Boring the Readers of Love-Hounds: A Marvick Tradition Since 1986

[IED0DXM%UCLAMVS.BITNET@MITVMA.MIT.EDU]

    The following are a series of unconnected reflections on Matterse
Katte Bushologicke which IED originally sent off to individual
victims, mainly MarK T. Ganzer. This explains the author's peculiar
(for him) references to a non-existent "I" and "me". Please disregard
those.
_______________________________________________________________________________

Dear MarK.
     As I'm sure you're aware by now, I'm in the midst of making a new
transcription of the complete lyrics, emphasizing their narrative
side, and I've finally gotten almost all the way through.
     I can't get over how terrific Kate's lyrics are. The biggest
eye-opener so far has come out of my feeble attempts to re-structure
the lines' break-off points by trying to keep stricter ties with the
_musical_ structure -- something which none of the earlier
transcribers has ever managed with any consistency. In doing this,
I've been gaining a new appreciation of the complexities of the
song-structures.
     There are very few songs -- even including the early ones --
which follow a conventional verse-chorus pattern. Almost all of the
songs include a third, "bridge" component, and there isn't a _single_
song that doesn't involve a significant re-organization of the verses'
original rhythms and melodic lines in later verses. This is completely
at odds with the tendency in pop music in general, where virtually all
songs follow a simple verse-chorus pattern (once in a while adding a
radically shortened and usually instrumental bridge interlude), and
where the melodic line or the lyric metre is rarely altered by so much
as a note or a syllable.  In Kate's recent songs her shifts and
additions are so significant that the job of figuring out where one
verse ends and another begins becomes quite difficult. Take "There
Goes a Tenner".
     I've just made what I think is a real breakthrough (for me,
anyway) interpreting the lyrics of this song.  For years I had been
confused about what actually happened to the burglars after the safe
blew up and the narrator found herself covered in rubble. The problem
was that if the gang had been caught, then how come in the end they
seemed to be enjoying the money? I now think that the answer is very
simple, and I wish I'd seen it earlier.
     The whole song is about WAITING. "We're waiting, we're waiting."
And it's about REMEMBERING. "Okay, remember;" "I hope you remember;"
"Remember them?"
     Here's my new transcription of the lyrics:

                      There Goes a Tenner

 FIRST VERSE
     Okay, remember.
     Okay, remember
     That we have just allowed
     Half an hour
     To get in, do it, and get out.

 SECOND VERSE
     The sense of adventure
     Is changing to danger.
     The signal has been given.
     I go in.
     The crime begins.

 BRIDGE
     My excitement
     Turns into fright.
     All my words fade.
     What am I gonna say?
     Mustn't give the game away.

 REFRAIN
     We're waiting.
     We're waiting.
     We're waiting.

 THIRD VERSE
     We got the job sussed.
     This shop's shut for business.
     The lookout has parked the car,
     But kept the engine running.
     Three beeps means trouble's coming.

 FOURTH VERSE
     I hope you remember
     To treat the gelignite tenderly for me.
     I'm having dreams about things
     Not going right.
     Let's leave in plenty of time tonight.

SECOND BRIDGE
     Both my partners
     Act like actors:
     You are Bogart,
     He is George Raft.
     That leaves Cagney and me.

REFRAIN
     We're waiting.
     We're waiting.
     We're waiting.

FIFTH VERSE
     You blow the safe up.
     Then all I know is I wake up,
     Covered in rubble. One of the rabble
     Needs mummy.
     The government will never find the money.

 SIXTH VERSE
     I've been here all day,
     A star in strange ways.
     Apart from a photograph
     They'll get nothing from me,
     Not until they let me see my solicitor.

 SEVENTH VERSE
     Ooh, I remember
     That rich, windy weather
     When you would carry me,
     Pockets floating
     In the breeze.

