Whenever the conversation of the greatest guitar riffs of all time crops up, Smoke on the Water is usually the first uttered. It was voted the best ever, according from a 2008 survey of students from music
schools in London.
Despite the riff's popularity, its origin is still something of an enigma. Back in 2007, Blackmore said he conceived Smoke on the Water
after listening to the foreboding chimes of Beethoven’s track: “I
thought [I’d] play [Beethoven’s fifth symphony] backwards, put something
to it… that’s how I came up with it.”
When asked to clarify if Smoke on the Water
really was just Beethoven’s fifth backwards, Blackmore explained, “It’s
an interpretation of inversion. You turn it back, and play it back and
forth, it’s actually Beethoven’s fifth.”
However,
Blackmore's tongue-in-cheek humor is well documented, meaning the riff
may have just been a classic example of “talented guitarist plays guitar
and stumbles on something that sounds good”. Judging by the comments
used in the latest Classic Rock, though, this looks far more likely.
In the winter of 1971, when Purple began work on the Machine Head
album in Montreux, Switzerland, guitarist Ritchie Blackmore played the
riff in their first jam session, and as Gillan recalled: “We didn’t make
a big deal out of it. It was just another riff. We didn’t work on the
arrangement – it was a jam.”
But
by the end of the recording sessions they came up short of material,
and so, in Gillan’s words, “We dug out that jam and put vocals to it.”
Blackmore played his Strat and was plugged into – as far as Gillan could
recall – “a Vox AC30 and/or a Marshall”. Over that mighty riff, the
singer told the true story of how the Montreux casino – where Purple had
been scheduled to record – burned down in a fire that started during a
Frank Zappa concert. And with that, a deathless rock classic was
created.
If you were a WestPac sailor anytime between 72 and 78 (my years) you heard this in every "sailor" bar you went into. And most of the hotels and restaurants. I still remember walking across the bridge over shit river (yea, that's what we called it) in Olongapo separating the town from the base and hearing Smoke on the Water.
This
brings back memories of Lincoln-Way High School in New Lenox Illinois. I
ran track (mile) and cross country for all 4 years. Our cross country
(2-mile) practice consisted of a 5 mile run from the high school down
Rt. 30 into town then down Cedar Road to Francis Road then down
Schoolhouse Road back to the school. I would listen to WLS radio station
on a tiny transistor radio while running. My senior year, I almost
always heard Crimson & Clover on my run. I didn't really get the
words, but I really liked the guitar.
You can find the meaning behind the song here.
At that time there were very few songs that held meaning to me, most of
the time I just liked the rhythm, melody or the guitar.
The legend of the Edmund Fitzgerald remains the most mysterious and controversial of all shipwreck tales heard around the Great Lakes. Her story is surpassed in books, film and media only by that of the Titanic. Canadian folksinger Gordon Lightfoot inspired popular interest in this vessel with his 1976 ballad, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down Of the big lake they called 'gitche gumee' The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead When the skies of November turn gloomy With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty That good ship and crew was a bone to be chewed When the gales of November came early
The ship was the pride of the American side Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most With a crew and good captain well seasoned Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms When they left fully loaded for Cleveland And later that night when the ship's bell rang Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound And a wave broke over the railing And every man knew, as the captain did too, T'was the witch of November come stealin' The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait When the gales of November came slashin' When afternoon came it was freezin' rain In the face of a hurricane west wind
When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin' Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya At seven pm a main hatchway caved in, he said Fellas, it's been good t'know ya The captain wired in he had water comin' in And the good ship and crew was in peril And later that night when his lights went outta sight Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
Does any one know where the love of God goes When the waves turn the minutes to hours? The searches all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her They might have split up or they might have capsized They may have broke deep and took water And all that remains is the faces and the names Of the wives and the sons and the daughters
Lake Huron rolls, superior sings In the rooms of her ice-water mansion Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams The islands and bays are for sportsmen And farther below Lake Ontario Takes in what Lake Erie can send her And the iron boats go as the mariners all know With the gales of November remembered
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed, In the maritime sailors' cathedral The church bell chimed till it rang twenty-nine times For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down Of the big lake they call 'gitche gumee' Superior, they said, never gives up her dead When the gales of November come early
Rare radio chatter between the Arthur M. Anderson and the Coast Guard November 10th, 1975. The last time anyone ever heard from the Edmund Fitzgerald...
