Embarcacao - The Vessel: Thank you!!

Sometimes a distant dream comes true at a time when you least expect it.  To a post written in 2007, on the 10th of October, 2010 (10/10/10 - what a lovely number!) Tam Aham Brumi Brahmanam wrote a translation of Embarcacao.  I hope to reproduce his efforts here to give justice to one of the most deeply beautiful songs ever written.

Embarcacao
The Vessel

Ai, ness mundo ca tem sô sofrimento

Oh, in this world here there is only suffering
Ma naquel olhar cheio di mágoa
But in that stare full of sadness
Modê crê tão cedo na felecidade
For believing so soon in happiness
Tcheu titá fogá na solidão
Something that is drowning in deep loneliness

Ma na embarcação quta levá nôs vida
But in the vessel that takes our lives
Um bom timonero nô ta desejá, pa guiá-no
We hope for a good helmsman to take us
Na temporal nô ta reá vela
Through the storm and pull down our sails
Pa nô ca perdê na profundeza dum amargura
So we will not be lost in the deepness of a sorrow


Terra longe à vista é um doce promessa
The desired land seen so far is a sweet promise
Ma qui ta desfazê nindiferença
But it is not making no difference
Um sonho nascê na porto dilusão
Because a dream is born in the port of illusions
Fgi pa longe parcê um solução
Fly away to a far place seems to be a solution


Ma na rota incerta di nôs destino
But in the uncertain route that is our fate
Nô ta pô esperança num brisa mansa e constante
We are putting our hopes on a sweet and constant breeze


Pintchi vela dnôs existencia
That blows the sails of our existence
E na paz levá, assim, nôs nau
And so in peace takes our vessel
Pum horizonte cheio di luz e bonança
Towards a horizon full of light and peaceful feelings


Pintchi vela dnôs existencia
That blows the sails of our existence
E na paz levá, assim, nôs nau
And so in peace takes our vessel
Pum horizonte di luz e bonança
Towards a horizon full of light and peaceful feelings

Stateless - Bloodstream

You need to be in an ice-cold room with a roaring fireplace, wrapped in furs, sipping a whisky glass filled with ice-cubes and a very good shot of espresso, listening to this.

Stateless - Bloodstream
Wake up, look me in the eyes again
I need to feel your hand upon my face
Words can be like knives
They can cut you open
And the silence surrounds you
And haunts you

I think I might have inhaled you
I could feel you behind my eyes
You've gotten into my bloodstream
I can feel you floating in me

Words can be like knives
They can cut you open
And the silence surrounds you
And haunts you

 I think I might have inhaled you
I could feel you behind my eyes
You've gotten into my bloodstream
I can feel you floating in me

The spaces in between
Two minds, and all the places they've been
I've tried to put my finger on it
I've tried to put my finger on it

I think I might have inhaled you
I could feel you behind my eyes
You've gotten into my bloodstream
I can feel you floating in me

Song for Whoever: Unplayed Piano

A beautiful, beautiful, beautiful song!  One of those lovely collaborations between two of my favourite artists who really should be me and you in another rambling life.

Incredibly poignant... further research shows it was for/about Aung San Suu Kyi.

Unplayed Piano - Damien Rice & Lisa Hannigan
Come and see me
Sing me to sleep
Come and free me
Or hold me if I need to weep

Or maybe it's not the season
Or maybe it's not the year
Or maybe there's no good reason
Why I'm locked up inside
Just 'cause they wanna hide me

The moon goes bright
The darker they make my night

Unplayed pianos
Are often by a window
In a room where nobody loved goes
She sits alone with her silent song
Somebody bring her home

Unplayed piano (unplayed piano)
Still holds a tune (still holds a tune)
Lock on the lid (years, years pass by)
In a stale, stale room (in the changing of the moon)
Maybe it's not that easy (too many windows)
Or maybe it's not that hard (in a stale, stale room)
Maybe they could release me (stale, stale room)

Let the people decide
I've got nothing to hide
I've done nothing wrong
So why've I been here so long?

