Chalkhills Digest Volume 6, Issue 276
Date: Tuesday, 26 September 2000

         Chalkhills Digest, Volume 6, Number 276

                Tuesday, 26 September 2000

Topics:

                      Re: Good Buds
                Altogether Too Much Stuff
                    One more rain song
                     "Almost Famous"
                      NEW YORKERS!!!
                 Tell Me In For Barrytown
                      FUME FUME FUME
                    LE JAPAN WASP STAR
                  just clearing the air
                      Frost Frolics
                 Does Andy pack a roscoe?
                        Pod people
                   Yazbek and Partridge
           RE: Show me the way to go Dome . . .
                   Tri-State Globo-Dome
                  All Hail Derek Miner!
       interview in a Finnish music mag translated
                    I Want To Be Here

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But I'm getting higher / wafted up by fame's fickle fire.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2000 21:13:39 -0500
From: "Christopher R. Coolidge" <cauldron@together.net>
Subject: Re: Good Buds
Message-ID: <l03130300b5f1c09087e7@[208.13.202.242]>

>"GREAT FIRE! BEATING OF HEARTS!"
>
>The conversation went fabulously from there :-) He really almost died
>when I gushed about Dukes. Man, did he misjudge ME! Ha!
>
>He has his tickets from the cancelled tour (how jealous I am!); all
>the music in vinyl -- was there from the beginning, unlike my poor
>novice self. His long-suffering wife just groaned and put her head on
>the table, as my spousal unit would have if he hadn't been at work. He
>groaned upon my re-telling and said he would have to change his
>opinion of this particular neighbor!
>
>Cool! A new bud, in living color.

  I had the same reaction when I first met my wife's first cousin
Kristen(who's been on this list, haven't heard from her in a while), we had
a good mutual laugh about my wife and sister-in-law's Air Supply and Chris
Deburgh loving ways. I wouldn't have married her though, even though she's
related to my wife, I'd get bored agreeing with her all the time(though we
could have found things to disagree with if we worked at it). She'd be a
good bud to hang with more often, unfortunately Indianapolis is a full
day's drive away.

Christopher R. Coolidge

Homepage at
http://homepages.together.net/~cauldron/homepage.html

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2000 21:08:25 -0400
From: Sylvan <psiogen@mindspring.com>
Subject: Altogether Too Much Stuff
Message-ID: <39CC0289.EBA6EBB5@mindspring.com>
Organization: ttp://www.sportingnews.com/baseball/

The Queen Worried:

> Finally (aren't you glad?) I'm serving up this question for all you
> Chalkhillians:
> Which song out of the whole XTC catalogue wouldn't you miss if it were
> to totally disappear from this bit of the Universe?

Hmmm... There's Omnibus, the worst thing XTC themselves, rather than the
record company bonus track people, have ever done to the flow of a record,
which is even more grating than the flow of this sentence, but I'd be
perfectly happy if it were simply relegated to compilations or
something. Leisure, Wounded Horse, and Beatown we could do without... It's
hard to think of anything they've put an an album that I would like to see
actually erased from history.

> Is it just me or are others feeling that xtc
> reached their peak a few years ago?

They did indeed reach their peak a few years ago. It's just that they are
still there.

> XTC sound like two men in search of inspiration.
> their last two albums have
> included no end of 'clunkers', (see the above)
> relieved by a great songs, 'Easter Theatre' an example.

There's nothing that I would call a real clunker on AV, and WS suffers not
so much from clunkers as from songs that are quite good but just don't
cross over the invisible line into greatness.  They need two things for
their next album: a session guitarist and the burst of creativity that
will come naturally now that they've got the Venuses out of the way. By
the time they wrote the songs for Wasp Star they were getting a bit
creatively constipated, to borrow the metaphor Andy used in a recent
interview.

A silly thread idea: (feel free to ignore this lunatic if it's already
been done to death) Names for the next album from the lyrics of Wasp
Star. Mine: "Pyramids and Palaces"

--
Sylvan
"The hamster is still dead." --Leonard Nimoy

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 17:38:26 +0900
From: "John Boudreau" <aso1@mocha.ocn.ne.jp>
Subject: One more rain song
Message-ID: <000201c02567$bacb03a0$675791d2@johnboud>

From The Kinks " Face To Face " album , " Rainy Day In June " . I recall
that when I was kid I sat down one afternoon and transcribed the lyrics
from the record , and then tried to convince my buddies that I had written
them . Hey , I was only 13 ! Give me a break !

