[ F | Introduction | Song Index | Updates ]
F#NY
F#NY:
Apparently this is short for 'F#Newey', as the song has also been
called (on the Bizarre Festival 1996 Video). # is a key in music
(major) and F# a chord; so this is a new song in F#.
Stevie:
Another Stevie appears in Eleven Years.
'79:
The date is possibly also refered to in Eleven
Years.
Royal Standard:
A pub on Manningham Lane in Bradford
that was demolished around 1997. The 1979 Ruts gig there is mentioned
in several interviews as a life changing experience for Justin Sullivan.
- Justin Sullivan interview with eGigs -
Many thanks to Bob
for pointing out the interview and giving further detail on the club.
The Ruts:
A band Justin named as influence in several interviews. The London
based band that mixed punk with reggae formed in 1978. In the same year
they released their single "In a Rut", a
song which New Model Army used to cover at live performances. October
1979 saw the release of their famous debut album "The Crack". After
their singer Malcolm Owen died of a heroin overdose in 1980, the band
continued under the name of Ruts DC with considerably less success.
- Read more:
All
Music Guide -
[ Back to F#NY | Back to Eleven Years ]
|
Falling
11,000 feet:
Roughly 3,353 metres. In comparison: Mount Everest, the world's highest
mountain, measures 8,848 metres or 29,028 feet; the highest mountain in
Britain is Ben Navis with 1,344 metres / 4409 feet.
[ Back to Falling ]
|
Family
M 6:
Motorway 6 in the north of the UK, roughly between Coventry (near
Birmingham) and Carlisle near the Scottish boarder.
Looking for
family:
One of Justin's favourite subjects (compare BD3,
Dawn,
Family Life, Home,
Inheritance, March in September, My People, No Mirror, No Shadow and
Twilight Home). Justin comes from a
large, and as far as I know, happy family. He has three brothers and
two sisters. His parents were liberal and supportive. His father
Matthew, who died in 1997, was a writer and broadcaster, his sister
Francesca, who did many of the band photos, is a successful belly
dancer in Cairo. In contrast, Justin's partner "Joolz comes from a
dysfunctional blood family, so her instinct was always to try and
create an alternate family. The loyalty to the tribe
thing and hostility to outsiders is very much her. The way I see it is
that there are two value systems; one is to do with tribal loyalties,
like when your friend does something really bad but you still have to
back them up. And then there's the liberal way of viewing the world -
you think your friend is completely in the wrong so you leave them to
their fate. My instinct is the latter and hers is the former and that
contradiction between the two value systems runs through a lot of what
we have done."
- Source: Justin Sullivan in the Between
Dog and Wolf Magazine -
- Read more: Matthew
Sullivan's obituary - Read more: Yasmina's (Francesca
Sullivan's) official site -
Water is thicker than
blood:
Blood is thicker than water is an (English) proverb meaning bonds
between
family members are stronger than other relationships. Connor pointed
out to me that the full proverb goes "the blood of the covenant is
thicker than the water of the womb" and means the exact opposite, i.e.
that bonds formed in a pact are stronger than family ties. However,
while this theory is widely spread online, I
could find no original source for that quotation, and Wikipedia,
Oxford English Dictionary and Duden
(the standard German dictionary) all give the first meaning. In any
event, whatever the original meaning, that is also the proverb's common
use today.
Thanks to Connor
for his comment!
[ Back to Family | Back to Marrakesh ]
|
Family Life
The song:
"In Stockholm many, many years ago, I met someone there on a dark rainy
night, and they told me this story." Accordingly, the refrain's "cities of the far north" seem to be
Scandinavian.
- Source: Justin Sullivan live in Hebden Bridge on 25/10/14 -
During the Q&A session on the noticeboard Justin
was asked if the
song was a nod to Ken Loach's movie of the same title. The answer
was: "yes, possibly but I can't remember. I do remember seeing the
movie when I was young and it having quite an effect on me." The movie
came out in 1971 and tells the story of a young woman who rebels
against her restrictive, conservative working-class parents and has a
nervous breakdown when they force her to have an abortion.