This is the last interview of Capt. Bernie Cooper of the Arthur M. Anderson conducted by the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society before he passed in 1993. The Anderson was 10 miles behind the Fitzgerald in the teeth of Lake Superior during that fateful night of November 10th, 1975 when all 29 men went down. Hear a first hand account of what it was like that night and Capt. Coopers theories on what may have happened to the Fitz.
Watch videographer and historian Ric Mixter give his lecture on, "The Edmund Fitzgerald Exploration." This event took place on October 6, 2017 at the Grace A. Dow Memorial Library Auditorium as part of the Library's "Modern Explorers" lecture series.
Below is a documentary from 1989. Not to be confused with the 1983 film. Commercials are included. I don't own the content that are shown in this video. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.
This was probably one of the best documentary on Big Fitz ..all theory very well explained and presented..God Bless the Crew and Family of the Edmond Fitzgerald and all sailors who have lost there lives to the seas....You are not forgotten...God Bless you all and rest your soul...
Memories...I had just entered Lincoln-Way High School in New Lenox,
Illinois. We lived on a small farm, grew our own vegetables and raised
chickens. I spent most of my time dodging work and sneaking off
fishing.
On October 1, 1965, THE BYRDS released the single TURN! TURN! TURN! (TO EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON.
Written
by Pete Seeger in the late 1950s and first recorded in 1959, TURN!
TURN! TURN! was built around the first eight verses of the third chapter
of the biblical Book of Ecclesiastes.
The song became an international hit in late 1965 when it was adapted in a folk rock arrangement by The Byrds.
The single reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on December 4th 1965. "Turn!
Turn! Turn!" had first been arranged by the Byrds' lead guitarist Jim
McGuinn in a chamber-folk style during sessions for Judy Collins' 1963
album, Judy Collins 3.
The
idea of reviving the song came to McGuinn during the Byrds' July 1965
tour of the American Midwest, when his future wife, Dolores, requested
the tune on the Byrds' tour bus.
The
rendering that McGuinn dutifully played came out sounding not like a
folk song but more like a rock/folk hybrid, perfectly in keeping with
the Byrds' status as pioneers of the folk rock genre.
McGuinn
explained, "It was a standard folk song by that time, but I played it
and it came out rock 'n' roll because that's what I was programmed to do
like a computer. I couldn't do it as it was traditionally. It came out
with that samba beat, and we thought it would make a good single."
The song reached No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart in late January 1965.
Another memory from <God, I can't believe it...> over 50 years ago <sigh> Am I REALLY THAT old? It's amazing what memories a song can bring back. I can't remember what I had for breakfast just a few hours ago, but a song from over 50 years ago can bring back a memory so vivid and clear that it could have just happened.
1969, one hell of a year...Graduated high school, scared stiff over the "draft", gained a "Love", enlisted in the Navy and had no idea of what to expect, went to a high school prom - that dress REALLY accented her bu...bre..."womanly" features, began a career that lasted almost 50 years...and lost a "love".
Nights In White Satin by The Moody Blues, one of the few "popular" songs that made it into my "country music" era. The video above, consists of clips of Paris and the famous monuments there, and the band singing the song from a staircase to in front of what appears to be a statue and a patterned room. The video has over 63 million views since its upload in 2006.
Justin Hayward started writing the song after he was dumped by a girlfriend. Remembering a gift a different girlfriend had given him he eventually wrote a song that became a multi million-selling, era-defining classic.
First released in November 1967, Nights In White Satin was a masterpiece that bridged pop and symphonic music, with a lyric ripped directly from Hayward’s personal life – it finds him caught between ecstasy and despair, between the end of one love affair while embarking on a new one.
“There was a lot of emotion that went into the song,” Hayward affirms. “I was nineteen or twenty at the time, living in a two-room flat in Bayswater with Graeme [Edge, Moody Blues drummer] and our girlfriends. I came back from a gig one night, around four or five in the morning, when the birds were just twittering, I sat on the side of the bed and wrote a couple of verses. The only people writing in the Moodies then were [keyboard player] Mike Pinder and myself. He’d been working on a song called Dawn Is A Feeling, which I’d heard him fiddling around with, and I knew the other guys were expecting something from me at rehearsal the next day.”
Searching for some kind of metaphor for his emotional turmoil, Hayward remembered the recent gift he’d been given. “Another girlfriend, who was neither the one that had just dumped me or the one that I was then going with, had given me some white satin sheets. They just happened to be in my suitcase and I was trying them out in this place that Graeme and I lived in. They were very romantic-looking, but totally impractical.”
