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See You in Hell

The song:
Lessons of our many years finally learned.
- Source: Lost Songs booklet -

[ Back to See You in Hell ]

Sentry

The song:
Last year I did my first solo record which was a lot of songs about the ocean, because that's what I'm in love with. And sandwiched in the middle of all these songs about the ocean was one about the desert.
- Source: Justin Sullivan at the Red Sky Coven Tour 2004 -

The feeling that it is war but nothing seems to happen might be inspired by Wilfred Owens poem "Exposure" (1918):

Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knive us...
Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent...
Low, drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient...
Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
But nothing happens.

Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire,
Like twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
Northward, incessantly, the flickering gunnery rumbles,
Far off, like a dull rumour of some other war.
What are we doing here?

The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow...
We only know war lasts, rain soaks, and clouds sag stormy.
Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army
Attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey,
But nothing happens.

Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence.
Less deathly than the air that shudders black with snow,
With sidelong flowing flakes that flock, pause, and renew;
We watch them wandering up and down the wind's nonchalance,
But nothing happens.

Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces-
We cringe in holes, back on forgotten dreams, and stare, snow-dazed,
Deep into grassier ditches. So we drowse, sun-dozed,
Littered with blossoms trickling where the blackbird fusses,
- Is it that we are dying?

Slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires, glozed
With crusted dark-red jewels; crickets jingle there;
For hours the innocent mice rejoice: the house is theirs;
Shutters and doors, all closed: on us the doors are closed,-
We turn back to our dying.

Since we believe not otherwise can kind fires burn;
Nor ever suns smile true on child, or field, or fruit.
For God's invincible spring our love is made afraid;
Therefore, not loath, we lie out here; therefore were born,
For love of God seems dying.

Tonight, this frost will fasten on this mud and us,
Shrivelling many hands, puckering foreheads crisp.
The burying-party, picks and shovels in their shaking grasp,
Pause over half-known faces. All their eyes are ice,
But nothing happens.

- Source: Project Gutenberg -

Red earth:
Perhaps an indication that the song is about Africa, like the song of that title?

[ Back to Sentry ]

Seven Times

Seven times sun, seven times rain:
Seven is a significant number in many different cultures. I think there is a weather proverb saying "after seven days of rain come seven days of sunshine".
- Read more: Wikipedia entry on Seven -

There is also a German nursery rhyme, said when a child has hurt itself, that uses the phrase to indicate the passing of time:

Heile, heile Segen
Sieben Tage Regen
Sieben Tage Sonnenschein
Wird alles wieder heile sein.

(Heal, heal the pain
Seven days rain
Seven days sunshine
All will be fine) [my clumsy attempt to keep the rhymes]

[ Back to Seven Times ]

Sheena is a Punk Rocker

The song:
A tribute to one of the "pioneers of dance music", Joey Ramone, who died of blood cancer on April 15 2001.
- Source: Justin Sullivan, 28/04/01, Podium, Hardenberg - Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Sheena is a Punk Rocker ]

Shot 18

The song:
The song treats the same topics as Vengeance and The Hunt.

Thou shalt not kill:
Fifth commandment (a set of ten rules God personally gave Moses for all Jews to obey. See also Ten Commandments).

Slate is cleaned:
To wipe the slate clean means to "forgive or forget past faults or offences; make a fresh start".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -

Christian martyr:
Someone who dies rather than deny his Christian belief and is therefore worshipped by the Catholic Church. The first official martyrs appear in the bible.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Teeth for teeth, eyes for eyes:
Biblical quotation: "And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." This is often misinterpreted as an invitation for revenge, when really it is a warning not to react disproportionately.
- Source: The Bible. Exodus, 21: 23-25 - Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Shot 18 | Back to Chinese Whispers ]

Singin' in the Rain

The song:
This song has been covered many times. The most famous version is probably that by Gene Kelly out of the 1952 movie of the same title. NMA reference this song in Poison Street.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Singin' in the Rain ]

Sky in Your Eyes

The song:
"The song 'Sky in your eyes' is about those kind of people who have climbed mountains, or dive, or exploring weird places or jumping out of aeroplane or go to war. They have these extreme experiences and the banality of ordinary life is very difficult for them. But I am very aware of this. There is a kind of material world and then there are other worlds and I am sort of half in either".
- Source: Justin Sullivan interview with Rock-Interviews.com -

