The Stranglers - Written In Red
Ray decided to be silly after all
He'd died a 1000 times before in the viet war
So he strapped himself in and he took his chances
Into the valley of the bird, absurd
I don't remember what it was the old man said
I know I' d tempted fate a 1000 times before
So we strapped ourselves in and we took such chances
And had a flight for the brother who can't be
Birdman, looking for the
Wasteland, trying to get my
Face tanned it's beautiful here
Doing it we're flying in the valley of the birds- fly
We decided one for all and all for one
And when I do, I really want to go in style
So without a sense of reason we explored
"Valley Of The Birds. This came from a riff John Ellis
had going in a piece he'd brought to the session (Tune-O-Matic,
later to find it's way onto John's Spic N Span, 1999 - C.i.B.).
The Song was the first written for the album, and is all about
a trip to New Zealand. JJ had a few words knocking about, and
I think they mostly made up the first verse - I took it on from
there really. The brother who is missing is our keyboard tech,
Trevor Dawkins, who had to see some long lost family, and missed
the mega leap down and across the 150 foot canyon. Ray is an
ex Vietnam zip-wire jumper, and, out of the whole party it was
Ray - me - Dan Bartley and Mike and Janice Feyen (who organised
the rugged outdoor stuff!) who took the jump. So that's how
I named us all birdmen. It also ties in with the fact New Zealand
was originally known as the land of the birds, so that's that.ke
throwing stones into the great known
[top]
I always seem to meet you in such unexpected places
In scenes that drift togethter with some strange attraction
Your style is always painted on a world of faces
I'll always look for you in unexpected places
I can't deny the perfect kind
And we'll always be bound to be lost
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
I always dreamed to meet you in such unexpected places
We seem to shift together with some strange reaction
Your smile is almost wasted on a world of basics
I'll always look for you in unexpected places
Who can deny the perfect find
Cause I'll always be chained to her tracks
These virtual lines disturb my eyes
But I'll always be lost in her thoughts
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
Thank heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
I heaven she walks
...
In Heaven She Walks. This I only added one extra musical
part in recording, but the rest is based around an old idea
from my previous band - it's really about penis extensions.
The fact that men have all these possessions that end up with
female names, maybe replacing the perfect woman. After I transformed
my video 'ideas' for it with the record company, featuring each
of us in our kind of fantasy mode, Triumph Motorcycles offered
to lend us a bike for the shoot... and then gave JJ the thing
forever for promotional purposes!! Oi...Where's mine??
[top]
It's 45 in the shade
This fire can't escape
Losing sleep in my dreams
Coldsweat I'm somewhere in between
Someday soon I'll find the strength to lose
Then I'll find the wisdom of the fool
And make some sense of it all
Slipped under the ice
Cool death it made me shiver
Pretty soon I'll be free
Won't have to rule over all I see
I don't want to fight the world
I only came to see it
Not a day tripper
Just let me stay, just let me stay
Don't wanna piece your scene
But this blood gotta hook me in
Last drinks at the bar
And all the way doesn't seem too far
Sometime soon you'll find the strength to lose
Spread your wings and someday you will choose
Your making sense of it all
I don't want to fight world
I only came to see it
Not a day tripper
Just let me stay
Don't let me fake it, I want to stay
I don't want to fight the world
In a While. Guilt is really the subject here and someone
trying to convince us that it's just misunderstanding, that
they really mean no harm and eventually the world will have
sympathy with them. We were playing with a backing track and
Andy Gill ended up getting the direction of the piece just right,
I had the melody sorted out and JJ had the line, 'I don't want
to change the world I only came to see it', and I wrote the
rest of it, wait for it............. in a Chinese restaurant
in Liverpool on a serviette (really, not a crap 'classic' R&R
story)except for the line 'the wisdom of the fool' - that was
JE - about an hour before we went back to the studio to do the
vocal.
[top]
Set sail on a mirror
Nothing stirs for here it's so easy to be
Just to be
Slipped into a big sky
Not a cloud to be seen
It was a perfect day
Such a perfect day
How can you feel hurt
Now can you see it
See the stars
With your eyes
That was me
See them shine shining just for you
Silver into blue
See a sun
Kiss a sky
Shout the moon
Send the tide turning just for you
Silver into blue
Two feet on the starship
Nothing gets in our way
We're going up and away
Up out of the way (milky)
No time for the red shift
We'll push in front of the sun
And start the world again
Silver Into Blue. This was originally a ballad called
"She Sails" but ended up as a kind of Motown/rock track. It's
about the slightly unreal trip to New Zealand me and Dan Bartley
shared. I'd better stop there!