Shaped by producer Tony Clarke and arranger/conductor Peter Knight, Nights In White Satin became a sumptuous epic in the studio. It formed the centerpiece of the Moodies’ second album, Days Of Future Passed, a dawn-to-darkness song cycle that made full use of the Mellotron’s ability to simulate an orchestra. Topped off by a spoken-word poem, Late Lament, Hayward’s song clocked in at nearly seven and a half minutes. Nights was duly edited down as a single, although not everyone at Deram, Decca’s new subsidiary label, was convinced of its worth.
The song continues to enjoy a prolonged afterlife. South Carolina’s Hard Rock Park in Myrtle Beach has unveiled the Nights In White Satin: The Trip - theme park, a sensory experience based on Hayward’s tune, with on-board audio, digital effects and psychedelic imagery.
So, what's MY memory of a ROCK song invading my era of country and western music? Like it's writer, I felt as though I had been "dumped" by my then girlfriend. I remember I was in the Navy, just out of bootcamp and just entered Electronic Technician "A" school at Great lakes, Ill. On a weekend liberty I went to my girlfriend's apartment in Chicago. When I left I kinda felt as if I had just gotten dumped. On the train ride back to Great Lakes I remember hearing the song and the "low and slow" "Oh I love you oh how I love you." Kinda had me down for a while.
The down feeling didn't last long, in a few months when I graduated, I was sent to California...I learned what "I wish they all could be California girls" meant (I later married one). The Moody Blues and hometown girls were quickly forgotten. It's good that when you are young you can just "push the past aside" and start over again. When you get older, it's harder to just "push stuff aside" and start over. Our character might say "forget it - move on" but our emotions, that only strengthen over the years, say "not yet, give it one more try, maybe something can be worked out". ... It's those strengthened emotions that let us smile and shake hands with one of those things that didn't go exactly the way we wanted it to. How we handle memories adds to those qualities that define our character.
Now when I hear Nights in White Satan, I get nostalgic and remember home - new Lenox Ill., high school, the draft, a girl. Memories remind me that life changes, instead of being sad over lost loves, things that I did wrong or things I should have done or not done, I'm happy that I had an opportunity to just live and add strength to my emotions and build the qualities distinctive to the Pogi Americano.
The Moody Blues perform "Nights in White Satin" and "Late Lament" at the 2018 Ceremony
One of my favorites is a song about a train ride from my hometown of Chicago to New Orleans.
One of the great American songs of the late twentieth century is “City of New Orleans.” The song was originally written and recorded by Steve Goodman but made famous by Arlo Guthrie.
"City of New Orleans" is a country folk song describing in bittersweet and nostalgic terms, a train ride from Chicago to New Orleans on the Illinois Central Railroad's train called "City of New Orleans". Goodman got the idea while traveling on the Illinois Central line for a visit to his wife's family.
While at the Quiet Knight bar in Chicago, Goodman saw Arlo Guthrie, and asked to be allowed to play a song for him. Guthrie grudgingly agreed, on the condition that if Goodman bought him a beer, Guthrie would listen to him play for as long as it took to drink the beer. Goodman played "City of New Orleans", which Guthrie liked enough that he asked to record it. The song was a hit for Guthrie in 1972.
The City of New Orleans was a train that the Illinois Central Railroad began operating in April 1947. The overnight train had the longest daytime regularly scheduled route in the country for a time. The train went between New Orleans, Louisiana and (my hometown) Chicago, Illinois. In May 1971, Amtrak took over the City of New Orleans train. The company converted it to a nighttime route, renaming it the Panama Limited.
After the song “City of New Orleans” became popular in the 1970s, Amtrak, hoping to capitalize on the song’s popularity, brought back the “City of New Orleans” train name in 1981.