Thousand yard stare:
The "limp, blank, unfocused gaze of a battle-weary soldier, but the symptom it describes may also be found among victims of other types of trauma".
- Source: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Sky in Your Eyes | Back to The Pack ]

Sleepwalking

The song:
Robert recorded this as a demo idea and wanted words written for it. Justin wanted to leave it alone. In the end we got Ed [Alleyne-Johnson] to put some violin on it and left it as an instrumental.
- Source: B-Sides and Abandoned Tracks booklet -

[ Back to Sleepwalking ]

Smalltown England

The song:
This is basically about the same attitude as Poison Street.
- Source: Robert Heaton in an interview with Chris Benn in May 1997 -

50 yards:
Almost 46 metres.

Rock the boat:
Do something that upsets the balance of a situation.
- Source: Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English -

Incrowd:
"A small group of people perceived by others to be particularly fashionable, informed or popular".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -

Nothing ventured, nothing gained:
Proverb meaning: "You can't expect to achieve anything if you never take any risks".
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -

Pint:
568 ml. Here: a glass of beer.

Bowling Lane:
There does not seem to be a street of that name in Bradford; however, there are districts called Bowling, West Bowling and East Bowling, to the south and south west of the centre, with a Bowling Old Lane in West Bowling and a Bowling Back Lane in Bowling.

[ Back to Smalltown England ]

Snelsmore Wood

The song:
If you drive from here down to Southampton and you want to miss the M25, you will go on something which is now known as the Newbury bypass. I haven't actually been on it yet, but I think it's probably only a matter of time before I find myself driving down it. And when I do, somewhere under that road, in a place called Snelsmore Wood, is the remains of my old long hair, that a security guard kindly pulled out for me - bastard. I wanna sing this song as a dedication to a battle that happened there three years ago.
- Source: Justin Sullivan, Red Sky Coven, 15/03/99, Hop and Grape, Manchester -

Justin also mentioned on several occasions, how satisfactory it felt to join the Road Protest Movement, because then he knew his enemies and felt he was at the right place at the right time.

Killing is also about the Road Protest Movement.

Newbury is a district and town in the county of Berkshire, to the west of London. Snelsmore Common, The Chase, Enborne Road, Redding Copse, Tothill and Andover Road were some of the places the protesters had their camps, The Chase furthermore was a nature reserve.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Kennet Canal:
Probably the Kennet and Avon Canal, linking the rivers Kennet and Avon, that flows through Newbury.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Yellow Jackets:
People wearing yellow jackets; very likely the workers felling trees or building roads. They stand with the "Thick Blue Line", i.e. they are on the same side as the police, against the demonstrants.

Thick Blue Line:
The phrase 'thin blue line' commonly refers to the police. I guess, the change to 'thick' indicates that here the police are too powerful.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Snelsmore Wood | Back to 1984 ]

Someone Like Jesus

The song:
I think it's a kind of key song and I think it's the best song that I have written for over ten years. You know when you sometimes meet people who are very good or when you are in a situation that is full of love and good things and there is something in you and you don't know what it is that makes you want to tear it all down or do something really bad or something very destructive. The basic feeling of the song is this darkness we all carry around with us and we don't know why. The last verse is not about me, it's someone else's story.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German online music magazine DocRock before the release of 'Eight' -

[ Back to Someone Like Jesus ]

Southwest

The song:
"Let it never be said that we can't do feel-good love-songs."
- Source: Justin Sullivan in Anthology booklet -

Also, yet another song about the sea, like Big Blue, Happy to be Here, Marry the Sea, North Star, Ocean Rising, Sun On Water, Twilight Home and Wipeout.

A-roads:
Major roads in Great Britain that are not motorways.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Pentire:
A coastal place in Cornwall, in the south-west of England.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Indian Summer:
Period of dry, unseasonably warm weather in late October or November in the central and eastern United States. This autumn warm period also occurs in Europe, where in Britain it is called All-hallown summer or Old Wives' summer.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica -

[ Back to Southwest ]

Space

The song:
The biblical stories are a rejection of God.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German magazine Zillo 10/90 ; my translation -

Should the Devil come:
Biblical reference: "[1] Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. [2] And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. [3] And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. [4] But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. [5] Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, [6] And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. [7] Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. [8] Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; [9] And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. [10] Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. [11] Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
- Source: The Bible. Matthew 4.1-11 - Read more: King James Bible -

Quotation:
Stafford's quote is from a book I have at home. It is full if things astronauts said when seeing the earth from outside. That's also what the song is about: seeing all this beauty from outside.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with German magazine Zillo 10/90 ; my translation -

Possibly (this is what a search for the quotation turned up), the book is Kevin Kelley's The Home Planet (1988).

