Music and Me – Part III

Continued from Part II

 

Moving on from Indian and Bengali music to English music, I was always more drawn in general towards rock and metal. Perhaps it was the influence of my friends which I will talk about later.

Anyway, even in this category, there are songs that became my favourites by the courtesy of their lyrics.

Here are a few examples.

 

This is the first Pink Floyd song I ever heard and made me a fan in a matter of seconds. I immediately started looking for Pink Floyd songs and now have got hold of almost their entire discography. But this one still remains a favourite. The more I think of it, the more the song is revealed to me. Recently, I was thinking of two characters for a film I would like to make one day and suddenly out of nowhere, the following lines came up in my mind.

When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse,
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone.
I cannot put my finger on it now.
The child is grown, the dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb.

I was not aware of this when I first heard the song. But today, those lines will have always have a different meaning for me and will go a long way in developing the two characters in my mind.

 

 

 

This is another special song from Pink Floyd’s 7th studio album of the same name - Wish You Were Here. 

The song is about longingness, loneliness, companionship, disillusionment and lost dreams etc. I later read that the song was also written for the band member Syd Barrett.

So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have you found? The same old fears.
Wish you were here.

There is a theme of lost idealism and selling out or maybe its just me.

 

 

 

Is there any rock music fan who doesn’t absolutely adore this song? I have nothing to say except, ‘just listen to it’. Listen to the guitar solo, just listen to the entire song.

 

 

 

 

Despite being a huge Guns N Roses, I had not actually heard this song until it was recommended to me by a close friend. This song has a very special meaning for me, because I heard it at a time when I was going through a bit of a difficult phase in my life. I was/still am disillusioned, upset, frustrated with the world, the wars, terrorism and the farce also known as peace and democracy. What’s astounding is that this song was probably written in the late 80s and yet it can just be as reflective of the world today.

The song starts off with a famous dialogue from the Paul Newman movie Cool Hand Luke 

What we’ve got here is failure to communicate. Some men, you just cant reach, so you get what we had here last week, which is the way he wants it. Well…he gets it.

My hands are tied
For all I've seen has changed my mind
But still the wars go on as the years go by
With no love of God or human rights
'Cause all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

 

 

Moving on to a soothing song.

The concept of “near-far” is a fascinating idea and something that has been explored beautifully in Arabic/Urdu/Turkish poetry and finds lot of resonance in mystical Sufi literature of the east as American writer Ali Eteraz explores here and here.

Here, this concept is explored from a totally different and unusual perspective – American heavy metal music.

I absolutely adore the last bit from 5:25, the singing by James Hetfield is magnificent after the guitar solo.

So close no matter how far
Couldn’t be much more from the heart
Forever trusting who we are
No nothing else matters.

 

 

Bon Jovi is another favourite band of mine. I first heard Bon Jovi back in 2000 when their album Crush came out with the instant classic Its My Life. That song energises me every time I hear it. But this is a different song, a love ballad, with very soulful lyrics that will always be close to my heart for personal reasons. Its a beautiful song, and you just have to listen to it.

 

I would like to end this post with this absolutely magnificent song Hallelujah. The song was originally written and sung by Canadian singer Leonard Cohen. Since then, the song was covered by various artists, most notable among them being the one by Jeff Buckley.

I first heard it in the German film The Edukators. The song is simply beautiful and one that I can listen to over and over again. It has that soothing/calming power, the power few songs have. I usually listen to it when I am all by myself in my room and want no one but music as my companion.

Maybe there's a God above
But all I've ever learned from love
Was how to shoot somebody who outdrew ya
And it's not a cry that you hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Needless to say, I am a huge Jeff Buckley fan now and have his whole discography.

Continued in Part IV