Riding on the City of New Orleans Illinois Central Monday morning rail Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders Three conductors and twenty-five sacks of mail All along the southbound odyssey The train pulls out at Kankakee Rolls along past houses, farms and fields Passin' trains that have no names Freight yards full of old black men And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles
Good morning America how are you? Don't you know me I'm your native son I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Dealin' cards with the old men in the club car Penny a point ain't no one keepin' score Won't you pass the paper bag that holds the bottle Feel the wheels rumblin' 'neath the floor And the sons of Pullman porters And the sons of engineers Ride their father's magic carpets made of steam Mothers with their babes asleep Are rockin' to the gentle beat And the rhythm of the rails is all they dream
Good morning America how are you? Don't you know me I'm your native son I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Nighttime on The City of New Orleans Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee Half way home, we'll be there by morning Through the Mississippi darkness Rolling down to the sea And all the towns and people seem To fade into a bad dream And the steel rails still ain't heard the news The conductor sings his song again The passengers will please refrain This train's got the disappearing railroad blues
Good night, America, how are you? Don't you know me I'm your native son I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
They always bring the memories back from a time that as I look back on it now, I really had no "worries" My supervisor or "CO" was responsible for everything. All I had to do was keep my equipment running. ... A time wen we could "Take it to the Limit!" ... And we did.
Eagles Live 2021 "You just can't kill the beat!"
Colosseum: The Complete Reunion Concert 1994 - FULL
I went through my 20's and started my 30's with the Eagles. They were known in EVERY Liberty port on the Pacific. Every bar, restaurant and whore house played the Eagles. It's amassing, how music can make memories come flooding back.
Listening to this stuff, I remember Mombasa Kenya. We had to anchor out and take a whaleboat in...There was no "port" the boat captain just ran the boat ashore. We had heavy seas coming in so we were all soaked when we made landfall. The taxi drivers saw us coming in and lined up for us.
After we climbed up from a rocky beach. I was with 4 other guys, we crammed into an old Toyota taxi. The driver didn't know any English so we made an "eating" motion and he shook his head yes. When he stopped, he said "steak" and pointed to the building. We thought GREAT! paid him and went in. I think it was probably water buffalo, you needed a chainsaw to cut it. Well, anyway we ate and got up to settle the bill, we sent one guy outside to flag down a taxi. Just about that time we could hear a radio playing "Hotel California." Kinda appropriate for what came next...A few minutes later our taxi hailer comes running in, said "the taxi driver knows one English word...Whorehouse... Ya want to go?" We learned later that it was a big hotel "downtown" that threw a party for the ship's company. The food was better and the beer flowed. And the Eagles was played.
"You just can't kill the beat!"
And where would we be without...
Hotel California
Or
Take It to the Limit (Live at The Forum, Los Angeles, CA, 10/20-22/1976)
What a haunting sax...they don't make music like this anymore. It's funny how you can hear a tune and it can transport you over decades to a place you barely recognize anymore.
Most people remember “Baker Street” for its wailing saxophone, and I was for many years no different. But at some point — a few years after I left the Navy — I began to pay attention to the song’s lyrics. They go like this:
Winding your way down on Baker Street Light in your head and dead on your feet Well, another crazy day You'll drink the night away And forget about everything
This city desert makes you feel so cold It's got so many people, but it's got no soul And it's taken you so long To find out you were wrong When you thought it held everything
You used to think that it was so easy You used to say that it was so easy But you're trying, you're trying now
Another year and then you'd be happy Just one more year and then you'd be happy But you're crying, you're crying now
Way down the street there's a light in his place He opens the door, he's got that look on his face And he asks you where you've been You tell him who you've seen And you talk about anything
He's got this dream about buying some land He's gonna give up the booze and the one-night stands And then he'll settle down In some quiet little town And forget about everything
But you know he'll always keep moving You know he's never gonna stop moving 'Cause he's rolling, he's the rolling stone And when you wake up, it's a new morning The sun is shining, it's a new morning And you're going, you're going home
The first few lines could have been written to describe me.
Light in your head and dead on your feet Well, another crazy day You'll drink the night away And forget about everything
That was me, I was drinking my nights away at a tavern across the street from my apartment. I didn't have a "care in the world" because I just didn't care about anything. Just work, drink, sleep, then repeat.
I was in San Diego, where "it was happening" whatever "it" was. But I didn't see it. It wasn't happening to me nor was "it" any part of my life.
This city desert makes you feel so cold It's got so many people, but it's got no soul And it's taken you so long To find out you were wrong When you thought it held everything
When I got out of the Navy I landed a really good job, it payed very well and I had medical benefits. I also had a nice place to live. I thought it would be easy to transition into civilian life. It wasn't. I suffered from PTSD and drank myself to sleep every night to keep from having nightmares. ... I kept telling myself it was easy, and in another year, I'll be happy.
You used to think that it was so easy You used to say that it was so easy But you're trying, you're trying now
Another year and then you'd be happy Just one more year and then you'd be happy But you're crying, you're crying now
The rest could be about my friend Chris. The "place" was Jimmy's Bar and Grill across the street from my apartment, where I spent most of my nights. Chris was the night bartender.
