No Subject

I hate those things.  Hate 'em, hate 'em, hate 'em.  Anybody who comes
up with a design like that doesn't look through their CD booklets
much.  They rarely fit neatly into the liner notes slot and folding and 
unfolding these things more than a few times tears them all up.

> The other side carries the lyrics.  The first six are in order of
> appearance on the CD, but then follow a rather wierd pattern.  

Interesting.  There are six songs supposedly included in the video,
including most, but not all, of the first six tracks.   The six songs
on the video are split on the CD by "Song of Solomon."  I guess it's
possible that SoS could appear in the film without a full fledged
video, but this series of songs just doesn't make sense to me for 
the film.   Why would "The Red Shoes" appear last in the sequence if
this reflected their order in the film?  What is the "wierd pattern"
of the second six lyrics?  Where does TRS fall in this order?

> lines unreadable.  They're printed in semi-opaque dark-grey boxes on
> a background of fruit.  All the fruit has been neatly cut in half. 
> Photo credits again go to John Carder Bush / Kindlight.

Kind of a shame that the packaging would be inspired by the least
inspiring track on the album.
 
> Then comes And So is Love.  No real comments at this stage.

Just say, "Great."  That covers it.  This is a theme that seems to pop
up a lot in the album.  Life is hard and so is love, says Kate.  Yet
she told one interviewer that she saw this as being positive (another
one of these deals).  I guess you could say so if you look at it from
the aspect that life and love are hard at times, but it's still worth
it all and still we continue on. 

> I'm still getting used to The Song of Solomon & Lily.

Great and great.

> The title track - now there's one I _know_ I like.  I can't sit still
> during this one (well I guess the story really works).  I just feel
> like leaping about - not club stuff, but a real head-nodder.  More
> Valiha on this one, with Paddy adding some whistles and a Musical
> Bow.  The whistles kinda make me think of Jethro Tull.  I'd like to
> hear this one on the radio.

The whistles have a very medieval feel, like some of Jethro Tull
or Ian Anderson's work.   

> Top of the City slows it all down again (relatively to tRS). 

Slows it down, but cranks up the intensity as it goes on.  The
desperation in this song is incredible.  It's a good thing they didn't
get it too close to "You're the One."  The commulative desperation
would have had folks out on ledges all over the world.

I DON'T CARE IF IT'S RAININ'
I DON'T CARE IF IT'S DANGEROUS
JUST TAKE ME UP TO THE TOP OF THE CITY   

The caps are a must here.

> Followed by Constellation of the Heart.  Again, still working out
> what I think of these.

What's to figure out?  This is, without question, Kate's tribute to
Y Kant Tori Read.  This track might seem like a throw-away at first but
it really says something about the whole tone of the album.  "Looking
at the big sky" is all well and good but at some point you need to
turn that telescope around and look at what's going on inside.  This
album seems to be the product of just such a self-examination.  

> BSL has been done to death on Love-Hounds, so I'll just mention it
> together with an answer to my own question of a few weeks ago -
> KaTe's the one on guitar.  She makes a few guitar appearances, is
> this new?

Wha?!  Kate on guitar?  Are we talking about the *lead* guitar on this
track?  If Kate went from not playing (that I know of) to playing *that
well* in just four years, she may be a goddess after all.

> Much of this is going to take a good few repeated listens to get used
> to, but I _definitely_ like it.

Toldja!

> I hope you all enjoy tRS when _your_ copies arrive.  

Done did.  The CD should arrive just in time for this tape to wear out
completely.  :-)



"Don't drive too slowly."                 Richard Caldwell
                                          AT&T Network Systems
                                          att!cbnews!nrc
                                          nrc@cbnews.att.com