In an earlier version the quotation was read by a man. Justin Sullivan explained, "It was a professional actor whose name I have long since forgotten, a friend of an associate of Joolz - done because I wanted a voice from outside the band to read this section and I originally felt that it should be a male voice. However we didn't love the result, so we asked Joolz to do it as she is such an emotional reader. Of course I am biased, so we left the final decision of which to use to Pat Collier, our producer at the time. He also loved Joolz' version and so it was chosen to be on the album. I had long since forgotten that there was any other . . ."
- Source: Peter Zych's New Model Army Site -

Thomas Stafford:
Born 17/09/1930. American astronaut who flew two Gemini rendezvous missions (1965-66) and commanded the Apollo 10 mission (1969) - the final test of Apollo systems before the first manned landing on the Moon - as well as the Apollo spacecraft that docked with a Soviet Soyuz craft in space in 1975.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica - Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Space | Back to London ]

Spancil Hill

The song:
A traditional Irish song abut the homesickness of an Irish immigrant. Spancil Hill is a real place in County Clare at the west coast of Ireland.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

23rd June:
Midsummer Eve. The next day is Midsummer Day, celebration of the return of summer. Each 23rd June the famous Spancilhill Horse Fair takes place.

[ Back to Spancil Hill ]

Spirit of the Falklands

The song:
I still think that a lot more could have been done at that time to try and get a peaceful solution. Thatcher was set on a war, and just went ahead with the unnecessary sinking of the Belgrano. It was like, sod it, let's have a war. If anybody told me that they found the song insulting because they'd had friends or relatives killed in the war, I'd say I am very sorry but I still stand by every word of the song. Because the song is, in fact, in sympathy with the people who died, not an insult to them. It's a straight political song against the politicians who sent those young guys out there. And I don't think that all war is wrong, just that particular one was bloody stupid. I'm not a pacifist by any means.
- Source: Justin Sullivan in an interview with the Melody Maker on 28th July 1984 -

The Falkland Islands War was a brief undeclared war fought between Argentina and Great Britain in 1982 over the control of the Falkland Islands and associated island dependencies. Argentina had claimed sovereignty over the Falkland Islands (which lie 300 miles [480 km] east of its coast) since the early 19th century, but Britain had occupied and administered the islands since 1833 and had consistently rejected Argentina's claims. In early 1982, Argentina gave up on its long-running negotiations with Britain over the issue and instead launched a military invasion of the islands. Argentine troops invaded the Falklands on April 2 of that year and easily overcame the small garrison of British marines there. Argentine troops seized the associated islands of South Georgia and the South Sandwich group (1,000 miles (1,600 km) east of the Falklands) the next day. By late April Argentina had more than 10,000 troops stationed on the Falklands. In response, the British government under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher declared a war zone for 200 miles (320 km) around the Falklands and assembled a naval task force with which to retake the islands. On April 25, while the British task force was steaming 8,000 miles (13,000 km) to the war zone via the British-held Ascension Island, a smaller British force retook Georgia Island. On May 2 the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano was sunk by a British submarine as it approached the war zone, and further battles ensued between the land-based Argentine air force and the British naval force. Attempts by both the United Nations and the United States to mediate the crisis at this point proved unsuccessful. Argentine air attacks sank two British destroyers and two frigates but failed to prevent the British from making an amphibious landing near Port San Carlos, on the northern coast of East Falkland, on May 21. From this beachhead the British infantry advanced southward to capture the settlements of Darwin and Goose Green, after which they turned eastward to surround the Falklands' capital of Stanley on May 31. The large Argentine garrison there surrendered on June 14, effectively ending the conflict. The British reoccupied the South Sandwich Islands on June 20. The British captured about 10,000 Argentine prisoners during the war, all of whom were afterward released. Argentina sustained about 700 men killed, while Britain lost about 250. Argentina's ignominious defeat severely discredited the military government and led to the restoration of civilian rule in that country in 1983.
- Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica - Read more: Wikipedia -

I think it is also not completely irrelevant to mention that Margaret Thatcher's popularity in Britain was at a low point at the time Argentina invaded the Falklands. Starting a war once again proved to be an efficient method to distract attention from national problems and regain popularity.