Unplayed pianos
Are often by a window
In a room where nobody loved goes
She sits alone with her silent song
Somebody bring her home
Unplayed pianos
Are often by a window
In a room where nobody loved goes
She sits alone with her silent song
Somebody bring her home

Unplayed piano (unplayed piano)
Still holds a tune
Years pass by
In the changing of the moon

Parachute - Cheryl Cole

Probably the only correctly captured version of this music video available on the net.  Forget about going to YouTube, the recordings of the videos are jinxed.

Just absolutely adore the dance and sync of imagery (costumes, movements, photography) used with the music.


Cheryl Cole - Parachute on muzu.tv

The Music Challenge: The Beautiful South

The Challenge: Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these questions. Try not to repeat a song title. It's a lot harder than you think.

Name of Artist: Beautiful South (who'd have thought!)

• Are you male or female: Girlfriend
• Describe yourself: You Keep It All In
• How do you feel about yourself: We Are Each Other
• Describe where you currently live: Alone
• If you could go anywhere, where would you go: Rotterdam (Or Anywhere)
• Your favorite form of transportation: I'll Sail this Ship Alone
• Your best friend is: From Under the Covers
  Your favorite color is: Little Blue
• What's the weather like: Bell Bottomed Tear
• Favorite time of day: Perfect 10
• If your life was a TV show, what would it be called: Don't Marry Her
• What is life to you: My Book
• What is the best advice you have to give: Let Go With the Flow
• If you could change your name, what would it be: Song for Whoever
• Your favorite food is: Good as Gold (Stupid as Mud)
• Thought for the Day: Baby Please Go
• How I would like to die: Straight in at 37

Language or the Kiss Reprise

As I navigate through the honey of her voice, I finally realise what she was talking about (doh!). And I don't know why but that dichotomy did not strike me until now. I've always seen language as expression, without thinking that the kiss expressed differently from language. But my mind was so blocked I never got it why there would be a choice between the two - my poetry being different from your dance.

Between the language or the kiss
I know I choose to think, to speak, to watch,
To learn, to philosophize, to dream, to envy.
And I'd wish, for you, if I could choose,
To do. To act, to move, to declare, to not
lose
The chances you would miss:
"Unforgiving the choice still is,
The language or the kiss".

Our choices make our choices. I know this now as well as I did then, and yet, knowing what I know, I would still end up gravitating towards making the choices I knew I would make. If we knew we wouldn't choose anything different, and our choices make our choices, do we really have a choice?

Pink and Glitter

Definitely my song for this winter... this must be the only song that Tori's ever done in jazzy, big band style which isn't really her, but I'm loving it! It's soft, it's feminine, it's pink, it's big band, it's jazzy, it's coy, it's cute, it's coquettish... what's there not to like?



Having a little girl really mellowed and added a new dimension to her views on being a woman. At the same time, I must be getting old.

Tori Amos - Pink and Glitter

"Darn Roses", that is what you call all the girls in the world, even the
thorns
You’re surrounded by an army of two who adore you

Our joy isn’t about a present or a grown up motor toy
And little boys all get an honorable mention from me
But this year I’m thinking
Shower the world
Shower the world
Shower the world with pink if you please
Shower the world
Shower the world
Shower the world... with pink.

Black satin, is what I wore
That, and our hearts left on the floor
How was I in that marshmallow snow, to know?
My life would change that night?

In pink, we will paint the town
Champagne never looked so divine
On his lips the sweetest words “Love, you’ve given me quite a ride.”

I'm already living the next decade of my life...

On May 4th a year ago, I wrote about the soundtrack of my life. It's odd how a year or so down the road and it feels that the next decade of my life has begun, but not as a slow transition as you would expect numbers to... moving from one to nine, but as a harsh cutover from 20 to 30.

It's not too bad the next decade, filled with mellow sounds of 70's music and progressing back slightly to angst ridden Robbie Williams with a touch of frost. Not so much beauty in depression than been-there-done-that-sweetheart wisdom.

