
Lay hold on life, and it shall be
Thy joy and crown eternally.
Run the straight race through God’s
good grace,
Lift up thine eyes, and seek His face;
Life with its way before us lies,
Christ is the Path, and Christ the Prize.
Cast care aside, upon thy Guide,
Lean and His mercy will provide;
Lean, and the trusting soul shall prove
Christ is its Life, and Christ its Love.
Faint not nor fear, for He is near,
He changeth not, and thou art dear.
Only believe, and thou shalt see
That Christ is all in all to thee.
- Read more: King James Bible -
Horns
and tails:
The way the devil looks according to Christian mythology.
[ Back to Spirit of the Falklands ]
States Radio
The song:
"That was very much a song that I’d been meaning to
write for ages. In a way, it’s out of date, because it’s a portrait of
Bush’s
America. But I think that it still has relevance"
- Source: Justin Sullivan
interview with Allan
MacInnis -
George W. Bush was
president of the USA from 2001 to 2009. He comes from a very rich and
influential family (his father George Bush was American president from
1989 to 1993, his brother Jeb Bush was governor of Florida). In the
first year of his presidency, on September 11 2001, the Pentagon (State
Department of Defense) and World Trade Centre were attacked by
terrorists. More than 3,000 people were killed. For the
neoconservatives in the government this was a welcome opportunity to
try to establish a new world order in which the USA no longer needed
legitimation by the UN for military
actions in foreign countries. They invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq
in 2003. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in or
because of these wars, and the USA managed to become one of the most
hated countries in the world. So far both wars have cost the American
taxpayer almost a trillion (1,000,000,000,000) Dollars, that went
directly into the pockets of arms manufacturers, oil companies and the
like, but left the country with a gigantic budget deficit. National
security was also a great excuse to restrict liberty and civil rights
within the USA. Bush was also responsible for tax cuts that contributed
to the budget deficit and increased economical inequality between the
wealthiest households and the lower and middle class. So Bush left a
country that was doing OK in a state of fear, hatred, injustice and
financial ruin.
- Read more: Wikipedia on George W. Bush
and Neoconservatism
-
88.2:
This and
the following figures are radio frequencies. They seem to be fictional.
At least a radio-locator I found on the internet did not list them.
Anyway, frequencies refer to local radio stations, so while I did not
find 88.2, 91.6, 96.4 or 101.0 anywhere in the USA, there are
86 different 94.7 stations,
but none of them weather.
- Look for yourselves: Radio-Locator -
Saviour station:
A Christian radio station. Saviour refers to Jesus
Christ.
Obama:
While
the tattered flyer seems to suggest cynicism, the "cynicism is not to
do with Obama himself [. . . .] The cynicism has to do with time. I
wrote the song in October, then the election comes along, and
everything changes, to some extent; I have to acknowledge that there's
been a change, I have to acknowledge Obama, but I also have to
acknowledge that it's a pretty safe bet that when the album comes out
nine months on, that everybody's idea that Obama is going to save the
world will be slightly tempered. That doesn't mean that the hope that
went into it is unjustified. I'm not cynical about hope, and I'm not
cynical about the election of Obama, either [. . . .] The right wing
religious fundamentalists - the New Right - who thought that they could
always use a kind of visceral paranoia across America to get their man
in, suddenly found that they couldn't. And I think that's a wonderful
moment."
- Source: Justin Sullivan
interview with Allan
MacInnis -
Barack
Obama
is the current (2013) president of the USA. He was elected in 2009, and
he is the first African American in this office. After the Bush
administration, he was greeted all over the world as the man who
would save America, if not the world. He was even awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize before he had really done anything. While he is more
liberal than his predecessor in some areas, he of course could only
disappoint these high expectations.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Plagues:
In
the bible, God inflicts ten plagues on Egypt when the Pharaoh refuses
to stop enslaving the Israelites. Amongst other things, God turns water
into blood, sends vermin, disease and a destructive hail storm. In the
song these plagues are compared to extreme weather events (floods and droughts) caused by
global warming. While most scientists
believe that global warming is at least partly caused by human
activity, this is denied by some, especially American scientists. With
their high per capita carbon dioxide emission (e.g. by using air-conditionings and flying (cf.
the vapour trails across skies))
the USA is one of the world's largest contributors to global warming.
High water consumption (The golf
course green)
also causes environmental problems. In 2005 one of the most destructive
hurricanes in the history of the USA, 'Katrina', occured. The hurricane
and subsequent floods killed more than 1,800 people and destroyed vast
parts of New Orleans.