Sushiman

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 13:43:43 -0400
From: "Benjamin A. Gott" <bgott@bowdoin.edu>
Subject: "Almost Famous"
Message-ID: <B5F2640F.1A0C%bgott@bowdoin.edu>

Gang,

Go, now, and see Cameron Crowe's new film "Almost Famous."  Not only is it a
wonderful story of a boy and a band, but I think it has a lot to say about
those of us who are obsessed with a certain set of songsmiths from Swindon.

-Ben

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2000 16:57:20 -0500
From: Paul Brantley <pebrantl@mailbox.syr.edu>
Subject: NEW YORKERS!!!
Message-ID: <39CBD5BE.5E8ECF2E@mailbox.syr.edu>
Organization: Syracuse University

I know this isn't the place or time, but I need to move to NYC immediately so
I'm begging your indulgence, and am asking for any leads or hints that might
help this long-time (mostly lurking) Chalkhillian, Awaken you Dreamers
contributor, recipient of fan letter from Dave Gregory, sometimes Yazbek
correspondent, grovelling, desperate, composer, cellist, Roy-el "Future Man"
Wooten collaborator, etc....

Help me... have to move now...

Oh yeah, and am I the only one who thinks that AV2 features some of Andy's
best vocals, by far?

Paul Brantley
http://web.syr.edu/~pebrantl/

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 00:46:24 EDT
From: KINGSTUNES@aol.com
Subject: Tell Me In For Barrytown
Message-ID: <af.f12081.26fee120@aol.com>

Regarding SIFJ/Barrytown?TMWYS:

Alright, guys.  If your going to nitpick, "Ears" Kingston is gonna have to
put in his two cents.
Let's take these lines and look at them both intervallically and
harmonically.

First, for the lay reader, suppose we attatch scale positions for each note.
Since all three of these tunes are diatonic, it should be easy.  Everybody
remember Do, a dear, a female dear?  Mary Poppins?  A scale is sung do, re,
mi, fa, so, la, ti, do.  (This is known as solfeggio in musical study, an
Italian practice of attatching a syllable to a tone for the sake of note
recognition.  In this case I will use 'movable' do, which means that *do* is
the first note of the scale regardless of the key.  In the true European
tradition, *do* is always the note C.  But in 'movable do' it doesn't matter.
 I don't know the keys to these tunes off the top of my head, and movable do
allows me to compare relativley without concern for key.  This way I can
compare all three songs directly.)

Now sing the scale to youselves;  do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do.

Now for more help, let's attatch a number to each note.  This may help those
who don't want to deal with solfeggio.  Like this:

Do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do
1     2   3   4   5    6   7  8 (which is 1 an octave higher.)

Now, when the same note is an octave higher, I will use the term *8va*.

Now, let's apply this to the words of these songs, and see what happens.

If    you       let me take your heart, (pause) I    will prove to  you
so  so(8va)  fa  mi  re     do    do                 la  so  do     mi  mi
5    5(8va)    4   3    2      1     1                   6   5    1      3
3
("Tell Me What You See")

I'm not        one to   look be - hind I    know that times must  change
so  so(8va)  fa    mi  re    mi   la     do re      do   mi      do     do
5     5(8va)   4     3    2    3     6      1   2       1     3       1
1
("Barrytown")

Joe called   up        to  ask me would  I    do  a   fa - vour
so   so(8va) so(8va) mi  re    mi   la     do  re  mi  la   do
5     5(8va)   5(8va)   3   2      3    6      1    2   3    6    1

while he's gon - na be...
re     mi    re     do do
2      3      2      1   1
(SIFJ)

Harrison says,
>Two of those lines scan (and sing) nearly exactly the same. One isn't even
>close. Which is the standout? "Joe," of course. It's similar, certainly. That
>distinctive octave leap in the beginning is common to all three lines.

I disagree.  Both SIFJ and Barrytown depart from TMWYS at the 6th note, where
they both go to "mi la do re".  This couples the two, and is why they are
closer to each other than either are to TMWYS.  If *anything's* different
between the two up to that point, it's that SIFJ stays on 'so' on the third
note, where Barrytown and TMWYS go to 'fa'.  But that's a minor alteration.
Another important point is that the harmony changes to a *2 chord* on the
second measure, in step with the word "Look" in Barrytown and "ask" in SIFJ.
This is also where the melody begins to depart from TMWYS.  There is no
change there at all in TMWYS.  It stays on the tonic.
Also, both SIFJ and Barrytown continue the melody in one long phrase, with no
pause in the phrase.  TMWYS's melody is broken in two (as indicated above).
The second half of TMWYS's phrase is completely different.  SIFJ and
Barrytown, continue the same, and don't part ways until later.