 EIGHTH VERSE
     Ooh, there goes a tenner.
     Hey, look! There's a fiver.
     There's a ten-shilling note.
     Remember them?
     That's when we used to vote for him.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

     There are actually ten verses, not eight, but to distinguish between
the regular verses and the two verses that directly precede the refrains
(and which take a different melody than the regular verses), I've
called those two "bridges".
     In the first and second verses (as I have split them up)
the burglars plan and wait for the right moment. In the third and
fourth verses they make certain it's safe, and enter. In the fifth and
sixth verses they blow the safe up, using too much gelignite, and
the narrator is knocked out by the blast. The noise attracts the
police, and the narrator wakes up in police custody, separated from
her partners and afraid. But she learns that somehow the money
(which means at least some of the gang, too) have not been recovered
by the police, and she will never give them away. They'll never get
anything from her but her mugshot.
     Then comes more waiting: I think the seventh verse is the narrator's
_prison_term_. She's in prison _remembering_. "Ooh, I remember
that rich, windy weather when you (one of the gang, probably) would
carry me (they were kids, I suspect), pockets floating in the breeze."
     And finally, in the eighth and final verse, she has served her
term and been released. She meets up with the old gang and they
play with the money in the wonderful open air which they've been deprived
of for so long while in prison.
     I know that this part doesn't sound too convincing, but I _do_
think that the trick to this story is in distinguishing between the
time-frame of the seventh verse and that of the last, eighth verse: In
the seventh, she's not just remembering, she's reminiscing --
something she'd do if she were in prison and had ages and ages of time
on her hands. But in the eighth verse, the reference to "remembering"
is not about the prisoner's idle memories, but about her experience
_after_ her release.
     She and the gang are "remembering" the _ten-shilling_note_. The
money is _no_longer_current_, which would make sense if she'd had to
serve years in prison before finally getting her hands on her share of
the swag. In other words, at the time of the burglary, the
ten-shilling note _was_ in circulation, and the gangsters were
imitating then-_current_ stars of Warner Brothers gangster pictures:
Cagney, Raft, Bogart, etc. By the end of the song, these are all
history. I suppose many people will have realised all this long ago,
but it's new to me.
     I see that it's still not an airtight reading, but what I like
about it is that it provides an explanation for the apparent fact that
(in the video), though the gang are arrested, in the end they are
nevertheless shown tearing through the streets with the money and
laughing, as though they had really pulled off the heist after all.

     [	|>oug thinks that IED's interpretation of the seventh and
	 eighth verse are incorrect.  He thinks that it is fairly
	 clear that at the end of the song Kate is in jail and that
	 she is reminiscing about better days, when she wasn't paying
	 the price for her criminal acts, but rather enjoying her
	 ill-gotten gains.  -- |>oug ]

     To add more fuel to the theory that the burglary took place in
the nineteen-thirties, I have just discovered what inspired Kate's use
of the looming shadow of the Bobby's profile which appears in the
video concurrent with the spoken line "What's all this, then?"
     I was re-watching Hitchcock's _The Thirty-Nine Steps_, which has
been showing on the Z Channel in L.A. this week.  It is such a
_happy_, magical film. Anyway, I was duly noting all the images that
Kate referred to in the _Hounds_of_Love_ video (the lovers linked by
handcuffs, the chase by foot over the moors at night, the
danger-amid-the-unknowing-crowd-at-a-party scenes, etc.).  All of a
sudden, at the very climax of the film, there was the Bobby's
silhouette, exactly the way it appears in "Tenner", except that in
Kate's video the Bobby's hat moves a bit. The derivation from
Hitchcock was unmistakable.
     I've had quite a run of similarly fortuitous, minor but exciting
little discoveries recently. Finding the lyrics and music to "The Two
Magicians"

      [ Please post the lyrics to "The Two Magicians".  -- |>oug ]

and The Ballad of Lucy Wan"; hearing Edna O'Brien on the
radio last week (her Irish accented voice, which JCB said they had
originally wanted for the reading of the poem in _Jig of Life_, was
exactly the same nearly-"BBC"-English-accent-with-just-a-trace-
of-Irish-lilt-to-it that John used in the recording); the discovery of
the original "Auntie Hetty" in an episode of _The Avengers_; and now
all this stuff about _There Goes a Tenner_.
     It's exciting, but it's also a bit worrying, because it implies
that there's a similarly clear solution to all of the other
countless mysteries to Kate's work, which we'll probably never
know unless someone just happens to stumble on them in the same way.
     Another idea or two, this time about "Suspended in Gaffa".
I can't help thinking that all of the odd characters and images
referred to so obliquely in the song are based on specific sources.
The little girl whispering in between the verses could be "Kate" herself,
as a child, or at least a little girl very like Kate talking to
her mother after having seen the "vision" -- or some kind of
experience of the divine.
     So if the "setting" of the song, or the general orientation, is
more or less autobiographical (it may please some of the Love-Hounds
to hear IED accepting this possibility), and, specifically, based on
some of Kate's early childhood experiences, then what if "half of a
heaven" really is a reference to Kate's own childhood barn out "in the
bottom of our garden," the place of the old broken-down organ which
was the home of countless mice? I've never been entirely sure about
this, but I think that that same old disused barn was later used as
one of Kate's early demo studios, where she would have done some of
her first musical creations.