[top]
Goodbye blue sky, goodbye blue sky
Did you ever think you had it made
It's a big wide world
Think of all the games left to play
You wrote the letter
I saw your fingers bleed
And your brown eyes glaze
Such a beautiful waste
Goodbye blue sky, what will it be, wash over me
Goodbye blue sky, wash over me
What will it be, wash over me
Wash over me
Whatever happens to the time we give
Never took a life
Never stole a kiss
Sitting here
Staring out, it's a twisting world
Someone's cracked the glass and
Turned it upside down
Blue Sky. A straightforward song about terminal illness.
This was aimed at the time at Marian Shepherd, a great friend
and hard working lovely person, she had a big fright about her
health, and I just wrote the lyrics for her, the music never
changed much from my demo really. I'd like to dedicate it to
anyone suffering the same sad fate. (Apparently in France, someone
had allegedly written that it was about 'smoking a joint in
your back garden and looking upwards'. Well, I wouldn't (a)
write anything so puerile, and (b) have no idea whom or where
this story came.)
[top]
Of silence in pieces here
Voices all disappear
Sacred inside
Doubled our silhouettes
One shape I can't forget
Tears the inside
Here could be sad if empty hands
Were what my head was resting in
Consider them protecting
Footsteps in paradise
Really moving through me now
It's cold lay your hands on me
Don't look into my eyes
I'm burning out the time
Here wrapped in all these chains
Only scent remains
Scares me inside
Feels like I'm sinking fast
Some moments never last
Keep it inside
It's just too bad that empty hands
Are what my head is resting in
I'm rendered unprotected
Fool steps in paradise
Really moving through me now
It's cold don't take your hand from me
They look into my eyes
I'm burning out the time
Footsteps in paradise
Fool stepsOf silence in pieces here
Voices all disappear
Sacred inside
Doubled our silhouettes
One shape I can't forget
Tears the inside
Here could be sad if empty hands
Were what my head was resting in
Consider them protecting
Footsteps in paradise
Really moving through me now
It's cold lay your hands on me
Don't look into my eyes
I'm burning out the time
Here wrapped in all these chains
Only scent remains
Scares me inside
Feels like I'm sinking fast
Some moments never last
Keep it inside
It's just too bad that empty hands
Are what my head is resting in
I'm rendered unprotected
Fool steps in paradise
Really moving through me now
It's cold don't take your hand from me
They look into my eyes
I'm burning out the time
Footsteps in paradise
Fool steps
Here. I love this track. This is the story of a guy
so fucked up by constant rejection that when he finds what he
imagines is his true love and loses it, he installs himself
beneath the boards of her house, looking and listening, living
on whatever he can catch-like insects etc- or whatever falls
through the cracks above him........well in his head he does
but by the last chorus he's beginning to realise what's happening
as the medication starts to work. It's a kind of tribute to
the Velvet Underground who I used to listen to a lot, they had
a track called 'The Gift' about a guy who falls in love with
a hooker and sends himself to her in a carton. In her panic
to open the parcel she plunges a knife straight through his
head killing him! This started with four notes literally of
a 10 minute mess about at the end of a day in the studio which
became the verse, and I took it home and put it all together
that evening.
[top]
She wiped the smile right off my face
And hid it away in a secret place
The night was dark and the ground was cold
I slipped myself into a pool
I saw the trees but not the wood
And floated in an icey flood
As cold began to freeze my heart
I heared a voice come through the dark
Bring up the coals
Light up the fire
Joy de viva
Joy de viva
Smile your shining smile on me
If you see her
Say I need her
Joy de viva
Joy de viva
Now sunburned men tell tales of me
Of how I sail the ocean deep
Upon the brow I shade my face
Searching for that sate of grace
Every night the moon appears
She shows me that I need not fear
The crashing rocks and siren wind
And I will find her in the end
Then I will run into her fire
Joy de Viva. I do love singing this song. It's another
JE number and I only re-worked the chorus melody wise. After
I transformed my video 'ideas' for it with the record company,
featuring each of us in our kind of fantasy mode, Triumph Motorcycles
offered to lend us a bike for the shoot... and then gave JJ
the thing forever for promotional purposes!! Oi...Where's mine??
