Dok (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} cyberinsekt) wrote,@ 2007-12-27 10:31:00 |
|
Robert Wyatt - Out of the Blue
One of the musical highlights of 2007 was, for me, the release of Robert Wyatt's album Comicopera. It's no secret that I'm partial when it comes to Mr. Wyatt. Over the years he's produced some extraordinary musical documents, and Comicopera certainly sits well amongst them. In a way, I am sorry to relate, it's a concept album. I'm sorry because that will immediately make many listeners just turn off. Still, some subjects are just too large for a single song to contain them, and this is a record that takes the world and starts drawing connecting lines over it.
The album starts with the personal, and moves seamlessly into the political. It's divided into three acts, and Out of the Blue marks the end of act two.
There's a popular story about the use of aerial bombing on civilian targets. Everyone knows it. It goes like this: the Nazis started it. They bombed the Spanish in 1936 to aid Franco. It's in all the books. Well yes, they did. But they weren't the first; Britain was. And it happened against an unexpectedly modern population: Iraqi Kurds. In 1920 that jolly old hero the Secretary of State for War Winston Churchill signed the order allowing tons of ordinance to be dropped on civilians. Actually, it could have been worse. Technical difficulties stopped Churchill from carrying out plan A, which would have been the use of airborne chemical weapons. Such a brilliant man. So innovative.
When the narrator of Wyatt's Out of the Blue sings that "Something unbelievable has happened to the floor" we are given no indication of who dropped the bombs. But we know who started it. This is a truly shocking song, full of dark electronic textures and some of the bleakest venom with which words were ever sung. "You have planted all your everlasting hatred in my heart," cries Wyatt at the end, and he is true to his words. For the rest of the album, he completely eschews the English language, choosing instead to sing in Spanish or Italian.
In other words, today's track needs a somewhat broader context than you're going to get by simply downloading it and listening to it on its own. I recommend buying the album.
Robert Wyatt - Out of the Blue
One of the musical highlights of 2007 was, for me, the release of Robert Wyatt's album Comicopera. It's no secret that I'm partial when it comes to Mr. Wyatt. Over the years he's produced some extraordinary musical documents, and Comicopera certainly sits well amongst them. In a way, I am sorry to relate, it's a concept album. I'm sorry because that will immediately make many listeners just turn off. Still, some subjects are just too large for a single song to contain them, and this is a record that takes the world and starts drawing connecting lines over it.
The album starts with the personal, and moves seamlessly into the political. It's divided into three acts, and Out of the Blue marks the end of act two.
There's a popular story about the use of aerial bombing on civilian targets. Everyone knows it. It goes like this: the Nazis started it. They bombed the Spanish in 1936 to aid Franco. It's in all the books. Well yes, they did. But they weren't the first; Britain was. And it happened against an unexpectedly modern population: Iraqi Kurds. In 1920 that jolly old hero the Secretary of State for War Winston Churchill signed the order allowing tons of ordinance to be dropped on civilians. Actually, it could have been worse. Technical difficulties stopped Churchill from carrying out plan A, which would have been the use of airborne chemical weapons. Such a brilliant man. So innovative.
When the narrator of Wyatt's Out of the Blue sings that "Something unbelievable has happened to the floor" we are given no indication of who dropped the bombs. But we know who started it. This is a truly shocking song, full of dark electronic textures and some of the bleakest venom with which words were ever sung. "You have planted all your everlasting hatred in my heart," cries Wyatt at the end, and he is true to his words. For the rest of the album, he completely eschews the English language, choosing instead to sing in Spanish or Italian.
In other words, today's track needs a somewhat broader context than you're going to get by simply downloading it and listening to it on its own. I recommend buying the album.
Robert Wyatt - Out of the Blue