Fight the good fight:
"Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses." is a biblical quote (1 Timothy 6.12), which also inspired this hymn by J. S. B. Monsell (1811-75):

Fight the good fight with all thy might;
Christ is thy Strength, and Christ thy Right;
Lay hold on life, and it shall be
Thy joy and crown eternally.

Run the straight race through God’s good grace,
Lift up thine eyes, and seek His face;
Life with its way before us lies,
Christ is the Path, and Christ the Prize.

Cast care aside, upon thy Guide,
Lean and His mercy will provide;
Lean, and the trusting soul shall prove
Christ is its Life, and Christ its Love.

Faint not nor fear, for He is near,
He changeth not, and thou art dear.
Only believe, and thou shalt see
That Christ is all in all to thee.

- Read more: King James Bible

Horns and tails:
The way the devil looks according to Christian mythology.

[ Back to Spirit of the Falklands ]

States Radio

The song:
"
That was very much a song that I’d been meaning to write for ages. In a way, it’s out of date, because it’s a portrait of Bush’s America. But I think that it still has relevance"
- Source: Justin Sullivan interview with Allan MacInnis -

George W. Bush was president of the USA from 2001 to 2009. He comes from a very rich and influential family (his father George Bush was American president from 1989 to 1993, his brother Jeb Bush was governor of Florida). In the first year of his presidency, on September 11 2001, the Pentagon (State Department of Defense) and World Trade Centre were attacked by terrorists. More than 3,000 people were killed. For the neoconservatives in the government this was a welcome opportunity to try to establish a new world order in which the USA no longer needed legitimation by the UN for military actions in foreign countries. They invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in or because of these wars, and the USA managed to become one of the most hated countries in the world. So far both wars have cost the American taxpayer almost a trillion (1,000,000,000,000) Dollars, that went directly into the pockets of arms manufacturers, oil companies and the like, but left the country with a gigantic budget deficit. National security was also a great excuse to restrict liberty and civil rights within the USA. Bush was also responsible for tax cuts that contributed to the budget deficit and increased economical inequality between the wealthiest households and the lower and middle class. So Bush left a country that was doing OK in a state of fear, hatred, injustice and financial ruin.
- Read more: Wikipedia on George W. Bush and Neoconservatism -

88.2:
This and the following figures are radio frequencies. They seem to be fictional. At least a radio-locator I found on the internet did not list them. Anyway, frequencies refer to local radio stations, so while I did not find 88.2, 91.6, 96.4 or 101.0 anywhere in the USA, there are 86 different 94.7 stations, but none of them weather.
- Look for yourselves: Radio-Locator -

Saviour station:
A Christian radio station. Saviour refers to Jesus Christ.

Obama:
While the tattered flyer seems to suggest cynicism, the "cynicism is not to do with Obama himself [. . . .] The cynicism has to do with time. I wrote the song in October, then the election comes along, and everything changes, to some extent; I have to acknowledge that there's been a change, I have to acknowledge Obama, but I also have to acknowledge that it's a pretty safe bet that when the album comes out nine months on, that everybody's idea that Obama is going to save the world will be slightly tempered. That doesn't mean that the hope that went into it is unjustified. I'm not cynical about hope, and I'm not cynical about the election of Obama, either [. . . .] The right wing religious fundamentalists - the New Right - who thought that they could always use a kind of visceral paranoia across America to get their man in, suddenly found that they couldn't. And I think that's a wonderful moment."
- Source: Justin Sullivan interview with Allan MacInnis -