[top]
Your making plans to miss to morning train
You want all the world to feel your pain
Tearing at the rules to ease your mind
Sometimes days are dull without this light
You see me staring down the wishing well
Drowning in the stories kissed and fell
Burning through the daze across the night
Summer days are dull without this light
I won't miss you, down where all the souls are broken
I won't miss you, drowned where all the eyes are soaking
I won't miss you, not gonna miss you
Not gonna miss you, I won't miss you
How I miss you
Standing in the shadow of your ties
Said you'd rather lived before it died
Now the days had lost their sweet caress
Decide it was right to taste the rest
You said we really had to freeze the frame
We'll meet another time the perfect plane
But stars really don't mean that much to me
Without their light there's nothing left to see
I won't miss you, down where all the hearts are choking
I won't miss you, drowned in all the stolen moments
I won't miss you, not gonna miss you
Not gonna miss you, I won't miss you
How I miss you
Maybe I lost, maybe I'm lost, break me tied knot
Maybe I'm lost, maybe I'm lost, maybe I'm not
Miss You. This was originally a song called 'The Train',
a song about a typical beautiful obsessive, always threatening
some shit or the other, in that respect the song stayed the
same but musically it changed into a slightly different thing
once Andy worked on it. I actually preferred my original track
but I think it was a bit too 'poppy' for him....win some lose
some, I went with the flow but have to say I think it's too
'Stadium' for me, maybe a punk version could be a good idea?
[top]
Oh my child
Walk in your prairie dreams
Shining dawn
Whispers of worlds you'll see
Now it's dusk
Darkness has killed the fire
I must ride
She calls me into my night
And you're leaving me cold as ice
Daddy's riding the range
In the toy cowboy suit
That his mother bought for him
Leaving, he won't stop loving you
Now that he's riding
The trail of the lone star
When you cry
I'll send the sun down to you
When you're lost
I'll spin the world round for you
Daddy's Riding The Range. This is pretty much a JE number
but I did come up with the verse and bridge melodies. It is
interesting to note that the first recording of this song was
a quite beautiful acoustic version, beautifully arranged and
wonderful to sing, not to say that the CD cut isn't great as
well, it's just different but I do wish the original had been
put on the record as well. Wonderful Land. Another JE number.
All I really did on this was help tie the song up, it was a
bit vague and Andy didn't seem too sure what he wanted so I
threw a few alternative melodies at the bridge and chorus and,
hey presto we had it in the 'can' (man).
[top]
Hot town summer in the city
Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty
Been down isn't it a pity
Doesn't seen to be a shadow in the city
All around me people looking half dead
Choking on the sidewalk, it's hotter than a match head
At night it's a different town
Go out and find a girl
Come on come on and dance all night
Just what you need, it will be alright
And babe don't you know it's a pity
The days can't be like the nights
In the summer in the city
In the summer in the city
Cool town meeting in the city
Dressed so fine and looking so pretty
Cool cat looking for a kitty
Gonna look in every corner of the city
'till I'm wheezing at the bus stop
Running up the stairs gonna meet you on the roof top
At night it's a different town, go out and find a girl
Come on come on and dance all night
Just what you need it will be alright
And babe don't you know it's a pity
The days can't be like the night
In the summer in the city
In the summer in the city
Summer In The City. This version was basically my idea.
The band had recorded a rock version of it at the insistence
of our MD (record co.boss) I didn't happen to be bothered by
the song, it's nothing special, so it was no surprise that it
came out rather flat (none of us liked it much). One day at
the studio I was messing about with some loops and just started
singing the song over the drum track then JE added some odd
guitar riffs and we were away as they say. The key really was
the half time verse. I reckon it's one better than the original
(not that you can really say that, but sometimes another artist
can bring out the 'song' in a piece), however not everyone agreed
with me including Andy, I don't know if he wanted the credit
or he just wasn't convinced of the idea. The rest of the guys
didn't seem too interested and our managers did not like it
either but, hey that's the way the cookie crumbles, they obviously
didn't understand! Bless 'em.........."
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