The Waterboys

13.07.2008: Schon klar, aber wenn jemand irgendwo „Waterboys“ sagt, geht bei mir ein 4-Minuten-Alarm los. Hab die Band mal leidenschaftlich geliebt. Mike Scott hatte ES. Wie Hegel sagte: gebt ihm zwei Akkorde, und er setzt das Absolute. Oder wie Ernest Thesiger sagte, in der Bustür eingeklemmt: „Stop! Stop! You’re killing a genius!“

December is the cruellest month
But this time for once my cheeks are warm
After long years in the monkey house
I’m ready for the storm
Let them throw all their cannonballs
Let all their strong men come
I’m ready to go anywhere
Through venom, sick and scum

December isn’t always cold
This year she’s mine and I know why
Somewhere a flower has to grow
For every flower that dies
I’m stricken with fever
But my heart is strong as steel
I’m ready to go anywhere
I can believe! I can feel!

December is a trusted friend
I always recognise her face
It’s a plague of fools thrown aside forever
By her soft and silent grace
She is reckless as a mayday
Gentle as a stone
She’s ready to go anywhere
To carry me back home

December fell deep in the bleak midwinter time
When Jesus Christ howled a saviour baby’s howl
A primal truth as pure as ice
And though we crucified him on a cross
And dragged his words from prayer to curse
He was able to go anywhere
He was almost one of us

How did he come here
Who gave him the key
It slipped into his hand
So secretly
And who put the colour
Like lines on his face
And brought him here
To a pagan place

Now who shot his arrow
How high did it fly
When he tipped it with poison
Did he even know why
What unseen hand
Brought him face to face to face to face
With all this and more
In a pagan place

Come into my parlour
Sail in at my shore
Drink my soul dry
There is always more
There is always more after now
Fly on my carpet
Look into my face
See the heart of man
In a pagan

Everything is rags
And there’s nobody to blame but me
And it would be so easy
If there was no one to hurt but me
But now everything that I do
Coming out of me will just tear through you
In and out of you
Up and down your life like a curse
Cast by the only Son of Rags
Who would wrap you up in all the finest tatters
But he wanted nothing more, my loved one
Than to wrap you up in joy
But it’d never be with me
You and I are like two worlds
Not meant to collide
Death to each other
In the unravelling of time
So tell me how do you… how do you…
How do you… how do you like it
What kind of… what kind of…
What kind of dream would you call it
To have one foot in Eden
One foot in Hell
To be always numb
Plagued by demons
Summoned by angels
At the same time endlessly
But I will
Burn me
Right out of this place
I will lay you down to sleep
So when you awake
I’ll be gone and
You
Will remember
Nothing

There’s a black wind blowing
A typhoon on the rise
Pummeling rain
Murderous skies
I’m gonna take my books
I’m gonna wear my coat
I’m gonna find my scarf
Wrap it around my throat

And you can come with me
Through the driving snow
We’re gonna ride on up to
Medicine Bow

Well I spent too long
Just stuck on the shore
There’s a man in my head
But he isn’t me anymore
I’m gonna find me a ship
Stowaway on a boat
I’m gonna burn all the words and letters and cards
That I ever wrote

And you can sail with me
Where the current flows
We’re gonna move on up to
Medicine Bow

I’m gonna change my colours
Cancel my things
Stop my squawking
Grow some wings

Well I will not sleep
And I will not rest
I will put my soul
And my will to the test
I’m gonna tug at my tether
I’m gonna tear at my lead
I’m gonna test my knowledge
In the field of deeds

And you can run with me
Fast as we can go
Over the hill to
Medicine Bow

Well the dawn it is howlin‘
And the main frame shakes
Feel like I’ve been sleeping in
A cellarful of snakes
My wings have been clipped
My shoes have been stuck with glue
Well if you’ll be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too

I’ve got goons on my landing
Thieves on my trail
Nazis on my telephone
Willing me to fail
They were all sent by someone
Obviously you 
Well if you’ll be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too

I’ve got a bucketful of Babylon
I’ve got a handful of lead
I’m gonna put them in a gun, man
Point it at your head
Because you stole all of my friends and you
Gave me the Buffalo Blues
If you’ll be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too

From the slime on your tongue
To the nails on your toes
From the scales on your skin
To the stains on your clothes
You’re gonna make me have to do something
That I do not want to do
But if you will be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too

My hands are tied
I’m nailed to the floor
I feel like I’m knocking
On the unknown door
Gun at my back
Blade at my throat
I keep on finding hate mail
In the pockets of my coat
I have been trying to grow
I have been cooling my heels
I have been working in the treadmill
I’ve been working in the fields
And I can’t get to sleep
And I can’t catch my breath
I can’t stop talking
and I LOOK LIKE DEATH
But I will put right this disgrace
I will rearrange you
‚cause if you’ll be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too
If you’ll be my enemy
I’ll be your enemy too
Be my enemy

Such a sad procession
Winding down the lane
What a strange impression
Was branded on my brain
A band was playing endless mindless
It was like a hooligan’s lament
It was dumb but it was timeless
I still wonder what it meant

But whatever needs to happen
Let it happen, let it be
Through all I am protected
Grace is effected over me

„Behold the lights of London“
The skipper said as his hands shook
His aura eaten by his jealousy
And all the drugs he took
He said „This is the real world, buddy
Toughen up your ass or it’ll break“
I said „I’m not your buddy, buddy
And your real world is a fake“