Barack Obama is the current (2013) president of the USA. He was elected in 2009, and he is the first African American in this office. After the Bush administration, he was greeted all over the world as the man who would save America, if not the world. He was even awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he had really done anything. While he is more liberal than his predecessor in some areas, he of course could only disappoint these high expectations.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Plagues:
In the bible, God inflicts ten plagues on Egypt when the Pharaoh refuses to stop enslaving the Israelites. Amongst other things, God turns water into blood, sends vermin, disease and a destructive hail storm. In the song these plagues are compared to extreme weather events (floods and droughts) caused by global warming. While most scientists believe that global warming is at least partly caused by human activity, this is denied by some, especially American scientists. With their high per capita carbon dioxide emission (e.g. by using air-conditionings and flying (cf. the vapour trails across skies)) the USA is one of the world's largest contributors to global warming. High water consumption (The golf course green) also causes environmental problems. In 2005 one of the most destructive hurricanes in the history of the USA, 'Katrina', occured. The hurricane and subsequent floods killed more than 1,800 people and destroyed vast parts of New Orleans.
- Read more: Wikipedia on the Plagues, Global Warming and Hurricane Katrina -

Kids:
The uniforms and body-bags suggest that this refers to young soldiers who died in the 2001 Afghanistan and 2003
Iraq wars.

Arlington:
There are many places called Arlington in the USA, but most likely this refers to the Arlington National Cemetery. It is a military cemetery, one of the largest cemeteries in the country and close to the capital, Washington, D.C.

- Read more: Wikipedia -

Shock jocks:
A shock jock is a "disc jockey on a talk-radio show who expresses opinions in a deliberately offensive or provocative way."
- Source: The New Oxford Dictionary of English -

[ Back to States Radio | Back to Lurhstaap | Back to Water ]

Still Here

Matthew Hopkins:
An English witchhunter during the time of the English Civil War.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Bloodstone:
A stone that is green with red flecks.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Tiger Eye:
A yellow-brown stone.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Heinrich Kramer:
A churchman and inquisitor (1430?-1505), author of the most famous medieval book on witchcraft, Malleus Maleficarum (Hexenhammer) (1486).
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Jacob Sprenger:
Another inquisitor (1435-1495), sometimes believed to be the co-writer of Kramer's Malleus Maleficarum.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Torquemada:
Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498), a Spanish inquisitor.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Seven by seven, all the ravens:
There is a German fairy tale called "The Seven Ravens" about seven brothers that have been cursed and turned into ravens to be saved by their sister. There are also frequent mentions of the number seven or "seven by seven" in the bible, where the number signifies perfection.
- Read more: Wikipedia entries on The Seven Ravens and Seven -

[ Back to Still Here ]

Stoned, Fired and Full of Grace

Our will be done:
Deliberate misquotation of the "Lord's Prayer", the most important Christian prayer, which says "Your (i.e. God's) will be done".
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Grace:
In Christian theology, the concept that God grants people salvation irrespective of actions or proven worth ("Everything will be forgiven"), because by being crucified Jesus Christ suffered substitutionally for mankind.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Wasted lands:
Perhaps this echoes "The Waste Land" (1922), the title of a very influential long poem by T.S. Eliot.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Stoned, Fired and Full of Grace ]

Stormclouds

The song:
One of many songs that uses driving as subject matter or metaphor, like After Something, Happy to be Here, Headlights, 125 MPH, Orange Tree Roads, The Price, Sunrise, Tales of the Road, Vagabonds, or Wipeout.

Sold to the devil:
It is a common story element that the devil tries to trick people into selling their souls to him for something a bit more valuable than one coffee. (Often the devil is tricked instead). A famous example is the legend of Faust (referred to in Devil), who sells his soul for access to unlimited knowledge.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Great Western Road:
Well, I found a Great Western Road in Shanghai and one in Glasgow. However, there are several Great West Roads leading from London to places in the west of England, among them the A30 to Land's End, which is mentioned in Wipeout, and the A4 to Bristol, which runs through the south of Buckinghamshire, where Justin Sullivan was born. Also, there is a Western Avenue, which is part of the A40, which leads to the M40, which is very close to the village Jordans, where Justin was born.