Based on these revelations, it is my contention that SIFJ and Barrytown are
much closer melodically than either are to TMWYS.  If I were a judge or jury
member at a lawsuit case over this, I would find cause for concern.  Although
I doubt it would ever happen.  There's not exactly millions involved.  And
I'm sure there's a mutual respect between the two groups that would have them
laugh it off, especially at their ages.

And, of course, one thing that's not been mentioned is the fact that SIFJ is
a rhythmic shuffle, where the other two are not.  That to me is a bigger
standout.

This is not to say that neither are subliminally influenced by TMWYS.  So I'm
not knocking Colin at all.  In fact, SIFJ is my favorite Colin tune on either
AV1 or WS.
Besides, who's to say that McCartney didn't lift TMWYS from something else,
eh?

The problem with My Sweet Lord was very well clarified by Harrison Sherwood,
and I agree.  But, to add fuel to the fire, what made George's problem worse
was the very feel and arragement, right down to the background vocals; that
left him little room to hide from the song detectives.

"Ears" Kingston

Remember - to member again

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 03:06:10 EDT
From: Xtckinks@aol.com
Subject: FUME FUME FUME
Message-ID: <f7.2fc70ab.26ff01e2@aol.com>

In Chalkhills Digest #6-271 D.V. Caputo wrote:

<< SHADDUP WITH THE ANAL AUTOBAHN CORRECTIONS!!!!! >>

Why D.V.? I think it's pretty crafty work!

Fuzzily warbling,
Paul LoPiccolo

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 18:52:10 +0900
From: "John Boudreau" <aso1@mocha.ocn.ne.jp>
Subject: LE JAPAN WASP STAR
Message-ID: <000701c02639$9a3f3980$775791d2@johnboud>

All ,

Have a sealed LE Wasp Star on Pony Canyon . If interested please email .

Sushiman

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 10:07:14 -0700 (PDT)
From: Brown <mb2@deltanet.com>
Subject: just clearing the air
Message-ID: <200009241707.KAA29141@mail2.deltanet.com>

Smudge asked:
> Oh, and am I the ONLY person who likes "Frost Circus" and "Procession"?

To which Todd replied:
>No, you're not. They're brilliant. You and I (and the other lovers of
these songs -- c'mon, I know you're out there) are right, and the
naysayers are wrong. If they listened to these songs for what they are
and didn't instead interpret them through the clouded glass of their own
expectations, they'd see the light.

'ello, remember me?  Deb Brown, Mummer lover extraordinaire.. (and that
includes the B-sides, baby!).. so naturally I'M with you, Smudge, Todd,
(your name here).. Frost Circus and Procession are both gems.. artsy and
oddball.. just like Partsy..  Those of you who dislike Frost Circus and
Procession are interpreting these little beauties through a *cloud of gas*,
if ya ask me.. (so lay-off the haggis, mmmkay?)

Speaking of Frost Circus, if you've been watching (U.S.)NBC's coverage of
the Olympics, you may have seen the Nike commercial where there is an ailing
elephant on the ground in front of a circus tent, surrounded by the usual
'circus' characters, etc..  Anyway, have you noticed that the background
music is reminiscent of Frost Circus?.. actually quite similar.
Nike.. shudder.

Debora Brown

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 22:12:32 +0100
From: "David Edwards" <david@awed.fsnet.co.uk>
Subject: Frost Frolics
Message-ID: <002601c0266c$2a2587c0$0b1a893e@oemcomputer>

Dear Chalkpals

Please be upstanding for Smudge and Todd - Frost Circus is indeed a great
song! Have you ever seen frost crystals emerging in fast-motion on one of
those nature programmes? They pop into magically harmonious existence and
grow and expand in perfect, disciplined order, as per the plonking sounds of
Frost Circus.

Frost emerging on leaves is as humble an event as you can imagine - as the
song suggests - and yet it is full of the harmony, magic and ultimate
mystery of all things, and of course of circuses. Like Humble Daisy, this
song (for me) is about tiny humble things just doing what they do,
magically. Although deemed of no importance whatsoever, in fact they are of
no less significance than anything else. A frost crystal flashing in and out
of existence is no more or less important than an empire doing the same, in
the grand scheme of things. So we can all relax in terms of being 'important
', you know - that's not what it's about.