30's - 40's soundtrack of life would be:-

1. Carpenters - We've Only Just Begun
2. Robbie Williams - Strong
3. James Morrison - Wonderful World
4. Carpenters - Goodbye to Love
5. Tori Amos - Take Me With You

This place has given me very much. But most of all a dream of mellow country flowers, a flavour of food... and a settling of the restlessness of youth that I haven't fully come to terms with.

What About Now?

One of my favourite music videos (link in title):

Daughtry - What About Now?

Shadows fill an empty heart
As love is fading,
From all the things that we are
But are not saying.

Can we see beyond the scars
And make it to the dawn?

Change the colors of the sky.
And open up to
The ways you made me feel alive,
The ways I loved you.

For all the things that never died,
To make it through the night,
Love will find you.

What about now?
What about today?
What if you're making me all that I was meant to be?
What if our love never went away?
What if it's lost behind words we could never find?
Baby, before it's too late,
What about now?

The sun is breaking in your eyes
To start a new day.
This broken heart can still survive
With a touch of your grace.

Shadows fade into the light.
I am by your side,
Where love will find you.

What about now?
What about today?
What if you're making me all that I was meant to be?
What if our love had never went away?
What if it's lost behind words we could never find?
Baby, before it's too late,
What about now?

Now that we're here,
Now that we've come this far,
Just hold on.

There is nothing to fear,
For I am right beside you.
For all my life,I am yours.

What about now?
What about today?
What if you're making me all that I was meant to be?
What if our love had never went away?
What if it's lost behind words we could never find?

What about now?
What about today?
What if you're making me all that I was meant to be?
What if our love had never went away?
What if it's lost behind words we could never find?
Baby, before it's too late,
Baby, before it's too late,
Baby, before it's too late,
What about now?

History of Us

Indigo Girls - History of Us,
originally uploaded by metaphoric.

Revisiting an old, favourite song.

So we must love
While these moments are still called "today"
Take part
in the pain of this passion play
Stretch our youth as we must,
Until we
are ashes... to dust.
Until time makes
History of us

Although I didn't go all the way to Paris, I might have gone all the way to Prague.

Interestingly, this song's evocation keyword was "Leonardo da Vinci".

Run

Shame it took Leona Lewis to bring this song to my attention. Thank you Snow Patrol - I want you in a car with me on a long, straight road to infinity. I want you lying next to me, staring at a blank canvas ceiling, doing absolutely nothing.

I'll sing it one last time for you
Then we really have to go
You've been the only thing that's right
In all I've done

And I can barely look at you
But every single time I do
I know we'll make it anywhere
Away from here

Light up, light up
As if you have a choice
Even if you cannot hear my voice
I'll be right beside you dear

Louder louder
And we'll run for our lives
I can hardly speak I understand
Why you can't raise your voice to say

To think I might not see those eyes
Makes it so hard not to cry
And as we say our long goodbye
I nearly do

Light up, light up
As if you have a choice
Even if you cannot hear my voice
I'll be right beside you dear

Louder louder
And we'll run for our lives
I can hardly speak I understand
Why you can't raise your voice to say

Slower slower
We don't have time for that
All I want is to find an easier way
To get out of our little heads

Have heart my dear
We're bound to be afraid
Even if it's just for a few days
Making up for all this mess

How happy is the blameless Vestal's lot!

How happy is the blameless Vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.
- Alexander Pope

So I finally managed to catch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on the telly. I was given a really good review of the movie, and I think, although surreal, the film did hit me, like a Darren Aronofsky's movie (much less dark, however).

I pride myself as someone who values memories. I used to tell myself, almost as a personal mantra that we live our lives in the pursuit of happy memories. That happiness is only as the memory is fleeting, we try to hold on to it like gold dust.

It's quite apt that this movie's changed that impression quite a bit.

I realise now that I will forget more than I will remember, that I will have impressions more than I will have recollections. Perhaps with that in mind, it is more important to have a pure heart than a spotless mind, for then at least, we get to make up our own minds.