[ Back to Stormclouds | Back to Devil's Bargain ]

Strogoula

Village square:
Perhaps the village is Pramanta. If you stand on the square in front of the Agia Paraskevi Church and turn south you can see a mountain that might be Strogoula.
- Read more: Wikipedia - Google Maps -

Strogoula:
A peak in the mountain range Tzoumerka in north western Greece.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

The cock crows, once, twice, three times:
Probably a biblical reference. Before Jesus Christ is crucified, his disciple Peter denies him before the cock crows. In the bible however, it is Peter who denies three times, not the cock that crows three times.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

[ Back to Strogoula ]

Stupid Questions

The song:
The title is self-explanatory; it applies to journalists, it applies to everybody. People have often come up to me and said, "I heard that song Stupid Questions, you wrote that song about me, didn't you?" And we say "Maybe" . . .
- Source: Robert Heaton in an interview with German radio station Radio Bremen 4 in February 1989 -

[ Back to Stupid Questions ]

Summer Moors

The song:
"On this new album there's a song called Summer Moors which Sullivan explains is a direct tribute to the beautiful scenery and character of Yorkshire. 'But I also think there's a frustration that creates the thought "we've got to get out of here!" We've got to get out of this small town England sort of thing, you kind of feel that as well."
- Source: Screamer Magazine -

The song ist "dedicated to Yorkshire, brass band and all. It's a personal song. . . it's a ghost story in a sense. It's Emily Bronte. I'd never read Wuthering Heights as a kid, but I had to read it recently and I found it amazing, it's like watching a punk band, there's not a single sympathetic character in it, yet it's utterly compelling."
- Source: Justin Sullivan in The Yorkshire Times -

Yorkshire is the county in which Justin's hometown Bradford lies. Its beautiful scenery is characterised by mountains and moors.

Emily Brontė is one of three sisters who lived near Bradford in the nineteenth century and became famous as writers. Her only known novel, Wuthering Heights (1847) is, along with her sister Charlotte's Jane Eyre (also 1847), one of the most respected as well as best beloved novels in literary history. It has been adapted to film dozens of time (there are even a French and a Japanese version!), Kate Bush wrote a well known song about it, and actor Heath Ledger was named after the main character.
The novel is a love story with elements of ghost stories, set in a beautiful but hostile landscape. The protagonist is Heathcliff, a gypsy boy who is adopted by Mr Earnshaw and comes to live with his family in Wuthering Heights, a farmhouse in the Yorkshire moors. His foster brother Hindley is very jealous, but between Heathcliff and his new sister, the beautiful, spirited, selfish Cathy, first a strong friendship and then passionate love develops. After Mr Earnshaw's death Hindley reduces Heathcliff to the rank of a servant. When Cathy enters into a marriage of convenience with their genteel neighbour Edgar Linton, Heathcliff is desperate and runs away. He returns three years later as a rich man set on revenge. He ruins Hindley (who after his wive's death had turned to drinking and gambling anyway) as well as Hindley's son Hareton and elopes with Edgar's sister Isabella. Cathy dies in childbirth (hence "the church where she lies") and seems to haunt Heathcilff. Still, he has not yet completed his revenge. . . .
- Read more: Full text at the Gutenberg Project - Summary at Wikipedia -

Pennistone Fell:
A fictional place in Wuthering Heights is Penistone (or Pennistone) Crags. A 'fell' is a high, barren landscape.
- Read more: Wuthering Heights Reader's Guide -

[ Back to Summer Moors | Back to BD3 ]

Sun on Water

The song:
In an interview after the release of Navigating by the Stars, Justin said: "The album is concerned with what I like to call 'the other world'.... Nature, emotion, vastness, the whole large cosmos, where single persons are only a part of the large whole. That is why so many songs are about the sea. I love the sea. I need places that imply vastness. In narrow rooms, houses, even in the wood I feel constricted because I can't see the horizon. But there is also another side to it. Perhaps you know the feeling? When I was little, I tried to be very small when I was very scared. For example, when I was outside on a field and it got dark. But that was rather a test of courage than reassurance. Vast spaces can be very intimidating, one feels lost. I like it to sometimes feel small. In moments where you can see far out you can also better look inside yourself. You can meet God, so to speak."
- Source: Interview with sallys.net; my translation from German -

About "Light and Water" Justin says:
"Sometimes I find myself just staring at clouds, sunsets, waves - the endless interplay of light and water. Everything in the World is changing all the time but every creature perceives time in a different way. So some things are moving too fast for us to take in (I mean - how the hell do bats do echo location while flying at that speed?) and some things too slow (seasons, mountains, tectonic plates). But the play of light and water happens in a time scale that we can witness. It honestly fills me with a sense of wonder and that most unfashionable of words, joy, again and again - like the heart-stopping moments of my favourite bits of my favourite songs - which of course brings me back to music, where we started."
- Source: Justin Sullivan on the official NMA Site -

Other songs about the sea are Big Blue, Happy to be Here, Marry the Sea, North Star, Ocean Rising, Southwest, Twilight Home and Wipeout.