- Read more: Wikipedia on the Plagues, Global Warming
and Hurricane
Katrina -
Kids:
The uniforms and body-bags suggest that this refers
to young soldiers who died in the 2001 Afghanistan and 2003 Iraq
wars.
Arlington:
There
are many places called Arlington in the USA, but most likely this
refers to the Arlington National Cemetery. It is a military cemetery,
one of the largest cemeteries in the country and close to the capital,
Washington, D.C.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Shock jocks:
A shock jock is a "disc jockey on a talk-radio show who expresses
opinions in a deliberately offensive or provocative way."
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
[ Back to States Radio | Back to Lurhstaap | Back to Water ]
Still Here
Matthew Hopkins:
An English witchhunter during the time of
the
English Civil War.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Bloodstone:
A stone that is green with red flecks.
- Read more:
Wikipedia -
Tiger Eye:
A yellow-brown stone.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Heinrich Kramer:
A churchman and inquisitor
(1430?-1505), author of the most famous medieval book on witchcraft, Malleus
Maleficarum (Hexenhammer) (1486).
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Jacob Sprenger:
Another inquisitor (1435-1495), sometimes believed to be the co-writer
of Kramer's Malleus Maleficarum.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Torquemada:
Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498), a Spanish
inquisitor.
- Read more:
Wikipedia -
Seven by seven, all
the ravens:
There is a German fairy tale called "The Seven Ravens" about seven
brothers that have been cursed and turned into ravens to be saved by
their sister. There are also frequent mentions of the number seven or
"seven by seven" in the bible, where the number signifies perfection.
- Read more: Wikipedia entries on
The Seven Ravens
and
Seven
-
Stoned, Fired and Full of Grace
Our
will be done:
Deliberate misquotation of the "Lord's Prayer", the most important
Christian prayer, which says "Your (i.e. God's) will be done".
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Grace:
In Christian theology, the concept that God grants people salvation
irrespective of actions or proven worth ("Everything will be
forgiven"), because by being crucified Jesus
Christ suffered substitutionally for mankind.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Wasted
lands:
Perhaps this echoes "The Waste Land" (1922), the title of a very
influential long poem by T.S. Eliot.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Stoned, Fired and Full of Grace ]
|
Stormclouds
The
song:
One of many songs that uses driving as subject matter or metaphor, like After Something,
Happy to be Here, Headlights, 125 MPH, Orange
Tree Roads, The Price, Sunrise, Tales
of the Road, Vagabonds, or Wipeout.
Sold to the devil:
It
is a common story element that the devil tries to trick people into
selling their souls to him for something a bit more valuable than one
coffee. (Often the devil is tricked instead). A famous example is the legend of Faust (referred to in Devil), who sells his soul for access to unlimited knowledge.
- Read more: Wikipedia -
Great Western Road:
Well,
I found a Great Western Road in Shanghai and one in Glasgow. However,
there are several Great West Roads leading from London to places in the
west of England, among them the A30 to Land's End, which is mentioned
in Wipeout,
and the A4 to Bristol, which runs through the south of Buckinghamshire,
where Justin Sullivan was born. Also, there is a Western Avenue, which
is part of the A40, which leads to the M40, which is very close to the
village Jordans, where Justin was born.
[ Back to Stormclouds | Back to Devil's Bargain ]
|
Strogoula
Village square:
Perhaps the village is Pramanta. If you stand on the square in
front of the Agia Paraskevi Church and turn south you can see a
mountain that might be Strogoula.
- Read more: Wikipedia - Google Maps -
Strogoula:
A peak in the mountain range Tzoumerka in north western Greece.
- Read more: Wikipedia -
The cock crows, once, twice, three times:
Probably a biblical reference. Before Jesus Christ is crucified, his disciple Peter denies him before the cock crows. In the bible however, it is Peter who denies three times, not the cock that crows three times.
- Read more: Wikipedia -
Stupid Questions
The
song:
The title is self-explanatory; it applies to
journalists, it applies to everybody. People have often come up to me
and said, "I heard that song Stupid Questions, you wrote that song
about me, didn't you?" And we say "Maybe" . . .
