Geo, Ah yes, Jerusalem, is a school hymn and also it is sung at the end of every meeting of the admirable 'Womens' Institute'. Personally, I think it is a superb example of jingoism?? no, rhetoric. I have really no idea what it means, but it is stirring stuff, so long as we don't look to closely for what the heck it's about. Because when Blake wrote it, was before we built our dark satanic mills, so to what could he have been referring?

I hadn't heard of Kansas or 'Dust in the Wind' - but it is just about the opposite of 'Oh Love that Will Not Let Me Go' - with regard to meaning. It is a rather bleak philosophy.

Most interesting geo; you do know that "Jerusalem" is sung at the very beginning of the movie "Chariots of Fire." Also, a variation of it is used in the final chapter the last book (No. 7) of Elizabeth Moon's Serrano Legacy series, "Against the Odds."

As for what is playing in my head today, it is "Me and Bobbie McGee." Why? I have no idea.

Been thinking about the dust song, ant. It still seems a sad thing to sing about.

Now - Henry Rollins version of 'The Liar' is wicked, but exhilarating:-

You think you're gonna to live your life alone
In darkness
And seclusion
Yeah I know
You've been out there
Tried to mix with those animals
And it just left you full of humiliated confusion
So you stagger back home
And wait for nothing
But the solitary refinement of your room spits you back out onto the street
And now you're desperate
And in need of human contact
And then
You meet me
And you whole world changes
Because everything I say is everything you've ever wanted to hear
So you drop all your defenses and you drop all your fears
And you trust me completely
I'm perfect
In every way
Cause I make you feel so strong and so powerful inside
You feel so lucky
But your ego obscures reality
And you never bother to wonder why
Things are going so well
You wanna know why?
Cause I'm a liar
Yeah I'm a liar
I'll tear your mind out
I'll burn your soul
I'll turn you into me
I'll turn you into me
Cause I'm a liar, a liar
A liar, a liar

I'll hide behind a smile
And understanding eyes
And I'll tell you things that you already know
So you can say
I really identify with you, so much
And all the time that you're needing me
Is just the time that I'm bleeding you
Don't you get it yet?
I'll come to you like an affliction
And I'll leave you like an addiction
You'll never forget me
You wanna know why?
Cause I'm a liar
Yeah I'm a liar
I'll rip your mind out
I'll burn your soul
I'll turn you into me
I'll turn you into me
Cause I'm a liar, a liar
Liar, liar, liar, liar

I don't know why I feel the need to lie
And cause you so much pain
Maybe it's something inside
Maybe it's something I can't explain
Cause all I do
Is mess you up and lie to you
I'm a liar
Oh, I am a liar

If you'll give me one more chance
I swear that I will never lie to you again
Because now I see the destructive power of a lie
They're stronger than truth
I can't believe I ever hurt you
I swear
I will never to you lie again, please
Just give me one more chance
I will never lie to you again
I swear
That I will never tell a lie
I will never tell a lie
No, no
Ha ha ha ha ha hah haa haa haa haaa
Sucker
Sucker!
Oh, sucker
I am a liar
Yeah, I am a liar
Yeah I like it
I feel good
Ohh I am a liar

Penelope wrote:Geo, Ah yes, Jerusalem, is a school hymn and also it is sung at the end of every meeting of the admirable 'Womens' Institute'. Personally, I think it is a superb example of jingoism?? no, rhetoric. I have really no idea what it means, but it is stirring stuff, so long as we don't look to closely for what the heck it's about. Because when Blake wrote it, was before we built our dark satanic mills, so to what could he have been referring?

I hadn't heard of Kansas or 'Dust in the Wind' - but it is just about the opposite of 'Oh Love that Will Not Let Me Go' - with regard to meaning. It is a rather bleak philosophy.

I dunno about the Blake poem. I'll have to look that one up. The lyrics seem grand and proud though.

Dust In The Wind does seem a sad reflection of the inevitability of death, but I know for a fact that Terry Livgren, who wrote the song, was (and probably still is) a Christian. Some of Kansas' songs do have Christian themes, but they were ambiguous enough to still appeal to a mostly secular audience. I see from Wikipedia that Livgren took inspiration for Dust in the Wind from the ashes to ashes, dust to dust Biblical passage.

Cattleman wrote:Most interesting geo; you do know that "Jerusalem" is sung at the very beginning of the movie "Chariots of Fire." Also, a variation of it is used in the final chapter the last book (No. 7) of Elizabeth Moon's Serrano Legacy series, "Against the Odds."

As for what is playing in my head today, it is "Me and Bobbie McGee." Why? I have no idea.

Certain songs regularly show up in my brain. I don't know why, they just do.

I didn't know that about the song. Somehow I missed that movie, although I've heard good things about it.

geo:
I dunno about the Blake poem. I'll have to look that one up. The lyrics seem grand and proud though.