Abel and Cain:
Biblical figures who would never walk arm in arm. They are the first and second sons of Adam and Eve (the first people God created). Abel raises sheep and Cain cultivates land. When God accept's Abel's sacrifice but rejects Cain's, Cain kills his brother and then denies his murder. God curses Cain to wander the earth but puts a mark on his forehead to prevent people from killing him.
- Source: The Bible. Genesis, 4.1-17 - Read more: King James Bible -

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Sunrise

The song:
One of many songs that uses driving as subject matter or metaphor, like
After Something, Happy to be Here, Headlights, 125 MPH, Orange Tree Roads, The Price, Stormclouds, Tales of the Road, Vagabonds, or Wipeout.

Get Ready:
'Get Ready' is a famous Motown song written by Smokey Robinson and recorded by The Temptations, The Supremes and Rare Earth
.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

National 7:
I don't think there is a National 7 in the UK, but there is on in France, a trunk road (a major road which is not a motorway) leading from Paris to Nice and on into Italy. The video clip for the song is recorded on a road near Plouaret in Brittany in northwestern France, possibly the N12/E50.

East of Eden:
A biblical place called Nod is described to be "on the east of Eden". It is where Cain is exiled after he has killed his brother Abel. The term is frequently used in literature and popular culture.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

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Sunset

The song:
Dismal attendances, internal fighting, and ludicrous distribution problems here two years ago resulted in a cancelled record contract and a vow never to return to American soil
- Source: Anthology Book, p. 15 -

I think this refers to a New Model Army tour through the USA in 1993. Justin, Michael and Dean toured the USA in 2003, New Model Army only returned there in 2005. In early live versions the song's last line was "Good bye, America".

Look away, look away:
Henning suggests that this might refer to the repeated line "Look away, look away, look away Dixie Land" from the song "Dixie". The song about a former slave longing to be back on the plantation of his birth was written around 1860 and is still very well known in the United States. During the American Civil War (1861-1865) it was adopted as unofficial anthem of the Confederacy, the slave-owning states of the American south. The line even resembles the same words in "Sunset" in tune and rhythm. The simple patriotism of the song ("I wish I was in Dixie, hooray! Hooray!") matches Justin's criticism of American culture and the corresponding lines "Drive away, drive away" and "Coming home, coming home" later in "Sunset" seem to directly contradict it.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Thanks to Henning!

Emperor:
In the fairy tale 'The Emperor's New Clothes' by Hans Christian Andersen there is a vain emperor who is only interested in clothes. One day two swindlers tell him that they can weave beautiful clothes that are invisible to unfit or stupid people. The emperor asks them to make some clothes for him, and while the swindlers get loads of money for only pretending to weave and sew, nobody around them dares to admit that they don't see anything. Eventually, the emperor goes out in a procession to present his new suit, and everybody is full of admiration, until finally a little child shouts: "But he is naked!" Now everybody else admits that they cannot see the clothes, but the emperor finishes the procession.
- Source: Andersen, Hans Christian, 'The Emperor's New Clothes' - Read more: Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts -

Sunset:
The setting sun is a recurrent symbol for the American dream and the settlement of the western territories in the 19th century (cf. All Consuming Fire).

As Jochen from New Zealand points out, Sunset is also short for the famous Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, that leads through several expensive residential areas, its most famous part being the Sunset Strip with many exclusive boutiques, restaurants, rock clubs and night clubs.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Thanks to Jochen!

Niko:
Perhaps Niko Bolas, the American producer of the 1993 album The Love of Hopeless Causes.

R'n'B:
Rhythm and Blues is a popular music genre combining jazz, gospel, and blues influences, first performed by African American artists.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

Fall of Rome:
Possibly a reference to The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, an influential book by the British historian Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). Gibbon introduced the theory that the Roman Empire fell because it had become too big and the loss of civic virtue (strength and industriousness) among the Romans made it easy for "Barbarians" to take over the empire which they had served. I remember to have read (but when and where?) this theory in connection with the foreign policy of the USA, which supposedly become weaker the further they extend their influence on forgeign countries.
- Read more: Wikipedia -

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16/11/14; last update 09/07/17