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Rating: SONGS FROM THE MEMORY OF A FREE FESTIVAL
or "we played our songs and felt the London sky resting in our hands"
"Control tower to Major Tom... Control tower to Major Tom"...
with these famous words, we connect to the universe of the young David Bowie's second album. The boy tried in many ways... he was a mime, a painter, a decorator, a spaced-out mod... one day we see him rummaging through the trash with Marc Bolan looking for discarded clothes from London's most "in" shops, we hear him imitate a laughing gnome, the next day he writes a space ballad about an astronaut lost among the stars (or a boy on overdose?), gets photographed like an antihero straight out of "A Clockwork Orange" or "2001: A Space Odyssey," and works on new and old sounds with Tony Visconti and a very young Rick Wakeman. The sci-fi atmospheres that would later heavily influence the future successes in "Space Oddity" are not yet present, but Bowie's voice stands out unmistakably and uniquely in the English scene of 1969, as he makes strange noises in the fast and frenetic "Unwashed And Somewhat Slightly Dazed" or chuckles in "(Don't Sit Down)." The other absolutely original element that defines this somewhat oddly dressed curly-haired young man is the ability to combine a new country-folk with different, original, critical, disillusioned, ironic, descriptive lyrics and to be as romantic and melancholic as any young man, without any pretense, as in the acoustic "Letter To Hermione."
And if we believe that with the first four tracks we have already heard everything, we're gravely mistaken, because suddenly, from his hat, David pulls out a critique of society, wandering and poetic, as in the nine and a half minutes of "Cygnet Committee"... but this hat has no bottom!: there is even room for the orchestra and the energy of the immense "Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud," perhaps one of the most beautiful ballads written by the future Ziggy Stardust. Following the same wave of folk madness already heard in the second track, we listen to the fun farewell to "Janine," followed by the intimate echoes of "An Occasional Dream." The exceptional expressiveness of this "beginner" is revealed again in "God Knows I'm Good": only Bowie can tell us in such a peculiar way the story of a lady caught shoplifting at the supermarket!
This brilliant and colorful patchwork of country and symphonic images and impressions ends with "Memory Of A Free Festival": it's the tale of the end of hippie ideologies, it's the disillusioned celebration of the last summer party, where the organ bids farewell to Bowie's sweet visions and the sun sets forever, placing its vibrant rays on a fresco where Peter Pan and Captain Hook chase each other carefree, where we talk to the Venusians, where we cross God's land without chains while the London sky rests in our hands...
The control tower is ready to launch into the ether the ballads (and the fame) of a boy who, with a long floral robe and hobbit hair, steps onto the stage of a Free Festival to paint with the pastel sounds of the twelve-string the dreams, images, and characters born of his imagination... we can do nothing but abandon ourselves to these so-playable inspirations and the fresh simplicity of the present...
from "Cygnet Committee"
"It's been a long time
and there is so little new
And when the dawn floods me
With glimmers
My friends talk
Of glory, dreams never told, where everything is God and God is just a word"
(translation derived from www.velvetgoldmine.it)
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Space Oddity (05:16)
Ground control to Major Tom
Ground control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on
Ground control to Major Tom
(10, 9, 8, 7)
Commencing countdown, engines on
(6, 5, 4, 3)
Check ignition, and may God's love be with you
(2, 1, liftoff)
This is ground control to Major Tom,
You've really made the grade
And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear
Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare
This is Major Tom to ground control
I'm stepping through the door
And I'm floating in the most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today
For here am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do
Though I'm past 100,000 miles
I'm feeling very still
And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
Tell my wife I love her very much, she knows
Ground control to Major Tom,
Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong
Can you hear me Major Tom?
Can you hear me Major Tom?
Can you hear me Major Tom?
Can you...
Here am I floating in my tin can
Far above the moon
Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do....
02 Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed (06:12)
Spy, spy, pretty girl
I see you see me through your window
Don't turn your nose up
Well, you can if you need to, you won't be the first or last
It must strain you to look down so far from your father's house
And I know what a louse like me in his house could do for you
I'm the Cream
Of the Great Utopia Dream
And you're the gleam
In the depths of your banker's spleen
I'm a phallus in pigtails
And there's blood on my nose
And my tissue is rotting
Where the rats chew my bones
And my eye sockets empty
See nothing but pain
I keep having this brainstorm
About twelve times a day
So now, you could spend the morning walking with me, quite amazed
As I'm Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed
I got eyes in my backside
That see electric tomatoes
On credit card rye bread
There are children in washrooms
Holding hands with a queen
And my heads full of murders
Where only killers scream
So now you ould spend the morning talking with me quite amazed
Look out, I'm raving mad and Somewhat Slightly Dazed
Now you run from your window
To the porcelain bowl
And you're sick from your ears
To the red parquet floor
And the Braque on the wall
Slides down your front
And eats through your belly
It's very catchhing
So now, you should spend the mornings lying to your father quite amazed
About the strange Unwashed and Happily Slightly Dazed.
04 Letter to Hermione (02:36)
The hand that wrote this letter
Sweeps the pillow clean
So rest your head and read a treasured dream
I care for no one else but you
I tear my soul to cease the pain
I think maybe you feel the same
What can we do?