- Source: Robert Heaton in an interview with German radio station Radio
Bremen 4 in February 1989 -
|
Summer Moors
The song:
"On
this new album there's a song called Summer Moors which Sullivan
explains is a direct tribute to the beautiful scenery and character of
Yorkshire. 'But I also think there's a frustration that
creates the thought "we've got to get out of here!" We've got to get
out of this small town England sort
of thing, you kind of feel
that as well."
- Source: Screamer Magazine -
The song ist "dedicated to
Yorkshire, brass band and all. It's a personal song. . . it's a ghost
story in a sense. It's Emily Bronte. I'd never read Wuthering Heights
as a kid, but I had to read it recently and I found it amazing, it's
like watching a punk band, there's not a single sympathetic character
in it, yet it's utterly compelling."
- Source: Justin Sullivan
in The Yorkshire Times -
Yorkshire
is the county in which Justin's hometown Bradford
lies. Its beautiful scenery is characterised by mountains and moors.
Emily Brontė is one of three sisters who
lived near Bradford in the nineteenth century and became famous as
writers. Her only known novel, Wuthering Heights
(1847) is, along with her sister Charlotte's Jane Eyre
(also 1847), one of the most respected as well as best beloved novels
in literary history. It has been adapted to film dozens of time (there
are even a French and a Japanese version!), Kate Bush wrote a well
known song about it, and actor Heath Ledger was named after the main
character.
The novel is a love story with elements of ghost stories, set in a
beautiful but hostile landscape. The protagonist is Heathcliff, a gypsy
boy who is adopted by Mr Earnshaw and comes to live with his family in
Wuthering Heights, a farmhouse in the Yorkshire moors. His foster
brother Hindley is very jealous, but between Heathcliff and his new
sister, the beautiful, spirited, selfish Cathy, first a strong
friendship and
then passionate love develops. After Mr Earnshaw's death Hindley
reduces Heathcliff to the rank of a servant. When Cathy enters into a
marriage of convenience with their genteel neighbour Edgar Linton,
Heathcliff is desperate and runs away. He returns three years later as
a rich man set on revenge. He ruins Hindley (who after his wive's death
had turned to drinking and gambling anyway) as well as Hindley's son
Hareton and elopes with Edgar's sister Isabella. Cathy dies in
childbirth (hence "the church where
she lies") and seems to haunt Heathcilff. Still, he has not yet
completed his revenge. . . .
- Read more: Full text at the Gutenberg
Project - Summary at Wikipedia -
Pennistone Fell:
A fictional place in Wuthering
Heights is Penistone (or Pennistone) Crags. A 'fell' is a high,
barren landscape.
- Read more: Wuthering Heights Reader's Guide
-
[ Back to Summer Moors | Back to BD3 ]
Sun on Water
The song:
In an interview after the release of Navigating by the Stars,
Justin said: "The album is concerned with what I like to call 'the
other world'.... Nature, emotion, vastness, the whole large cosmos,
where single persons are only a part of the large whole. That is why so
many songs are about the sea. I love the sea. I need places that imply
vastness. In narrow rooms, houses, even in the wood I feel constricted
because I can't see the horizon. But there is also another side to it.
Perhaps you know the feeling? When I was little, I tried to be very
small when I was very scared. For example, when I was outside on a
field and it got dark. But that was rather a test of courage than
reassurance. Vast spaces can be very intimidating, one feels lost. I
like it to sometimes feel small. In moments where you can see far out
you can also better look inside yourself. You can meet God, so to
speak."
- Source: Interview with
sallys.net;
my translation from German -
About "Light and Water" Justin says:
"Sometimes I
find myself just staring at clouds, sunsets, waves - the endless
interplay of light and water. Everything in the World is changing all
the time but every creature perceives time in a different way. So some
things are moving too fast for us to take in (I mean - how the hell do
bats do echo location while flying at that speed?) and some things too
slow (seasons, mountains, tectonic plates). But the play of light and
water happens in a time scale that we can witness. It honestly fills me
with a sense of wonder and that most unfashionable of words, joy, again
and again - like the heart-stopping moments of my favourite bits of my
favourite songs - which of course brings me back to music, where we
started."
- Source: Justin Sullivan on the official NMA
Site -
Other songs about the sea are Big Blue, Happy to be Here, Marry the Sea, North Star, Ocean Rising, Southwest, Twilight Home and Wipeout.
Abel and Cain:
Biblical figures who would never walk arm in arm. They are the first
and second sons of Adam and Eve (the first people God created). Abel
raises sheep and Cain cultivates land. When God accept's Abel's
sacrifice but rejects Cain's, Cain kills his brother and then denies
his murder. God curses Cain to wander the earth but puts a mark on his
forehead to prevent people from killing him.