     [	C'mon Andy!  "Out in the garden, there's half of a heaven", is
	obviously a reference to Kate's 8-track studio, which is
	almost literally "half" of a heaven.  I don't see that it's
	really even a matter of debate.  -- |>oug ]

     Now, if that's an autobiographical detail, then what about "And
we're only bluffing, we're not ones for busting through walls"? Wasn't
Kate so blown away by Pink Floyd's _The Wall_ that she felt that "it
had all been said," or something like that?  Wouldn't that have been a
perfect example of "catching a glimpse of God," (at least for a
musician like Kate, who loved Pink Floyd so much) only to feel it
beyond her own reach? What do you think?  Too far-fetched?

      [	No, this is not far-fetched.  It is obviously true!  -- |>oug ]

     The "they" who have "told us unless we can prove that we're doing
it" could be Kate's teachers, warning that a true knowledge of God (or
maybe just satisfaction from a job well done) can't be attained
through any shortcuts, right? So the "he" and the "she" are people who
have taken shortcuts or escaped their responsibilities to their art in
some way or other -- everyone has an excuse for failing to realise
their early ambitions, so to speak.
     Then couldn't the part about the "plank in me eye" be intended as
a kind of joke? I mean, here the heroine of our song has been
distracted by this thing in her eye (an awfully vivid image for what
is mainly a reference to a couple of old sayings), and her reaction is
to "thank you for yanking me back to the fact that there's always
something to distract". Now, isn't that a _perfect_ description of
Kate's attitude in interviews? Here she is in the song forcing
herself, disciplining herself to "see the positive side," see the
lesson in what is after all a pretty horrible "distraction": a plank
in her eye!
     If I follow her in the last verses, she's _assuring_ "them" (God?
teachers?) that _if_ they allow her back into heaven, so to speak, or
at least if they give her a "longer look" at God, she will _not_ look
into those parts of divine existence that a _still-living_ person
shouldn't see (such as her future, people's private thoughts,
foreknowledge of life and death, etc.): "Don't worry, God," she might
be saying, "I won't get too nosy! I only want to experience that
feeling again, that's all."
     Also in the final verses, I've never been clear what or who Kate
might be referring to when she talks about the "girl in the mirror".
Obviously she means herself (or the character in the song herself),
but is it also a reference to some fictional "girl in a mirror," such
as Alice Through the Looking-Glass? Help would be greatly appreciated
from you or from anyone else who might still be reading.

      [	Perhaps "that girl in mirror" could possibly be a literary
	allusion, but I doubt it.  It just makes perfect and complete
	sense without having any additional overtones.  One's image in
	the mirror is widely known to be focus for many people's
	worries and self-doubt.  As Kraftwerk sings, "Even the
	brightest stars, don't like what they see in the looking
	glass." (Or something like that.)  Kate is clearly saying here
	that her self-doubt often gets in the way of her doing the
	things she wants to do.  -- |>oug ]

take care.

-- Andy Marvick

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From: Your Humble Pseudo-Moderator (Doug Alan) <nessus@athena.mit.edu>
Subject: Suspended In Gaffa
Date: Today
Organization: Kate Bush and Butthole Surfers Fandom Central

Since we are analyzing "Suspended in Gaffa" in detail here, I'm going
to include a snippet and an article I wrote for net.music four years
ago (in the pre-Love-Hounds era!).

Snippet:

And to me it seems that "Sat In Your Lap" is saying nearly exactly the
same thing as "Suspended in Gaffa".  As you learn more and more, you
see more and more you need or want to know (but you didn't know before
about all that unkown knowledge).  And now you want to learn all that
too, but you know that if you do, then you'll see that there's even
more and more stuff you need to learn.  So as you learn more and more,
it seems like you know less and less.  Like you're getting nowhere
fast.  Like you're suspended in Gaffa!  ("I hold a cup of wisdom, but
there is nothing within.")