It's interesting that what I got out of the movie was a strong theme of personal authenticity and self-determination. And ironic also that in that self-determination came a strange theme of fate, of "liking someone and not knowing why, just because". Almost as if our preferences came through more strongly than our choices or past choices, and that almost inevitably, we end up falling for the same person, for the same type of person, we look for things that remind us of that one true love we almost seemed to have used to know.

I wonder if that's really true.

---

incidentally, i did want to mention that i do recognize that alex pope said "how happy is the blameless Vestal's lot" as a sardonic question disguised as an exclamation. to be blameless is to also be empty, meaningless and blank, without the weight of choice and consequence. the liberty of the lack of responsibility is naturally also the restraint of having "each wish resign'd". if we want only what we're given - is that happiness?

Damien Rice presenting "9" on KCRW

New post, and be warned this is a very large video file, although absolutely worth it for the sheer pleasure of watching Damien play the piano. This is him presenting (ie. playing live) the songs on the album "9". First few minutes on "9 Crimes" is quietly thrilling.

9

I'm back into a Damien Rice phase, and I never realised how much I love the quiet angst of "9 Crimes". It is the piano, honestly, that gets me. It's that repetitive, quiet, simple (I could so play this!) chord that echoes throughout the entire song. Oh, and Lisa Hannigan's voice. (Aarrgh that she does not have a band or a professional album of her own. She has a uniquely Portisheadish voice.)

Leave me out in the waste
This is not what I do
It's the wrong kind of place
To be thinking of you
It's the wrong time
For somebody new
It's a small crime
And I've got no excuse...

Private Road

One of the best written songs I've heard. It's so clever! Listen to this song on a lazy, white bright Saturday afternoon. Sip a glass of chilled, iced lemon tea with twinkling cubes of ice. Relax in a cold, cold room on a leather sofa.

Serve chilled.

Private Road
My heart for now is a private road
No thoroughfare, no heavy load
No slow traffic, no graphic details,
Cold or collisions
No more stories to make me ache

I'll always love you, Venus
Still you are mine
Why'd you have to take so much time
In calling me
Just want to be easy like
Sunday morning

Snow falls in silence and covers the green
Still you can see where the birds have been
Hungry but alive and free, waiting
Waiting

The Glory of the 80's

It's scary how it probably reveals your age when you think about the songs that defined your angst years, the teenage years. Bands like Heart, Erasure, The Pet Shop Boys (though that was a mainstay), U2 (another evolution), Chris Isaak.

I grew up with A Little Respect (Erasure), Somebody (Depeche Mode) and These Dreams (Heart). But ended up living with a New Kids on the Block generation that preferred Go West (Pet Shop Boys), Dirty Dancing (various - I've had the time of my life...) and Hero (Mariah Carey).

Where did the world go to?

Anyway, just a little treat for the glory of the 80's. I took a taxi from LA to Venus in 1985.

Where is my album "O"?

Stumbled across "The Blower's Daughter" on tv today while watching a drama series (case in point that I'm addicted to all drama series that have good music, but will leave that to another blog) and within the first chords of the song, "And so it is...", the one single underlying thought in my head was, "I have that song... what album is it in my iPod?" I'd managed to isolate it down to Damien Rice (classic voice you gotta love the man for his voice, not his looks), but somehow, my iPod houses only "9" and the song came from "O".

So now. That is one of my favourite albums of all time. And I just can't find it. Together with the other albums that I've lost - Tori Amos's From the Choirgirl Hotel (my favourite Tori album of all time also) and Tori Amos's To Venus and Back Disc 1 (following on with a close second of favourite Tori albums and strangely enough I have Disc 2, the one I don't like). It's missing. Together with "O".

I definitely own them. Originals too (in case you wonder), because they are my all time favourite albums and I won't compromise having anything but the originals.

But they are missing. As in they are nowhere to be found in all my collection of CDs that have survived my fifth house move now. Well, considering their vanished nature, I'm not about to say they have survived now - but instinct tells me I must have taken all my favourite albums and put them in a CD case. And it is that very precious CD case that comprised all the music I wouldn't want to live without if there were no CDs left on earth that is now missing.

Missing.

