Tuesday, April 3, 2007

The Gap Between Crack And Thunder Is Closing In....

'Sometimes' is an amazing song, a moment of songwriting genius. I love the song live in it's guitar soaked frenzy racing away, the crowd carried away by it's wave of euphoric possibility. Equally I love the version Tim Booth sang at Glastonbury in 2004 with The Individuals. Stripped down to the bare bones of vocals, sax and piano, the song is vulnerable and haunting. My skin tingles every time I hear it. Apparently when Brian Eno heard it for the first time he declared that it was the highlight of his musical life. It's that kind of song.

When I heard 'Sometimes' for the first time as a teenager I was intrigued by the peculiar poetry of the lyrics. These strangely beautiful and yet violent images in a song that sounded so joyous and celebratory had an oddly unsettling and discordant effect. This sense of something extraordinary being around the corner, standing in the rain, making choices no matter what the consequences. It's really brave and powerful. I'm always totally blown away and wrung out to dry by Tim Booth's lyrics, but this one has a special power of it's own.

One of my favourite lines has to be the one I've stolen for the title of this blog. It has an unworldliness to it that hints at all kinds of possibilities. The gap between crack and thunder is a moment frozen in time. A split second of indeterminate length, the frame has been briefly stopped and you choose where the next step takes you. For me it's a moment that allows the gaps between worlds to shift and the magic to escape. The moment the Shaman moves and weaves his spell. That one man can see a rainbow, the other only endless rain. That death can be a choice, a positive act, that sometimes being delivered on to the next round isn't always a bad thing. That a soul is a tangible thing to be touched and held. That a storm can bring good in it's havoc and that waiting for the storm to break is an act of defiance as much as an act of cowardice.

I tend to see the world in the four new colours rather than the endless grey. To me magic and mystery are woven into the fabric of our existence. I believe in the multiple rather than the singular, I don't believe in fixed outcomes. This song is about choices, about being tiny in the face of such enormity, the fishing boats being spewed onto the shore and the buses stripped to chrome, and yet still being able to remain human. To make the choices that make us human and to still see our souls. To always look for the spark that lies inside our eyes.

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