I'm not quite sure what we're supposed to do
So I've been writing just for you
They say your life is going very well
They say you sparkle like a different girl
But something tells me that you hide
When all the world is warm and tired
You cry a little in the dark
Well so do I
I'm not quite sure what you're supposed to say
But I can see it's not okay
He makes you laugh
He brings you out in style
He treats you well
And makes you up real fine
And when he's strong
He's strong for you
And when you kiss
It's something new
But did you ever call my name
Just by mistake?
I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to do
So I'll just write some love to you
05 Cygnet Committee (09:36)
I bless you madly,
sadly as I tie my shoes
I love you badly,
Just in time, at times, I guess
Because of you I need to rest
Because it's you
that sets the test
So much has gone
and little is new
And as the sparrow sings
Dawn chorus for
Someone else to hear
The Thinker sits alone growing older
And so bitter
"I gave Them life
I gave Them all
They drained my very soul
...dry
I crushed my heart
to ease Their pains
No thought for me remains there
Nothing can They spare
What of me?
Who praised Their efforts
to be free?
Words of strength and care
and sympathy
I opened doors
that would have blocked Their way
I braved Their cause to guide,
for little pay
I ravaged at my finance just for Those
Those whose claims were steeped in peace, tranquility
Those who said a new world, new ways ever free
Those whose promises stretched in hope and grace for me"
I bless you madly,
sadly as I tie my shoes
I love you badly, just in time,
at times, I guess
Because of you I need to rest, oh yes
Because it's you
that sets the test
So much has gone
and little is new
And as the sunrise stream
Flickers on me,
My friends talk
Of glory, untold dream, where all is God and God is just a word
"We had a friend, a talking man
Who spoke of many powers that he had
Not of the best of men, but Ours
We used him
We let him use his powers
We let him fill Our needs
Now We are strong
And the road is coming to its end
Now the damned have no time to make amends
No purse of token fortune stands in Our way
The silent guns of love
will blast the sky
We broke the ruptured structure built of age
Our weapons were the tongues of crying rage
Where money stood
We planted seeds of rebirth
And stabbed the backs of fathers
Sons of dirt
Infiltrated business cesspools
Hating through Our sleeves
Yea, and We slit the Catholic throat
Stoned the poor
on slogans such as
'Wish You Could Hear'
'Love Is All We Need'
'Kick Out The Jams'
'Kick Out Your Mother'
'Cut Up Your Friend'
'Screw Up Your Brother or He'll Get You In the End'
And We Know the Flag of Love is from Above
And We Can Force You to Be Free
And We Can Force You to Believe"
And I close my eyes and tighten up my brain
For I once read a book in which the lovers were slain
For they knew not the words of the Free States' refrain
It said:
"I believe in the Power of Good
I Believe in the State of Love
I Will Fight For the Right to be Right
I Will Kill for the Good of the Fight for the Right to be Right"
And I open my eyes to look around
And I see a child laid slain
on the ground
As a love machine lumbers through desolation rows
Ploughing down man, woman, listening to its command
But not hearing anymore
Not hearing anymore
Just the shrieks from the old rich
And I Want to Believe
In the madness that calls 'Now'
And I want to Believe
That a light's shining through
Somehow
And I Want to Believe
And You Want to Believe
And We Want to Believe
And We Want to Live
Oh, We Want to Live
We Want to Live
I want to live
06 Janine (03:25)
Oh my love, Janine
I'm helpless for your smile
Like a Polish wanderer
I travel ever onwards to your land
And were it not just for the jewels, I'd close your hand
Your strange demand
To 'collocate' my mind
Scares me into gloom
You're too intense
I'll have to keep you in your place
I've no defence
I've got to keep my veil on my face
Janine, Janine, you'd like to know me well
But I've got things inside my head
That even I can't face
Janine, Janine, you'd like to crash my walls
But if you take an axe to me
You'll kill another man
Not me at all
You're fey, Janine
A tripper to the last
But if I catch you standing on my toes
I'll have a right to shout you down
For you're a lazy stream
In which my thoughts would drown
So stay, Janine
And we can glide along
I've caught your wings for laughs
I'm not obliged to read you statements of the year
So take your glasses off
And don't act so sincere
Janine, Janine, you'd like to know me well
But I've got things inside my head
That even I can't face
Janine, Janine, you'd like to crash my walls
But if you take an axe to me
You'll kill another man
Not me at all
10 Memory of a Free Festival (07:11)
The children of the summer's end gathered in the dampened grass
We played our songs and felt the London sky
resting on our hands -- it was God's land
It was ragged and naive -- it was Heaven
Touch, we touched the very soul
of holding each and every life
We claimed the very source of joy ran through
It didn't, but it seemed that way
I kissed a lot of people that day
Oh, to capture just one drop of all the ecstasy
that swept that afternoon
To paint that love upon a white balloon
And fly it from the toppest top of all the tops that man has pushed
beyond his brain
Satori must be something just the same
We scanned the skies with rainbow eyes and saw machines
of every shape and size
We talked with tall Venusians passing through
And Peter tried to climb aboard but the Captain shook his head
and away they soared,
Climbing through the ivory vibrant cloud
Someone passed some bliss among the crowd
and we walked back to the road, unchained
The Sun Machine is Coming Down, and We're Gonna Have a Party...
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