And another thing. Did the universe, like that frost crystal seems to,
really just pop out of nothing perfectly formed? Something from nothing? Not
possible! Well then did it emerge from some previous cause that itself had
no beginning? Something without a beginning? Not possible! According to
common sense, then, +everything+ is impossible. Those little crystals
twinkle at us with that dazzling mystery (it's like a mystic Morse code!).
As I say, they are a close relation of the Humble Daisies communicating the
same wonder - Andy'll sing about frost crystals if nobody else will - and
also of the little flower messengers "huddled there, in petalled prayer",
before a kneeling, awestruck Andy in World Wrapped in Grey.

Sincerely

David Edwards

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 15:23:34 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ryan Anthony <hamsterranch@yahoo.com>
Subject: Does Andy pack a roscoe?
Message-ID: <20000924222334.14891.qmail@web122.yahoomail.com>

Dear fellow goddam chalk-monkeys:

I am not a "completist." I don't own *Homespun* or any
of a dozen alternate versions of "Towers of London"
(which may or may not exist) with sneezes, dog-barks,
or toaster pop-up noises standing in for clanks. I
don't have much use for home demos if the final
versions are available. Generally, hearing a demo
makes me realize how good the polished song is.

Nevertheless, last week I bought the CD-single of "I'm
the Man Who Murdered Love," which includes home demos
of ITMWML and Colin's "Didn't Hurt a Bit."

I parted with $4.99 American, plus tax, because ...

1. Okay, maybe I am a bit of a completist.

2. As far as I know it's the only way to get any
version at all of "Didn't Hurt a Bit."

3. It's packaged in a nifty little clear plastic
snap-shut case, shaped like the Greek letter Omega, I
had never seen before.

4. TVT Records, Idea Records, and Our Boys have to be
cuddled, coddled, and rendered obscenely rich by you
and me, two or three miserable pennies at a time.

5. The cleverness of graphic artists as well as of
musicians must be rewarded. The CD-single's label is
similar to that of *Wasp Star*, except the primary
colors have been washed down, and what was an abstract
high-techy digital test pattern design is now the face
of poor unfortunate Love right after he was rendered
room temperature by Andy Partridge. What was, on the
album, a black bar which carried the album's and
band's names, is now Love's mouth, bent into a frown
with a stream of blood at one corner. Above are his
eyes, squinched shut, and above and between his eyes
is a bullet hole.

That does it! I've been holding back on this, because
I know it twists Chalkhillers' undergarments into
uncomfortable knots, plus sensei Relph has asked us to
refrain from tossing verbal molotov cocktails at each
other, but there's real authentic XTC content to be
discussed here, and I must needs evoke the f-word.

Firearms.

Isn't Partridge the idealistic fellow who, eighteen
years ago, likened violence to a disease and guns to
"the germ which is man-made in metal ... really a key
to your own tomb"?

Didn't he, in a spasm of smug optimism, predict,
"You'll gather your senses I'm sure, then agree to
melt the guns, melt the guns, melt the guns and never
more to fire them, melt the guns, melt the guns, melt
the guns, and never more desire them"?

Okay, then, in the final year of the 20th century,
Love approached the same self-righteously
ballistophobic Mr. Partridge and begged to be put out
of, excuse me, put FROM his misery. Andy obliged. In
what holistic, organic, Earth-friendly manner did he
do the deed?

I shot an arrow through his sugar head ...?

I sank a hatchet in his sugar head ...?

I dropped a mallet on his sugar head ...?

No! "I put a bullet in his sugar head." With tweezers?
Not likely, to judge from the businesslike bullet hole
on the CD-single.

All the same, no unnecessarily high level of firepower
was utilized. No spray of bullets, and no nasty sugary
mess spread over half an acre; in fact, evidently the
bullet didn't even burrow all the way through that
sugar head. This was no shotgun, no rifle, no
submachine gun. It was a small and presumably
easily-concealable handgun. How'd he get it? Do you
suppose Andy "Melt the Guns" Partridge leaned over
into one of the British government's oven-bound
tumbrels full of guns, rescued a roscoe from its
appointment with the forge, and carries it in his
pants?

Well, either that or he's just happy to see us, and
when was the last time he toured?

Ryan "the Hamster From the Ministry" Anthony

An independent Internet content provider

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 19:12:02 -0700 (PDT)
From: Rob Hill <squidriver@yahoo.com>
Subject: Pod people
Message-ID: <20000925021202.4213.qmail@web1302.mail.yahoo.com>

Sir Partridge can be found extolling the virtues of the Line 6 Pod in
the latest Studio2Stage at your nearest music store.