There is quite an interesting write-up on Wiki about Blake and this particular poem. Some suggestion that 'the dark Satanic mills' were referring to the established church of the time. Mills, as in grinding out people with a certain hopeless mindset - Blake being quite a radical and rebellious thinker. The great old gothic churches of the time were (and still are and more so) ineffectual, nurturing the preservation of the status quo, the rich and privilidged exploiting the masses of poor, ill-educated and hungry and the later non-conformist chapels of John Wesley were on fire and producing evangelical ministers and men who changed their world, and themselves for the better. There certainly needed to be a revolution (as can be seen from the writings of Charles Dickens) but instead of a revolution, as happened in France, we, in Great Britain, had a religious revival. Methodism's founder, John Wesley, was an Anglican priest whose own religious experiences spurred him to try to reinvigorate the religious lives of people throughout the English-speaking world. Himself the son of an Anglican clergyman, Wesley first attracted attention to his work in the 1730s as a tutor at Oxford University, where he and his brother Charles brought together a group of pious students and instructors. Leading to a much needed religious revival in England and Wales and thence on to the USA. OK, I'm not in the least keen on the kind of fundamentalism which developed from this revival, but at the time it happened, it must have been wonderful to observe. In this part of England, close to the Welsh border, there are still a lot of indications of the holy fire sweeping through the land - lots of houses around here with plates claiming that 'John Wesley slept here' etc. It must have seemed as though 'those feet' were walking again in England's green and pleasant land.

Some of Kansas' songs do have Christian themes, but they were ambiguous enough to still appeal to a mostly secular audience. I see from Wikipedia that Livgren took inspiration for Dust in the Wind from the ashes to ashes, dust to dust Biblical passage.

Yes, Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust - All Flesh is Grass - Well, that is true of the body, our physical manifestations do return to dust and ashes but our souls are indestructable. So we have to keep trying to get it right, you see.

What about those words which I used to find so damned irritating in my youth:-



Who would true Valour see
Let him come hither;
One here will Constant be,
Come Wind, come Weather.
There's no Discouragement,
Shall make him once Relent,
His first avow'd Intent,
To be a Pilgrim.

Who so beset him round,
With dismal Storys,
Do but themselves Confound;
His Strength the more is.
No Lyon can him fright,
He'l with a Gyant Fight,
But he will have a right,
To be a Pilgrim.

Hobgoblin, nor foul Fiend,
Can daunt his Spirit:
He knows, he at the end,
Shall Life Inherit.
Then Fancies fly away,
He'l fear not what men say,
He'l labour Night and Day,
To be a Pilgrim.

John Bunyan

Absolutey, John Bunyan, Absolutely!

undiscovered talent at a construction site.

http://www.wimp.com/workersings/

There is something about song lyrics that really embed themselves into one's brain. They have recently found that alzymer sufferers, when they loose all memory of their people and their history, can still remember songs. Where I work, at the second hand bookstore, we also sell old sheet music and just recently people often come in looking for sheet music to play in old peoples' homes where they can have community singing. I am told that their faces are a picture of joy, when they realise that they can join in because they remember the old songs when they can't remember anything else.


Did any of you see the film 'Touching the Void'. It is a marvellous film showing endurance at its most profound. It is the one where the man cuts his own fingers off to release himself, then becomes buried in snow and assumes that he is going to die there. By a miracle he is found. But when he is lying there in the darkness, dying, he becomes delirious and rather than hearing choirs of angels singing, he hears Bony M singing 'Brown Girl in the Ring' - which he can't understand because he can't stand that song:-

Touching the Void is a 2003 docudrama based on the book of the same name by Joe Simpson about Simpson's and Simon Yates' disastrous and near fatal attempt to climb Siula Grande (6,344m) in the Cordillera Huayhuash in the Peruvian Andes in 1985.


The climbers reach the summit to the climax of Thomas Tallis's Spem in alium. During one of Simpson's many deliriums, he experiences a very strong reminiscence of a Boney M song he hated thoroughly, "Brown Girl in the Ring"; at one point thinking "Bloody hell, I'm going to die to Boney M".


Being interested myself in Neuro Linguistics - I found this very amusing and absolutely fascinating.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UO_uK33aQY8&noredirect=1

Been thinking about the dust song, ant. It still seems a sad thing to sing about.

I think it's an eye opening song. A song that reminds us that it matters not what may or certainly may not happen after our time runs its course.
Every structure, no matter how meaningful, marvelous, or dear to us will eventually amount to dust. If there is anything certain it is that.
The enormity of time itself is all there is and perhaps ever will be.

What a gift we've all been "given" by the creative acts of Nature.

Anyway, it is not a sad song to me. It's telling us by way of song that endings are very much apart of life.

Dust in the Wind is one of my all-time favorites. As Ant says the song is eye opening. Not all songs are meant to make you smile. Some will make you cry.

How about "Cats in the Cradle" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etundhQa724

...or "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" - Gordon Lightfoot http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vST6hVRj2A