HW: Lyrics

[Carl Edlund Anderson]

On lör 15 maj 1999 14.18 +0000 DASLUD at AOL.COM wrote:
> but during the era we're discussing, it was
anti-establishment/non-conformist
> gonzoid sci-fi etc., and this is the distinction lost from where we are
now,
> i tink.

     Perhaps so.  I mean, I recognize that HW is anti-establishment
and non-conformist, but so is darn near all the music I have to
some extent (that is, the music collection which I have established
conforms well to sentiments of anti-establishment/non-conformist
ideologies :)  My views are doubtless skewed by a deep distrust
of anything that smells like politics--no wonder I was so into
the Dead :)

> surely i was thinking they were "fun" when i was 15, but they also sang
lines
> like "they put you down/they cut your hair", and as someone who was once
> forcibly dragged outside from the kitchen table and gagged by their
> stepmother so that USMC daddy-o could climb on top of me and hack up my
hair
> w/scissors so badly i'd have to go get a haircut...well, i guess you had
to
> be there...

     Hmmm, yes, that's outside of my experience!

> In a message dated 5/15/99 1:14:52 PM, cea20 at CUS.CAM.AC.UK writes:
> << I like them for all the reasons I've never warmed to post-Barrett
Floyd.
> There were some people taking loads of drugs and still
> not having fun ;)  Miserable introspective gits! >>
>
> well said, carl-chan. i might have phrased it "miserable filthy-rich
> introspective gits"...y'know, several weeks back when me and others were
> tearing up various bands and upsetting certain people here, i didnt dare
> bring up floyd because it's not worth going there...

     Well, my intention is not to knock post-Barrett Floyd--I mean,
they do what they do, and there are countless legions who dig it.
I wanted to provide an example that made a good counterpoint to
my example of the Hawkwind "fun-factor".  Like it or hate it, few
I think will pick post-Barrett Floyd as a band over-burdened with
_fun_.  People have often been surprised that I am not a Floyd-fan
since I like all that psychedelic and progressive stuff.  I've often
been surprised myself. It's fine in small doses. But it comes down
to their lacking the "fun" factor.  It makes me want to "sit upon
the carpet and tell sad stories" ;)  Whereas Hawkwind's music, even
when they sing about grimmer things, still strikes me as underlyingly
"fun" ... or "defiant", at least.  Something of the Lemmyish "born
to lose, live to win" thing :)

     Which is why (to get back to the start of this part of the
thread) I think that although spaceships and ley-lines are to a
great extent inherently tacky, they might make fairly rockin'
HW subject matter :)

in space we trust,
Carl

ObCD: Amorphis, "Divinity" CDS

--
Carl Edlund Anderson
Dept. of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, & Celtic
St. John's College, University of Cambridge
mailto:cea20 at cus.cam.ac.uk
http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~carl/