Way down the street there's a light in his place He opens the door, he's got that look on his face And he asks you where you've been You tell him who you've seen And you talk about anything
He's got this dream about buying some land He's gonna give up the booze and the one-night stands And then he'll settle down In some quiet little town And forget about everything
you know he'll always keep moving
You know he's never gonna stop moving 'Cause he's rolling, he's the rolling stone And when you wake up, it's a new morning The sun is shining, it's a new morning And you're going, you're going home
Happily, my life changed one night when an old friend, Walter happened by and we talked ...Well, he talked and I drank for a couple of hours. Walter made sure I got home that night and as he turned to leave he dropped my keys on my chest, shook his head and said "I knew you when you were good." His last line stuck with me. It made me to want to get better and do something with my life.
Sometimes I think back on those days, mostly when I hear a song from that era or see an old picture. It is kind of haunting, difficult to ignore and forget. Not the best time of my life, a time I wish I could forget, a time I wish never happened. I guess that's why the wailing saxophone effects me so much.
It's stuff like this that brings you back to your roots. It brought back memories of visiting my Grand Parents in Chicago. Trips to the Amphitheater once a year for the International Car Show. The big Sears store and "Monkey-Ward". Zales, White Castle, all the "Old Style" tavern signs, the Field Museum and Museum of Science and Industry. Big buildings lots of people and traffic.
Several kinds of "streetcars" and buses and the "L" train through the city. And my weekend train trips from Great Lakes Naval Station through the Northwest train station then a walk through downtown to the LaSalle Street Station for my train to New Lenox.
Probably most of that stuff is gone. It's kind of sad, it's "progress" - I know, but it's still sad that the things that make something unique and stick in your memory are the first things that disappear. But the music lives on forever.
This is what happens when you put the 5 best guitar players in the world together in the same room (Buddy Guy, Eric Clapton, Johnny Winter, Robert Cray, Hubert Sumlin). They fight over who plays lead guitar in - "Sweet Home Chicago" Buddy Guy stole this show, Eric was just another guitar player. HA! can you even imagine Eric - justanother guitar player?
"Sweet Home Chicago" is a popular blues standard in the twelve bar form. It was first recorded and is credited to have been written by Robert Johnson. Over the years the song has become one of the most popular anthems for the city of Chicago despite ambiguity in Johnson's original lyrics.
Look who came to this party of "Who's Who" of the Blues ...
Buddy Guy gets President Obama to sing a verse of Sweet Home Chicago! ... I think "New Orleans" just dropped off into the gulf of Mexico.
Finale Performance of "Sweet Home Chicago" featuring Eric Clapton, Bonnie Raitt, James Taylor, members of Earth, Wind & Fire, Lovin' Spoonful, Robbie Robertson and Melissa Etheridge at the 2000 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony.
Led Zeppelin was given tribute at the Kennedy Center Honors on December 2, 2012. It was televised on Dec. 26, 2012. Jack Black introduced the band and the performers include The Foo Fighters, Kid Rock, Lenny Kravitz, and Heart. ALL amazing performances.
Whoever arranged that version of Stairway to Heaven deserves an award .. absolutely incredible. To bring the great Robert Plant, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones to tears with their own song is an amazing feat! Could only have been done by another legend of rock history - Heart - Ann and Nancy Wilson!
In the '70s a day didn't pass aboard ship without hearing "Stairway". ONLY Ann Wilson of Heart could do justice to Stairway to Heaven. No words great enough to describe the phenomenal performance at the Kennedy Center Honors! Her voice is truly a gift from God.
"Stairway to Heaven" is a song by English rock band Led Zeppelin, released in late 1971. It was composed by the band's guitarist Jimmy Page and lead singer Robert Plant for their untitled fourth studio album (often titled Led Zeppelin IV). The song is widely regarded as one of the greatest rock songs of all time.
The song has three sections, each one progressively increasing in tempo and volume. The song begins in a slow tempo with acoustic instruments (guitar and recorders) before introducing electric instruments. The final section is an uptempo hard rock arrangement, highlighted by Page's guitar solo and Plant's vocals, which ends with the plaintive a cappella line: "And she's buying a stairway to heaven."