Speaking of which, have any guitar aficionados here tinkered with this
Pod device much? What do you think of it? The guitars on Wasp Star do
sound a bit "processed" for the most part. I'm suspicious. Is the Pod a
case of convenience winning out over quality or is there somethin' to
it? How does it sound in a live setting?

Rob

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 05:15:58 -0700
From: "Victor Rocha" <wstsidela@mediaone.net>
Subject: Yazbek and Partridge
Message-ID: <003001c026ea$5cf47020$45548218@we.mediaone.net>

Yazbek in the LA Times:
http://www.latimes.com/print/suncal/20000924/t000090308.html

Victor Rocha

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 13:58:02 +0100
From: "Smith, David" <David.Smith@tfeurope.com>
Subject: RE: Show me the way to go Dome . . .
Message-ID: <4BBE67B71C1DD411A23600508B65F71E6862A5@tfsecmsg04.tfseur.co.uk>

One final Dome response (promise) to David Seddon, who said of my post:

"It just seems spurious to me that opponents of the Dome see fit to
compare it to NHS money. The two are not mutually exclusive.
Why do they it compare to NHS funds unless it is to make a point
with cheap emotional pull?"

Maybe my mistake, but if you listen to our beloved Tony (I'm
listening) Blair, he uses every opportunity available to tell us that
we can't have what we want because "we'd have to take the money from
the NHS" - ie, the two, according to the politicians, ARE mutually
exclusive.

What are we supposed to think? Once you brought the subject of the NHS up,
the horse was off and running - I simply jumped on!

Anyway, I'm starting to sound like a young Tory here - and I'm neither
of those, so let's leave it at that and stop boring the rest of the
free world :-)

	"See you at the Dome for a beer, James and David?"

Been there, done that!

Now the Tate Modern . . . .

Smudgeboy "Wobbly Bridge" boy
E-Mail: david.smith@tfeurope.com

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 07:08:09 PDT
From: "Edward Sizzorhends" <skylar_king@hotmail.com>
Subject: Tri-State Globo-Dome
Message-ID: <F167utJLtosJ3Ih7jtr00001e91@hotmail.com>

Yeah, I got a direct response from THEEEE Harrison "Sure Would" Sherwood.
That made my day!

Really though, Your points, sir, were very well recieved and my erratic
thoughts on the matter have calmed a bit because of them.

I really wasn't out to "get" XTC or make anyone go "Arrrrgh", I just knew
the smart people on this list could make valid arguments and sway my
thinking back from "the Dark Side." And they
have............almost.......which leads me too.........

I can't tell you how UTTERLY glad I am that we have started talking about
"The Dome" instead of that rotty XTC band.

I know, howsabout "The Sad Dome" where at the turn of the decade, we build a
huge, expensive dome, stuff all our sad song choices in them, and blow it to
Smithereens?

Yes, I know Smithereens was capitalised, I mean let's blow it TOO the band,
The Smithereens. Just for the hell of it.

I am going to see THE WHO on Thursday in Atlanta Georgia. All you
Chalkhillers will know me ...I will have a huge DOME on my head with the
list of my favorite/least favorite concert experiences on it. It will be
ACTUAL SIZE. At the moment a 67 year old Roger Daltrey sings the lines "I
hope I die before I get old" a great Monty Python Finger of God will ascend
from the top of my Dome and smite him with holy lightning.

Really though, I never thought I'd see "Donkey Dicks" used in this forum...I
never..... Wayne Coyne is an artist who deserved credit and I have NEVER
heard ANYTHING by Guided By Voices.  Though I am sure they are good too, I
really HOPE that dude was drunk off his arse and can't remember what his
wretched meat chute spewed forth. Hubris.

Alas,
The Skylar "I may be no copyright Law expert but I sure am the" King

for some tunes with DEFINATE swiping going on check out frsh new tunes at
http://www.mp3.com/phelan   The Skylar King's alter -(and broke ass)- ego.

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 14:31:42 +0000 (MET)
From: rappard@dds.nl
Subject: All Hail Derek Miner!
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.90.1000925142634.29315A-100000@fatima.dds.nl>

For making the excellent CD-R "Jules Verne's Sketchbook" (great artwork
as well), and for elucidating what happened to that very funny scene
(woman hawking her red-letter husband's collection of Motown vinyl for a
ridiculously small amount) in the book High Fidelity when the movie was made.

