| Author | Message | ||
     Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 14 Registered: 10-2006 |
Just finished reading the long locked-down Too much of one thing thread: excellent! More threads like that are needed on the lyric page - serious words require serious attention. Did Mr Isley leave forever?? Meanwhile, I'd like to know a little more about the FORW songs Spirit & His life, both tremendous - the Nichols book says that Spirit is "about the band" - so, how? Who is "one thing greater /Than all the things that you are together."? And who is living whose life? | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 824 Registered: 05-2005 |
Mr Isley was first sent to the sin bin Stuart and then banned completely. For a while posts went into a holding area before going up after moderation, so poisonous had the atmosphere gotten. We lost a few good men and women in that war of attrition. | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 855 Registered: 04-2005 |
Yeah, my stomach churned at the thought of resuming lyric discussions a la Mr. Isley. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 18 Registered: 10-2006 |
Well, it was interesting, until it turned nasty..ok... maybe I'll hold off my on my close reading of He Lives My Life for a bit then... | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 23 Registered: 10-2006 |
Ok, that’s long enough. Anyway, let’s have a look at He Lives my life. A great song, but what’s it about? The first time I heard: He's got a four wheel drive that he takes to Double Island Point He's got a relationship with a woman that he met in an Irish joint I got the feeling that it was actually satirical, maybe because of the way Forster hits down on “joint” (and probably because I’m always being mashed against the wall by SUVs here in Italy) but that wouldn’t really make any sense in the song: this is where geography comes into play, since it all depends if DoubleI point is a cool place to drive to, and not a mall, say. (Pause to google DI point: wow, it is fabulous!! A paradise north of Brisbane for diving & surfing, “named” by Cook in 1770 … ok, so the guy who drives out here – and the 4-wheel is a practical necessity for beach driving, not just a chic accessory – is a lucky dude, let’s call him Cool Dude…) And since RF has probably spent as much time as the rest of us of in pubs, he’s not likely to be heavily against Irish joints. So the sentences aren’t critical in any way, they’re simply a neutral description of a person, this CD who’s “living” RF’s life: perhaps, the person RF would have been if he hadn’t entered the great rock n’ roll circus. The CD’s life is not a bad one, with the house overlooking the park, the piano to play after dark…though the house is “all to himself”. It’s a gentle, luxurious life, with the leisure to visit beautiful landscapes, no domestic stress (or comfort), the time to play music without the pressure of putting out product… I know the land And the coloured sand Everything's fresh at the source in this land These lines refer to the landscape around DI point, I guess. The famous “rainbow beach” and the apparently wonderful rainforest ecology of Fraser Island nearby (one road there from Brisbane is called Freshwater Road, too). But the third line is just great for its sound, that stream of “s” s, and the image of endless renewal it conjures up. The lovely chorus is plaintive and a bit regretful, And I wish him luck I hope he gets it right As he lives my live as if RF maybe feels he didn’t get it quite right in his own life; but at the end with that satisfying “see him/be him” clincher RF and the CD seem to merge, perhaps a reference to RF’s return to “the source”, settling back after a life of music craziness into his hometown and tranquil domesticity… And if you see him Tell him I'll be him As I live his life …maybe even with that 4-wheel drive to take out to the point… | ||
| Kurt Stephan Member Username: Slothbert Post Number: 912 Registered: 04-2005 |
No, no, Stuart...that's all wrong. We need Mark Illsley to step in and tell us what it's really about.  Just kidding. You may have analyzed what it means more than RF has! I think your take is as good as any on what's one of his more interesting, enigmatic lyrics. | ||
| David Matheson Member Username: David_matheson Post Number: 109 Registered: 12-2004 |
I love this song and have often wondered if it is about Grant. I have been fortunate enough to visit Double Island Point and it is a wonderful place. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 24 Registered: 10-2006 |
Grant couldn't drive, though, could he? I was hoping this might be one of the few Forster songs not about Grant (or Lindy)! (which probably means it's about himself!) I love Forster's lyrics, often just a brief, colloquial sketch of a person or situation suddenly illuminated by a line or two of terse poetic beauty... | ||
| Michelle M Member Username: Michelle Post Number: 18 Registered: 09-2004 |
I recall an article which stated that this song was about a person known to Robert knew. I even think (false memory perhaps) the article quoted Robert saying that this person was moved when watching the song being performed. I tried to search the Internet for it but the best I could come up with was: "..the poignant "He Lives My Life" tells of swapping existences (Robert having moved to Bavaria while his German wife's friend moved out to Brisbane).." http://elsewhere.adactio.com/?amazon-Ite mId=B00004YTVK&amazon-locale=uk I like this song because it is about my home town and the surrounds. Also it is about those times when you think about what would/could/should have been if you had made different choices. If L.K. is reading this. Re: lyrics and that line from "The Statue" "Then the sunrise seeks you through a maze of dragons" I always thought it may refer to the sky as the sun rises (particularly in Aust.) and the formation of clouds and the reds and oranges appearing like a maze of dragons. | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 93 Registered: 09-2006 |
I like the would/could/should aspect of it a lot: one fellow leading the career musician's life, the other a relatively quiet, ordinary one, each (mostly) happy with the choices they've made but sometimes living the life of the other in their head. | ||
| Little Keith Member Username: Manosludge Post Number: 1191 Registered: 03-2006 |