The horrid truth is that I couldn't find them since I've moved here. Which makes me suspect that I may not have moved with them in the first place. The thought that the CD case of music could have been left at some relocation movers warehouse to be collecting dust for all eternity while I'm sitting here having "Can't take my eyes off of you..." playing repeat in my head is quite horrifying.

Imagine for a moment my distress.

And what did I do? To tide my sorry heart over, I went to YouTube and promptly looked for the stupid song that prompted this all.

It's right here.



So this is love/Just when I've lost my CD/And I'm lost and sorry.../Now, at this time/And so it is/I've lost that one thing.../I've cared for.../More than your voice./Can't take my eyes off.../Shouldn't take my eyes off...

Should have put it together with the passport and the intricate little obsessions we carry around with us every day.

Tokens, trinkets, sentimentalities.

The song reminds me of so much that I cannot find. So it's not really about The Blower's Daughter really, that is now occupying my fast flowing, random, path of least resistance stream of consciousness.

Ever played a song and all that came to mind were old photographs, faded memories, snatches of moments where you stole a glance at someone you shouldn't have? That's "The Blower's Daughter".

It's what you think of when you're staring into a vastness of ocean that looks like seemingly nothing.

It's what you say when she comes up to you and asks, "What are you thinking?" And you smile and say, "Nothing, sweetheart." She turns away and you hum a song, "And so it is..."

How do we live our lives in our sleeping, soft, silent, subtle, dreaming moments, when they shatter as we wake? How do we explain our lives to the people that fill it in our waking moments, when they don't touch us where we sleep?

And so it is, the colder water, the blower's daughter, the pupil in denial. I'll be waiting at that ocean's edge, hair in the wind, salt water in my eyes.

Meme: Car Music

I'd always wanted to start this list - a compilation of music that go well with long car rides, road trips... basically songs the DJ should be playing at 60 miles/hour. More additions to follow, but I realized that one of my favourite experiences would be to drive a Saab (potentially possible) to Tori Amos (also possible).

1. Tori Amos - Sleeps with Butterflies
2. Tori Amos - Bouncing off Clouds
3. The Eagles - Love Will Keep Us Alive

Incidentally, a playlist I came up with when I was bored (I play a little game with myself on the train, I go through my playlist and come up with a playlist with a theme) - this one was music with driving/cars/travelling themes (my iPod music list wasn't complete):

1. Tori Amos - Cars and Guitars
2. Tori Amos - Taxi Ride
3. Tracy Chapman - Fast Car
4. Sheryl Crow - Every Day is a Winding Road
5. Tori Amos - Big Wheel (surprisingly goes very well after Sheryl Crow)
6. Tori Amos - Beauty of Speed
7. Bent - Private Road
8. Radiohead - Street Spirit (at some point, I insist)
9. Tori Amos - Roosterspur Bridge
10. Vienna Teng - Harbor
11. Snow Patrol - Chasing Cars

More to follow as things strike me - although I thought the car/travel playlist if made into a CD would be a very good congratulations gift to someone who's just got himself a new car or just passed his driving test. (eh, little fish?)

Diffusion Drama

And because I am bored and missing alcohol...

Cocktails for Two

I'm quite taken by this incredibly cute ad on the telly these days from Schweppes. And thanks to subtitles being on, lyrics can now be found - (in bold are the bits used by the ad)

Cocktails For Two
Music by Arthur Johnston, lyrics by Sam Coslow, 1934

Oh what delight to be given the right
To be carefree and gay once again
No longer slinking, respectfully drinking
Like civilized ladies and men

No longer need we miss
A charming scene like this:

In some secluded rendezvous
That overlooks the avenue
With someone sharing a delightful chat
Of this and that
And cocktails for two

As we enjoy a cigarette
To some exquisite chansonnette
Two hands are sure to slyly meet beneath
A serviette
With cocktails for two

My head may go reeling
But my heart will be obedient
With intoxicating kisses
For the principal ingredient

Most any afternoon at five
We'll be so glad we're both alive
Then maybe fortune will complete her plan
That all began
With cocktails for two

And of course, you can find the ad on YouTube. :-)