- Source: Justin Sullivan on the
NMA
notice
board - Read more: IMDB -
Family:
One of Justin's favourite subjects. Compare BD3, Dawn, Familiy,
Home,
Inheritance, March in September, My People, No Mirror, No Shadow and
Twilight Home.
Do
unto them as they have done to you:
In his Sermon on the Mount Jesus says:
"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do
ye even so to them"
- Source: The Bible. Matthew
7, 12 - Read more:
King
James Bible -
|
Far Better Thing
Time to wait:
A passage in the bible goes: "There is a time for
everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to
uproot,
a time to kill and a time to
heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to
dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace
and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to
throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to
speak,
a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for
peace." Pete Seeger's well-known folk song "Turn! Turn! Turn! (1950)
quotes that passage almost verbatim.
- Source: The Bible.
Ecclesiastes 3, 1-8 - Read more: Wikipedia
-
It's a far better thing
I do / Than I have done before:
Charles Dickens' novel A Tale of Two Cities
(1859) ends with the words "It is a far, far better thing that I do,
than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than
I have ever known." This is one of the most famous novel endings in
English literature. The novel is about the years leading up to the
French Revolution and the ensuing Jacobin reign of terror. The novel's
last sentence are the dying words of Sidney Carton, a reformed cynic
who sacrifices his life for another man, a revolutionary and husband of
the woman Carton loves.
Thanks to Jochen from New Zealand for pointig this out.
- Read more:
Wikipedia -
Cancer
ward:
Jakub suggests that this is a reference to the homonymous novel (1967)
by
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn about a small group of patients in a cancer ward
in a Soviet Union that is changing two years after Joseph Stalin's death.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Thanks to Jakub!
Personally, I am always reminded of Gottfried Benn's expressionist poem "Man and Woman Go Through the Cancer Ward" (1912), but only because of the title:
The man:
Here in this row are wombs that have decayed,
and in this row are breasts that have decayed.
Bed beside stinking bed. Hourly the sisters change.
Come, quietly lift up this coverlet.
Look, this great mass of fat and ugly humours
was precious to a man once, and
meant ecstasy and home.
Come, now look at the scars upon this breast.
Do you feel the rosary of small soft knots?
Feel it, no fear. The flesh yields and is numb.
Here's one who bleeds as though from thirty bodies.
No one has so much blood.
They had to cut
a child from this one, from her cancerous womb.
They let them sleep. All day, all night. - They tell
the newcomers: here sleep will make you well. - But Sundays
one rouses them a bit for visitors. -
They take a little nourishment. Their backs
are sore. You see the flies. Sometimes
the sisters wash them. As one washes benches. -
Here the grave rises up about each bed.
And flesh is leveled down to earth. The fire
burns out. And sap prepares to flow. Earth calls. -
Translated by Babette Deutsch
Rifle:
This verse seems to be about an assassination or attack, like
All of This, The
Attack and Flying Through the Smoke
as well as Bloodsports, and
Breathing.
|
Fashion
NME:
New Musical Express. A popular British pop music magazine.
The spoilt generation:
I
still think it sounds like they sing "my generation" here. The
Who and "My Generation" were
major influences on Justin Sullivan:
"I
first heard 'My Generation' when I was 10 years old and vividly
remember that it caused me to run around the house screaming my head
off and refusing to 'behave myself'; that and watching Keith Moon on
Ready Steady Go - the sound and sights of musical anarchy was a
completely life changing moment. Fast forward through the Who's
variable catalogue to Quadrophenia, released when I was 17 and the
perfect soundtrack to teenage boy angst. The record remains my
favourite rock album of all time - with its combination of beauty and
violence - the most (and perhaps only) successful marrying of rock and
classical music sounds. Like all my favourite records, I keep it for
special occasions so as not to wear out its magical powers. It still
retains plenty of these for me."
- Source: Justin Sullivan on the official NMA
Site -
Here are the lyrics of the song "My Generation":
People try to put us d-down (Talkin' 'bout my
generation)
Just because we get around (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
Things they do look awful c-c-cold (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
I hope I die before I get old (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
This is my generation
This is my generation, baby
Why don't you all f-fade away (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
And don't try to dig what we all s-s-say (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
I'm not trying to cause a big s-s-sensation (Talkin' 'bout my
generation)
I'm just talkin' 'bout my g-g-g-generation (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
This is my generation . . .