And to Derek: yes, it definitely (and looks) a lot better than the
commercial Japanese EX-series bootleg. Best six bucks I ever spent.

Marty "continuing Todd's legacy" van Rappard
http://members.xoom.com/rappard

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 10:28:04 +0300
From: jari.kostilainen@om.fi
Subject: interview in a Finnish music mag translated
Message-ID: <C2256965.00284EB5.00@hkigw01.om.fi>

I wrote earlier that there was an interview of Andy in the Finnish
music magazine Soundi (but the issue was August, not September).
Soundi (www.soundi.fi) is written in Finnish only and it is not a
Finnish edition of any British music magazine.  Because there probably
aren't many Finnish XTC fans in Finland, I thought that it would be a
shame if only few people read this interview, so after some
consideration (and after the editor who interviewed Andy had okayed
this) I decided to translate it.  English is not my native language
and I'm not a translator, so there may be some mistakes in the
translation, but probably you won't mind.  And don't tell me if there
might have been an easier way to do this !

                              Jari Kostilainen
                              Oulu, Finland
                              E-mail:  jari.kostilainen@om.fi

	[ http://chalkhills.org/articles/Soundi0008.html ]

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2000 10:56:08 -0700
From: "Steve Young" <sjyoung@hotmail.com>
Subject: I Want To Be Here
Message-ID: <OE471tZvPBHdQtcJvab00000792@hotmail.com>

So for ages I've been hearing about the tracks that never made it to Wasp
Star, four of which seem to stand out in recommendation: Ship Trapped in the
Ice, Wonder Annual, Dame Fortune and I Don't Want To Be Here - the last one
in particular receiving many of the accolades.  I've been sour-graping these
tracks for some time, having heard only "Ship", and just *hating* the idea
that there were three other songs I hadn't heard that were better than most
(or all) of the tracks on WS (which despite having the best album-closing
track in the history of album-closing tracks, seems to be placed somewhere
between "Go 2" and the infamous bootleg "Andy's Bowel Movements, Spring
1984" on many Chalkhiller's lists) . . . so anyhow, I finally heard "I Don't
Want To Be Here".

God, I hate it when you people are right.  You're totally, utterly,
sickeningly right.  With the inclusion of this track, Wasp Star would NOT
have been the album Andy wanted, but it would have still been glorious!
This song reminds me slightly of "Cherry In Your Tree" and I can picture it
being a radio hit (but of course *I* could).  Well... anyhow, who's better
equipped to judge art - the artists or the artists' public?  Who best to
judge longevity?  Maybe we'll be hearing "Wounded Horse" (a song I happen to
dig) on classic rock stations in 20 years.  Or maybe not...

"Was A Yes".  I could have used this little snippet of song in high school.
It's so... and I mean this in the most literal sense of the word -
"adolescent"!  No, really - I mean that very affectionately.  "Here comes my
neck..." (makes me think of the guillotine in the second-to-last movements
of Symphonie Fantastique - so *dramatic!*!) - I had a bonkers head-over-heel
crush on a classmate of mine my senior year of high school, and after months
of pubescent agony asked her to the senior dance in an infatuatory fit.  She
seemed very uncomfortable and asked if she could "think about it".  So I hid
from her all day, in some cases literally *ducking out of sight*.  ("Covered
my ears...")  Finally she found me and handed me a slip of paper, which I
took to me a carefully worded rejection.  I unwrapped it at my locker and
written in small block letters in one corner was "Yes."  I went literally
skipping down the hallway with joy.  (She's now one of my best friends -
funny how these things work)

I don't believe this song was ever ready for prime time - it's always seemed
somewhat incomplete and the lyrics sort of... well, just not "mature" enough
(?).  It pains me to say it.  But in that sense I think it captures the
requition of lovesickness perfectly, and it holds a dear place in my
"private catalog"!

I recently got "Mummer" and "Big Express" on vinyl.  Without the benefit of
an audiophile's trained ear, I can say that I do prefer them to the CD.  If
only for the "coolness" factor - look, it's "Beating of Hearts" at 45 RPM!
Tee Hee!  Alvin Andy!  Chipmunk Colin!

~~Steve

P.S. nah nah.  "That Wave" and "Omnibus" DO belong on Nonsuch!  I say
replace "War Dance" with a track featuring the singing penis doing Bach's
Cello Suite #2 (and Colin doing scat)...

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End of Chalkhills Digest #6-276
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Go back to Volume 6.

26 September 2000 / Feedback