HW: More thoughts on Distant Horizons

Dave Berry daveb at HARLEQUIN.CO.UK
Tue Nov 18 06:23:00 EST 1997


What do people think of the lyrics to Population Overload and Wheels?  I'm
not keen on them myself -- not because I don't like social/political lyrics,
nor that I disagree with Dave as such; I just think the lyrics are too
general.  It's as if they're saying "overpopulation is bad" or "pollution is
bad", which we already know.  I think it's better to make lyrics more
personal.  Show me how overpopulation or pollution affects someone in
particular -- preferably (since this is HW) in a science-fiction scenario.

Joni Mitchell made the same mistake with "Dog Eat Dog", in the late 80's
(he said, veering wildly off-topic).  Her early work was all about people
in particular situations, and was excellent.  But on "Dog Eat Dog" she
lost that, and wrote vague, general, lyrics about how cigarettes are
bad, etc.  It doesn't work, at least not for me.

I guess Bob managed to do it, with Hassan I Sahba, and maybe High Rise,
but even those had characterisations of a sort.  Hassan I Sahba is
more or less the thoughts of one of the Hashihim, and High Rise is
basically about someone growing up in a high rise block.

Dave's lyrics used to do this.  Even songs like "Born To Go" or
"Down Through The Night" say "we're doing this ...".  His best
recent songs are also about individual people - Secret Agent,
Right To Decide, Alien, etc.  Even Clouded Vision, which isn't one
of his greatest, is better than the other two on this album.

Dave.

--
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Mayfield Road, Edinburgh, EH9 3JL, UK.
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