Why don't you all f-fade away . . .
This is my generation . . .
People try to put us d-down . . .
This is my generation . . .
Cut my hair:
Probably another reference to The Who. On their album "Quadrophenia",
which Justin Sullivan calls "a perfect album" on the "Live 161203" DVD,
there is a song called "Cut My hair":
Why should I care
If I have to cut my hair?
I've got to move with the fashions
Or be outcast.
I know I should fight
But my old man he's really alright,
And I'm still living at home
Even though it won't last.
Ch:
Zoot suit, white jacket with side vents
Five inches long.
I'm out on the street again
And I'm leaping along.
I'm dressed right for a beach fight,
But I just can't explain
Why that uncertain feeling is still
Here in my brain.
The kids at school
Have parents that seem so cool.
And though I don't want to hurt them
Mine want me their way.
I clean my room and my shoes
But my mother found a box of blues,
And there doesn't seem much hope
They'll let me stay.
Ch
Why do I have to be different to them?
Just to earn the respect of a dance hall friend,
We have the same old row, again and again.
Why do I have to move with a crowd
Of kids that hardly notice I'm around,
I have to work myself to death just to fit in.
I'm coming down
Got home on the very first train from town.
My dad just left for work
He wasn't talking.
It's all a game,
'Cos inside I'm just the same,
My fried egg makes me sick
First thing in the morning.
[ Back to Adrenalin | Back to Before I Get Old | Back to Fashion ]
|
Fate
I've killed the things
that I love the best:
This seems to echo a verse from Oscar Wilde's poem "Ballad of
Reading Gaol":
Yet each man kills the thing he loves
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!
- Read more: Project Gutenberg -
Coward's kiss:
I think this is proverbial (see also the Wilde poem above), but I'm not
sure what it means. Perhaps it refers to Judas'
kiss of betrayl?
[ Back to Fate ]
|
51st State
The song:
"... a friend of the band, Ashley Cartwright,
... had written it for a local band that he was in called 'the shakes'.
The band did not go anywhere and NMA reworked the music and lyrics
(Justin added the 3rd verse), and recorded it not thinking that it
would become the hit that it did."
- Source:
Chris
Benn's Chinese Whispers - NMA faq -
The song is a reaction against the American influence on Europe in general and America's military presence with Cruise Missiles in Britain in particular.
W.A.S.P.s:
White Anglo-Saxon Protestants. the ruling class of the USA.
Star-spangled:
Like the national flag of the USA
Union Jack:
The national flag of the UK.
Reds under the bed:
Socialists and communists are called reds; the phrase was "used during
the cold war with reference to the feared presence and influence of
communist sympathizers in a society."
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
Land of opportunity:
A slogan usually used for the USA.
Corridors of
power:
The term was first used by English writer C.P. Snow in his novel Homecomings (1956). It has become a
household phrase for the centres of government and power.
- Source: Wikipedia
-
In '51st State' this refers to the Pentagon, the
American Department of Defence.
- Source: German magazine Zillo 6/93 -
[ Back to 51st State | Back to Killing | Back to Master Race | Back to My Country ]
|
Fireworks Night
The song:
"Justin's musical monument for Rob Heaton. The relationship between the
two was rather difficult. Justin wouldn't call Rob 'friend'. Their
problems culminated while working on their album 'Strange Brotherhood'
that took three and a half years! 'We had both lost faith in each
others artistic work. I did not trust his judgement anymore, and he did
not trust mine. Everybody around us wodered what took us so long. We
lost perspective. With hindsight it is no wonder that Rob changed,
because a tumor the size of a golfball grew in his brain.' The tumor
was successfully removed, but after surgery Rob left the band. Only a
few years later Rob died of cancer. Justin bravely sang 'Green and
Grey' at his funeral, one of the major hits the two had written
together. 'It was some kind of death watch and is one of the most
difficult things I have done in my live. It was fort Robert, a great
musician.' "
- Source: Justin Sullivan in German Online Magazin
Uncle
Sally's; my translation -
Robert Heaton
was New Model Army's drummer for 16 years and co-wrote many of their
songs. He died of pancreatic cancer on November 4th 2004.