"Stairway to Heaven" was voted number three in 2000 by VH1 on its list of the 100 Greatest Rock Songs, in 2004 Rolling Stone magazine ranked "Stairway to Heaven" number 31 on its list of "500 Greatest Songs of All Time". It was the most requested song on FM radio stations in the United States at the time, despite never having been commercially released as a single in the US. In November 2007, through download sales promoting Led Zeppelin's Mothership release, "Stairway to Heaven" reached number 37 on the UK Singles Chart.
I don't know why I'm listening to this tonight. It brings back many memories of my time in the Navy and shortly after I got out. There's a lot of controversy over what it means. I don't know if the band - Procol Harum - has ever come out and said what it means. If you go to "Song Meaning and Facts" you might find something you like. Personally, I think it was written by a guy who just got word he was shipping out in the morning. ...
This is one of my favorite renditions of Whiter Shade of Pale - Procol Harum performing A Whiter Shade of Pale with the Danish National Concert Orchestra and choir at Ledreborg Castle, Denmark in August 2006.
As far as hits go, no song could have asked for a bigger success than “A Whiter Shade of Pale”. It came out as part of Procol Harum’s debut album, which itself is entitled Procol Harum. And the track reached number 1 in nearly 15 different countries, including most notably the UK Singles Chart.
After topping the Dutch Top 40 in 1967, it went on to also do the same on the Netherlands’ Single Top 100 in 1972, having also recharted on the UK Singles Chart that year. Additionally it reached number 5 on the Billboard Hot 100, despite receiving limited promotion in the United States.
I never paid much attention to the words until I got out and sober. I just liked the melody. Then I heard it while sitting in my chair one evening, just thinking about stuff and the words started to talk to me.
I remember hearing it on my last night ashore in Alemeda Caifornia, Looking back I realized it’s significance. It was a perfect accompaniment to my last night ashore in the US, on my way to my first WestPac cruse to Vietnam. I was celebrating what could have been my last night in the US.
“We danced the light fandango, did cartwheels ‘cross the floor….”
I was celebrating with my fellow shipmates our newfound definition of Manhood. We were Sailors, going to war.
“I was feeling kind of seasick…”
Then we started thinking about the seriousness of this phase of our life and were beginning to have second thoughts.
“But the crowd called out for more…”
Come ON, MAN! You’re a HERO! The crowd recognizes where you are going as they gaze at your uniform. They cheer you on!
“And the room, it started spinning and the ceiling flew away….”
This is a done deal, and I’m GOING and have absolutely no control over this.
“But they called out for another drink and the Waiter brought the tray…”
It might be our last night on this earth, so drink up and celebrate this night.
“And it wasn’t until later when the Miller told his tale, that her face at once just ghostly turned a Whiter shade of pale…”
It wasn’t until we truly understood where we were going and what we would be doing that the horror of it became clear. And this was long after we’d returned.
“She said there is no reason, and the truth is plain to see….”
We arrived there, and realized the insanity of war and the brutal fact that we were a part of it. We were there, trying to kill them, as they tried to kill us, neither truly understanding why. But we were there. This was happening.
“But I wandered through my playing cards and would not let her be…”
Unfortunately, war becomes normalized, and a deck of cards represents the chances one takes in its execution. Is tonight the night? Is this my last patrol?
”One of sixteen vestal virgins who were headed for the coast…”
Could I have decided to go somewhere else?
“And my eyes were opened wide, though they might as well have been closed….”
Now I’m starting to see the madness in all of this; the destruction and the terror of it all. But it’s too late. I’m here and I have a duty to perform.
“And it wasn’t until later when the Miller told his tale, that her face at once just ghostly, turned a Whiter shade of pale….”
And now I must live with these memories.
As I look back on it, while listening to the music, I realize that I was at that party that so many of us can't get out of our head. You never forget the party beforehand nor the death and destruction afterward. Today I heard that Russia was conscripting all it's men into military service. It's really a sad state for any country to do something like that. We, the US had it in the 60's for Vietnam. The "normal" people rioted in the streets, burned buildings, they beat those who wore the uniform and dumped trash on them.
Today, over 50 years later, the "normal" people think of Whiter Shade of Pale" as a Blues song. It's good, the present generation doesn't have to live through what we did...But, then again, I can hear my Dad a World War 2 Veteran, saying the same thing. Won't we ever learn?
Sometimes I feel like getting a Whiter Shade of Pale, just to numb my mind, heart and soul to war and it's death and destruction.
Procol Harum - a white shade of pale, at Gala du Midem 1968