Article:

["And I'm afraid by the way we grow old"]

In celibration of Kate Bush's birthday, which is today (she was born on
July 30, 1958 -- July 30 is also the birthday of Emile Bronte), I am
posting my interpretation of another song from "The Dreaming".  This
time I shall look at "Suspended in Gaffa".

"Suspended in Gaffa" is about the pursuit of perfection, and about how
this pursuit is so frustating that it can make one very impatient.  In
this way, it is very similar to "Sat In Your Lap" which is about the
pursuit of knowledge, and how that can sometimes seem very frustrating
and futile.

	I caught a glimpse of a God all shiny and bright

.... Kate tells us.  Perfection is sighted, but how to achieve it?

	Suddenly my feet are feet of mud
	It all goes slow-mo
	I don't know why I am crying
	Am I suspended in Gaffa?
	Not until I'm ready for you
	Not until I'm ready for you
	Can I have it all
	I try to get nearer
	But as it gets clearer
	There something appears in the way
	It's a plank in me eye
	With a camel who's trying to get through it
	Am I doing it?
	Can I have it all now?
	....
	But sometimes it's hard
	To know if I'm doing it right
	Can I have it all now?
	We can't have it all

It's so much work trying to achieve perfection, and all that work is
necessary if one is ever to achieve perfection, but still perfection
doesn't seem to get any closer.  It all goes slow-mo, and it's very
difficult to move when bound up in gaffer's tape.  And how does one
know if they are even trying to go in the right direction?

	Where are the angels?  I'm scared of the changes.

In order to get closer to perfection, Kate has to mature as an artist,
which is why she is making "The Dreaming" the way she is, but it is
scary maturing artistically -- just like it is to mature physically
from a girl to a woman.

	We all have a dream, maybe.

"The Dreaming" is Kate's attempt at achieving her dreams.  It don't
know whether she achieved hers, but she certainly achieved mine.

"Suspended in Gaffa" is strange in that it talks about some sort of
crime -- as if someone is trying to take a short-cut to achieve their
goals.  In "There Goes A Tenner", the metaphor for Kate's recording
career is hidden very well and nearly obscured by a story of bank
robbery.  In "Suspended in Gaffa", the two images are sort of jumbled
together or superimposed surrealistically, with neither seeming to be
the surface meaning or the hidden meaning.

	Out in the garden, there's half of a heaven

The money from the bank robbery is hidden in the garden?  But also
Kate's 8-track recording studio is in her back yard (this was pointed
out to me by someone else).  But the 8-track studio is only good
enough for demos.  She needs a 48-track studio to make final
recordings.  It's only half of a heaven.

	And we're only bluffing
	We're not ones for busting through walls

Kate Bush once said in an interview, that when she heard Pink Floyd's
"The Wall", she nearly stopped writing music, because she felt it said
everything there is to say.  (I find this interesting, because though
I feel it is not by far Pink Floyd's best album, it is the first Pink
Floyd album I ever heard, and it effected me as strongly -- it
introduced me to the fact that music could and should be more than
just entertainment -- that it is an art form.)

Is "The Dreaming" Kate Bush's "The Wall".  If "The Wall" is Roger
Waters's description of what drove him crazy, is "The Dreaming" Kate
Bush's description of what drives her crazy?  It seems like a lot of
it is!

	But they've told us unless we can prove
	That we're doing it
	We can't have it all

Unless Kate can convince the record company that her "The Wall" will
be as successful as Pink Floyd's, they won't let her use the fancy
fully digital studio?  Well it didn't turn out as successful
commercially (though it's certainly more successful artistically) as
Pink's did it?

	I'm much more like
	That girl in the mirror
	Between you and me
	She don't stand a chance of
	Getting anywhere at all
	No, not a thing
	She can't have it all

Does her ego sometimes get in the way of working towards perfection?

Well, despite what Kate Bush will tell us, I think she did it!  She
reached perfection even if she doesn't believe it.  Only time will
tell if she can sustain it.

"You'll never have me maidenhead that I have
 kept so long!"

 |>oug /\lan