- Read more: Wikipedia
- Rob
Heaton on the official New Model Army Site -
Fireworks Night:
The Guy Fawkes Night, which is annually celebrated in the UK on
November 5th to commemorate the failure of the Gunpowder Plot, an
attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament in 1605.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Further on than I
ever went:
Possibly a reference to Justin's near death
experience in 1992.
City:
Probably Bradford, which lies between
'hills and moorland' and was Rob's hometown.
[ Back to Fireworks Night | Back to Echo November | Back to Ghosts ]
Flying Through the Smoke
Tunnel vision:
Defective sight in which objects cannot be properly seen if not close
to the centre of the field of view.
Informal: the tendency to focus exclusively on a single or limited
objective or view.
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English - Read more:
Wikipedia -
The
bomb in the bag:
This is reminiscent of All of This as well
as The Attack and Far Better Thing
as well as Bloodsports and Breathing.
[ Back to Flying Through the Smoke ]
Freedom '91
The
song:
Written after Justin took a train trip through the newly "liberated"
countries of eastern Europe at the beginning of 1991.
- Source: Lost Songs booklet -
Another song about the end of the DDR is Lurhstaap.
Dresden:
Beautiful city in the former German Democratic Republic. In World War
II it was almost completely destroyed by the Allies' air raids. The GDR
did not have the means to rebuild or even maintain their cities, so
that even today many places still look shabby and broken.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
Idiot's
gold:
Fools's gold is a substance that looks like gold but isn't.
The caves and the
trees:
Where humans lived before civilisation (caves) and before Evolution
turned them from apes into humans (trees).
121st
Street:
Maybe
this refers to the 121st Street in Manhattan, New York City. It's in
the middle of Harlem, a neighbourhood with a large African-American
population.
- Read more: Wikipedia -
Crack:
A really nasty synthetic drug.
German
cars:
German cars are very prestigious and expensive, at least outside
Germany.
Tinseltown:
Derogatory term for Hollywood with it's superficial glamour.
Malcolm
X:
19/05/1925-21/02/1965. American black militant leader who articulated
concepts of race pride and black nationalism in the early 1960s. After
his assassination, the widespread distribution of his life story - The
Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965) by Alex Haley - made him an
ideological hero, especially among black youth.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica - Read more: Wikipedia -
In 1992 his life was made into a
movie - called Malcolm X - by Spike Lee with Denzel Washington
in the title role.
- Read more: IMDB -
Justin Sullivan explains his
interest in the person of Malcolm X: "[. . .] one of my favourite
stories - certainly I love the movie very much - is that journey, of
someone who starts very materialistic, then finds radical politics, and
then eventually finds something much deeper and longer-lasting . . ."
- Source: Allan
MacInnis: "New Model Army: Tribal Warfare and Western Civilization.
Telephone interview on May 18th, 2008 -
[ Back to Freedom '91 | Back to Lurhstaap ]
Frightened
Ratrace:
A way of life in which people are caught up in a fiercely competitive
struggle for wealth or power.
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -
Pass by on the other side:
Biblical reference. In the parable of the "Good Samaritan" a traveller
is robbed and nearly killed. Several respectable religious men ignore
him and "passed by on the other side". Only a Samaritan, a member of a
group despised by Jews, helps him. Jesus tells this story to illustrate
the nature of Christian charity and to criticise the hypocrisy of a
faith that is professed in words but not practised in charitable acts.
- Source: The Bible. Luke 10, 25-37 - Read more: Wikipedia -
Brand new Britain:
Perhaps Britain under Margaret Thatcher,
Britain's Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990, who cut down social
welfare, privatised puplic companies and supported individual
responsibility rather than compassion and solidarity.
- Read more: Wikipedia
-
[ F | Introduction | Song Index | Updates ]
16/11/14; last update 17/06/17