Michelle, that's such a loverly interpretation of that lyric, it's gotta be the truth! I like that poetic technique, forget what it's called, possibly "personification", where human qualities, or agency, is attributed to non-living things. Another great example of the technique is the line from the bridge of "Bachelor Kisses", "The rain surrenders to the town". So vivid - I can picture the exact town, though I've never been to Oz. | ||
| Matthias Treml Member Username: Matthias Post Number: 174 Registered: 05-2005 |
Michelle, I love you. You too Keith. And now Stuart. I'm a lyrics archaeologist so your insight move me. Next up, Spirit... | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 25 Registered: 10-2006 |
Thanks very much Matthias. I think Spirit is a song about friendship, about sharing – and since David Nichol comments that it’s “about the band”, we have to assume I guess that it’s RF talking to GM: I wonder, has any other musical friendship provoked such a wonderful dialogue sequence of songs? The lyric is casual, idiomatic, nothing particularly “poetic” till the final lines which suddenly open the whole song out into “something greater” than we might have expected at the beginning: just an invitation to a concert, the best show in town, music to enjoy together, but an odd line creeps in: “I might come along with something you’ve been missing”, which sounds like a reference to their songwriting together, hey, maybe I’ve got a tune to fit to your lyric, or a middle-eight, or a wee guitar figure to slot in…or on a more general level, just anything individual one person brings along to the other in a relationship, a sense of irony, sympathy, humour, erudition (thinking about RF’s Hipster article), after all he’s “got no money, got nothing at all” but he’ll “keep you guessing” – ok, guessing about what? I’ve not idea really, unless it’s a wry comment on RF’s eternal inability to keep up with GM’s prolific song production: will he come up with five tunes for the next album, has he got anything recent, is he really going to write a reggae tune?? “I’m bound to hit the wall and I’ll be running” the song goes on: which sounds like a bit of a contradiction – if you hit the wall, you end up staggering, not running: now, if it was “hit the ground running” it would be nice – as if referring to a sudden spurt of inspiration, perhaps encouraged by his friend, which would get the work finished – but as it is, it’s hard to get sense out of the line. Did RF get his idioms mixed up? – unlikely, I know – or am I missing something? Does it mean he hit the wall – a rough patch, a writer’s block – but he kept running through it anyway? That might work too. More gentle humour: “I’m no trouble - I’m nothing like the trouble I used to be when I was somebody’s double” could refer back to the older & crazier Go-betweens days, a love affair that was so intense it ended up with the participants behaving like & mirroring each other to such an extent that other relationships suffered – he doesn’t even drink whisky any more, but he “likes to know it’s along there with me”, as if the rock n’ roll drink par excellence is something he no longer really needs to write or perform, but symbolises that sense of youthful anarchy and energy he hopes he hasn’t lost completely. “There’s nothing I’ve seen that’s ever really flattened me”… nothing musical, at least: what flattens him is the stuff they do together, the music they are going to go on to produce, the excitement of collaborative creation, because after all “there’s something in the corner of your eye that gets me”: he knows the other guy’s going to come up with something wonderful… in the end, the “spirit” is the inspiration the friend brings to the relationship, despite faults and frailties, or even apart from specific virtues, the ability to empathise and work together towards a common goal that makes the whole thing work, that produces the “one thing greater”, a creative force, a completed song. A great tribute to a great friend. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 898 Registered: 05-2005 |
Paragraphs, Stuart, paragraphs. Hit the enter key once in a while! | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 899 Registered: 05-2005 |
I should have put in a smiley face thing there. I'll try now. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 28 Registered: 10-2006 |
Sorry, it does look a bit dense, doesn't it?? Written in a bit of a rush... and I missed out the whisky/spirit pun too! | ||
| Elizabeth Robinson Member Username: Liz_the_new_listener Post Number: 33 Registered: 10-2006 |
Thank you so much - I really liked that, even without the paragraphs. Today I am taking a Go-B's CD or two over to my sister's for Thanksgiving, because my nephew is a budding guitar player and should really hear some of this, including 'Spirit'. FORW will be one of the CD's, and 'Spring Hill Fair', too. | ||
| Michelle M Member Username: Michelle Post Number: 19 Registered: 09-2004 |
Thanks Matthias. I love the idea of being an archaeologist of lyrics. I am going to steal your idea if you don't mind. Next time someone asks me what I 'do', I will answer, "I work in a library for money but my true calling is an archaeologist of lyrics. I am never happier than when I am digging up and reconstructing a lyric." Stuart, Re: Spirit. Before the "its about the band" comment, I always thought it was a song about the beginnings of a new relationship. The offer for a "date" to a show and then the person laying their cards on the table. I haven't any money and I've been trouble in the past but maybe we could be good together and I can add something to your life that has been missing up until now. I sense that we will keep each other interested (guessing). What do you think, tell me what you're thinking this minute? I like everything about you but more than that I like your "spirit" the essence of you ie the one thing greater. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 29 Registered: 10-2006 |
The only thing that goes against the "romance" reading maybe is the whisky bit - or would an Australian bloke expect the girl to bring along the booze? Well, I know Ozgirls are feisty types...on the other hand, is the "something in the corner of your eye" part perhaps just a wee bit too "delicate" for one guy to say about another? | ||
| Duncan Hurwood Member Username: Duncan_h Post Number: 70 Registered: 05-2005 |
'Spirit' reminds me of my daughter. I like it when songs can have a life beyond the original intention of the author. |