- Source: The Bible. Genesis, 4.1-17 - Read more:
King
James Bible -
[ Back to Sun on Water | Back to Seven Times | Back to Sunrise | Back to Western Dream | Back to Whites of Their Eyes ]
Sunrise
The song:
One of many songs that uses driving as subject matter or metaphor, like After Something,
Happy to be Here, Headlights, 125 MPH, Orange
Tree Roads, The Price, Stormclouds, Tales of the Road, Vagabonds, or Wipeout.
Get Ready:
'Get Ready' is a famous Motown song written by Smokey Robinson and
recorded by The Temptations, The Supremes and Rare Earth.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
National 7:
I
don't think there is a National 7 in the UK, but there is on in France,
a trunk road (a major road which is not a motorway) leading from Paris
to Nice and on into Italy. The video clip for the song is recorded on a
road near Plouaret in Brittany in northwestern France, possibly the
N12/E50.
East of Eden:
A biblical place called Nod is described to be "on the east of Eden".
It is where Cain is exiled after he has
killed his brother Abel. The term is frequently used in literature and
popular culture.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Sunrise ]
Sunset
The song:
Dismal attendances, internal fighting, and
ludicrous distribution problems here two years ago resulted in a
cancelled record contract and a vow never to return to American soil
- Source: Anthology Book, p. 15 -
I think this refers to a New Model Army tour through the USA in 1993. Justin, Michael and Dean toured the USA in 2003, New Model Army only returned there in 2005. In early live versions the song's last line was "Good bye, America".
Look
away, look away:
Henning suggests that this might refer to the repeated line "Look away,
look away, look away Dixie Land" from the song "Dixie". The song about
a former slave longing to be back on the plantation of his birth was
written around 1860 and is still very well known in the United States.
During the
American Civil War (1861-1865) it was adopted as unofficial anthem of
the
Confederacy, the slave-owning states of the American south. The line
even resembles the same words in "Sunset" in tune and rhythm. The
simple patriotism of the song ("I wish I was in Dixie, hooray!
Hooray!") matches Justin's criticism of American culture and the
corresponding lines "Drive away, drive
away" and "Coming home, coming home" later in "Sunset" seem to directly
contradict it.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Thanks to
Henning!
Emperor:
In the fairy tale 'The Emperor's New Clothes' by Hans Christian
Andersen there is a vain emperor who is only interested in clothes. One
day two swindlers tell him that they can weave beautiful clothes that
are invisible to unfit or stupid people. The emperor asks them to make
some clothes for him, and while the swindlers get loads of money for
only pretending to weave and sew, nobody around them dares to admit
that they don't see anything. Eventually, the emperor goes out in a
procession to present his new suit, and everybody is full of
admiration, until finally a little child shouts: "But he is naked!" Now
everybody else admits that they cannot see the clothes, but the emperor
finishes the procession.
- Source: Andersen, Hans Christian, 'The Emperor's New Clothes' - Read
more:
Folklore and
Mythology Electronic Texts -
Sunset:
The setting sun is a recurrent symbol for the American
dream and the settlement of the western territories in the 19th century
(cf.
All Consuming Fire).
As Jochen from New Zealand points out, Sunset is
also
short for the famous Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, that leads
through several expensive residential areas, its most famous part being
the Sunset Strip with many exclusive boutiques, restaurants, rock clubs
and night clubs.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Thanks to Jochen!
Niko:
Perhaps Niko Bolas, the American producer of the 1993 album The
Love of Hopeless Causes.
R'n'B:
Rhythm and Blues is a popular music genre combining jazz, gospel, and
blues influences, first performed by African American artists.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Fall of Rome:
Possibly a reference to The History of the Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire, an influential book by the British historian Edward
Gibbon (1737-1794). Gibbon introduced the theory that the Roman Empire
fell because it had become too big and the loss of civic virtue
(strength and industriousness) among the Romans made it easy for
"Barbarians" to take over the empire which they had served. I remember
to have read (but when and where?) this theory in connection with the
foreign policy of the USA, which supposedly become weaker the further
they extend their influence on forgeign countries.
- Read more:
Wikipedia
-
[ Back to Sunset | Back to Into the Wind | Back to La Push ]
[ S | Introduction | Song Index | Updates ]
16/11/14; last update 09/07/17