BOC: HW: Moorcock BOC tracks

[Ductor, Dan [NEUUS]]

Nik Turner did a spoken word version of "The Great Sun Jester" on his first
Space Ritual tour with Pressurhead and
Helios  Creed.

Dr. Dan

        -----Original Message-----
        From:   Andrew A. Apold [SMTP:mordru at FLITE.NET]
        Sent:   Friday, August 11, 2000 10:15 AM
        To:     BOC-L at LISTSERV.SPC.EDU
        Subject:        Re: BOC: HW: Moorcock BOC tracks

        >> Agreed. Now can anyone remind me which Moorcock books the
characters and
        >> ideas in these songs are drawn from? 'The Great Sun Jester' is
obviously
        >> the Fireclown from 'Winds of Limbo'. I guess that 'Black Blade'
is an
        >> Elric reference. Not sure about VotPW. Some Jerry Cornelius thing
        >> possibly?
        >
        >        Is it actually tied to a book? I took it as a kind of Song
of the
        >Eternal Champion. Like the spoken-word pieces on HW's _Warrior at
the Edge
        >of Time_ - some of them are almost verbatim culls from _The Eternal
        >Champion_ (is that just the omnibus title? The one with Erekose in,
        >anyway), some of them seem more general. Is it not more a song from
the
        >cycle than from any book in particular? My 2pworth, yours,


        All this info is availabe in the BOC FAQ at
http://hometown.aol.com/bocfaqman

        to quote:

        The BOC/Michael Moorcock
Connection===================================
             Science-Fiction writer and former Hawkwind member Michael
Moorcock
        has collaborated with Eric Bloom on three BOC tunes:  "The Great Sun
        Jester", "Black Blade", and "Veteran Of The Psychic Wars".  The
lyrics
        to these songs have been inspired by, or used in several of
Moorcock's works.
             "The Great Sun Jester" is mentioned in two of his novels:  "The
        Fireclown" (a line from the song), and "The Transformation of Miss
Mavis
        Ming" (this latter has recently been included in a collection of
        Moorcock's stories under the title "Constant Fire" - the collection
        itself is called "Behold the Man and other stories").  Perhaps
        coincidental, but in "The Transformation of Miss Mavis Ming" (titled
        "Messiah at the End of Time" in the U.S.), the character who appears
        claiming to be the Fire Clown states one of his many names as
Emmanuel
        Bloom (E. Bloom - co-author of "The Great Sun Jester"?).
             The song "Black Blade" refers to Elric the albino king,
featured
        prominently in several Moorcock stories (e.g. "Elric of Melnibone",
        "Stormbringer").  Elric was a melancholic individual who relied on a
        supernatural, but treacherous sword for his strength and vigor.  The
        "Black Blade" is that sword, which rules its master, and eventually
the
        universe.     The title of the song, "Veteran Of The Psychic Wars"
was used in
        Moorcock's "The Dragon in the Sword" (published in 1987) -- "We are
the
        lost, we are the last, we are the unkind.  We are the Warriors at
the
        Edge of Time.  We are the cold, the halt, the deaf, the blind.
Fate's
        frozen forces, veterans of the psychic wars..." (from "The Dragon in
the
        Sword", p.68.)  In addition, the line "we are veterans of a thousand
        psychic wars" appears in Moorcock's song "Standing On The Edge",
which
        appeared on Hawkwind's 1975 concept album, *Warrior On The Edge Of
Time*.
             There is an interesting connection between two of the three
        BOC/Moorcock tunes.  One of the lyrics in "Veteran Of The Psychic
Wars"
        refers to "the winds of limbo".  "The Winds Of Limbo" was the
        alternative title of Moorcock's novel, "The Fireclown".  As
previously
        mentioned, "the fireclown" is mentioned in song "The Great Sun
Jester".
             In addition to the three songs mentioned, Michael Moorcock also
        wrote lyrics for a BOC song which eventually became "Feel The
Thunder".
        Although the lyrics were not used, some form of them were eventually
        used in the song, "Sleep Of A Thousand Tears", which was released on
        Hawkwind's 1985 album, *Chronicle Of The Black Sword*.
             Eric Bloom and Michael Moorcock once performed "Black Blade"
and
        "Veteran Of The Psychic Wars" together in 1987 at the Dungeons and
        Dragons convention, "Dragoncon '87".  Moorcock has also performed
        slightly different forms of the songs "Black Blade" and "The Great
Sun
        Jester" as spoken-word pieces.  "Black Blade" was performed in 1977
(3
        years before appearing on *Cultosaurus Erectus*), and "The Great Sun
        Jester was performed with Hawkwind in the early 1980's.

        .....
        side note - I believe Darxtar (with Nik, IIRC) did a spoken word
version
        of the Great Sun Jester..
        "Left behind by the latest trends...
         eating fried chicken with his regicidal friends...
           - "Porcelain Monkey" by Warren Zevon
        ===============
        Andrew Apold
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ispnet.net/pipermail/boc-l/attachments/20000811/c099732d/attachment.html>