The D.J. took his vengeance
As the wedding guests arrived
There was malice in his handshake
Quicksand in his eyes
As he slunk across the courtyard
From far-off I heard a horn
Somewhere in the bleak mid-distance
Something beautiful is born

I stumbled down a street of shadows
A black hallelujah split the night
Anarchists and priests were playing stripjack
Underneath the crude lamplight
I came upon a weeping soldier
He said „I’m all washed up now hush!“
But when I glanced across his shoulder
He held the royal flush

I’m still here, I’m still breathing
I’m who I thought I was or just about
I’ll be walking down this boulevard
Until my legs give out
Thoughts like storms and seas are raging
I know it is a matter of degree
But it’s not the world outside that’s changing
It’s me

Is she conscious
Is she really wide awake
Is she conscious
Of her beautiful mistake
Is she conscious
As she moves among the crowd

She’s got the world upon a piece of string
She’s got the world upon a piece of string, it’s so
He was ugly and she was beautiful
He was ugly and she was so…

Is she conscious
Is she asleep or just afloat
Is she conscious
Of the letter that she wrote
Is she conscious
Of the muzak in her ears

The Queen of Sheba could have shined her shoes
The Queen of Sheba could have shined her shoes, it’s so
He was ugly and she was beautiful
He was ugly and she was so…

Is she conscious
As she sways across the room
Is she conscious
Of the weeping of the moon
Is she conscious
As she leaves the door ajar
Is she conscious
As she gets into the car

I don’t even want to say her name
I don’t even want to say her name, that’s all
I want to sing it from the toppest top
I want to sing it from the toppest top, that’s all
The Queen of Sheba could have shined her shoes
The Queen of Sheba could have shined her shoes, it’s so
He was ugly and she was beautiful
He was ugly and she was so…

Is she conscious
Of the chauffeur as he drives
Is she conscious
As the ambulance arrives

At long weary last
This game is over
The sins of the past
Have fled from my shoulder
The sleep that I need
Is all I ask
In thought and in deed
I have burned the mask
Here I am
Here I am

Enchantment is broken
I merge with the crowd
Oaths have been spoken
Inside and out loud
Emerging from under
Notions of god
In tears
And in wonder
I venture abroad
Here I am
Here I am

Can you walk a smithereen
Can you walk a smithereen
Closer to me
Could you love a thimbleful
Could you love a thimbleful
Harder for me

Encountered a loathly hag
Blood on the snow
She said I’ve a burden to drag
And leagues to go
I left her down by the seaside
In someone’s hall
By dawn’s empty light I cried
To no one at all
Here I am
Here I am

I swing between tears and wonder

I wish I was a fisherman
Tumbling on the seas
Far away from dry land
And its bitter memories
Casting out my sweet line
With abandonment and love
No ceiling bearing down on me
Save the starry sky above
With light in my head
You in my arms

I wish I was the brakeman
On a hurtling fevered train
Crashing headlong into the heartland
Like a cannon in the rain
With the beating of the sleepers
And the burning of the coal
Counting the towns flashing by
In a night that’s full of soul
With light in my head
You in my arms

I know I will be loosened
From bonds that hold me fast
That the chains all hung around me
Will fall away at last
And on that fine and fateful day
I will take me in my hands
I will ride on the train
I will be the fisherman
With light in my head
You in my arms

Anhang: Kommentarsektion Antirationalistischer Block

07.05.2014

ray05:

Sowas von DEIN ZEUCH. Hab’s gern gehört, freilich. Das kam so aus der Ferse, oder? – apropos, “aus der Ferse“, das sagte Madame immer, wenn sie überzeugt davon war, dass meine Aktivitäten zu neuem Leben führen würden. :)

08.05.2014

Antirationalistischer Block / Christian Erdmann:

‚zactly. Scott klang wie ein Freund, der aus dem Unmöglichen zurückkommt und den Weg dahin als einzig möglichen beschreibt. Fersengeld geben, ready to go anywhere im Hagel der Kanonenkugeln, The new life starts HERE. „Und dann begannen plötzlich Türme einzustürzen, begann das ganze Geröll zu rollen unter Aljoschas Füßen“, so you better learn to dance to THE BIG MUSIC.

thequietus.com: This Is The Sea is too in love with open spaces to allow for any sense of boundaries. Instead it brings walls tumbling down, sending light flooding across an often mythical landscape, conjuring spirits, calling out to a universal force. It’s fantastic: for its exuberance, its sentiments, its poetry and its ambition. It’s also fantastic in the truest sense of the word: „extravagantly fanciful“. This Is The Sea is packed with spiritual references […] and there is a joyful sense throughout that, even when battling demons, the world offers an abundance of mysterious magic that offers more than enough to live for even if we don’t understand its source.

But though This Is The Sea is a modern record born of wonder at what surrounds us, it employs a vocabulary that is at times antiquated – never twee, however – and calls upon writers that inspired Scott such as Yeats and Blake, Keats and C.S. Lewis, Burns and Joyce. It rejects rock’s more commonplace language without fear of alienating those unfamiliar with such a style, and in so doing lends the album a charming gravitas and a timeless quality that match its themes.

[The Whole Of The Moon] builds continuously, adding layer upon layer of instrumentation, spectacular image after image reeled off […] until finally it almost collapses under the weight of its own enthusiasm, the sound of a comet ‚“blazing“ across the speakers over Lorimer’s celebratory brass and Scott’s invocation of „every precious dream and vision underneath the stars“.