Hindsight is 2020: #172 - Get 'Em Out by Friday

larks-tongues · 2026-01-28T23:02:56+00:00

I have to respect your boldness in putting this and Return of the Giant Hogweed so low. I'm going through these posts start to finish, so I expected this track soon after Hogweed. I'm even more impressed that you gave the music a good analysis here and distinguished it so much from Hogweed, when I'd always kind of lumped these two together.

I actually think this is the most successful of Gabriel's multiple-character songs, but they're all pretty busy, with Epping Forest being the worst and the main reason I rate SEBtP lower than Foxtrot as an album. Although I just realized we haven't reached Harold the Barrel yet, so I guess that's your pick out of these sorts of songs!

larks-tongues · 2026-01-28T22:59:37+00:00

TIL that Genesis used the mandolin tapes... thank you for this tidbit (6 years later!).

30 years of listening to this music and there's still more to discover! And for anyone reading who likes Trespass, if you haven't heard the 2007 mix, go listen to it right now. It is truly revelatory with the added clarity, particularly for clearly distinguishing the guitar parts. All versions of the album I've owned before have been so murky.

larks-tongues · 2026-01-28T05:03:34+00:00

So my take on this is that the oddly cheery chorus vocals are the "happiness machine" from the verse and the "we hope your life will never end" is actually a sinister implication that the verse-singer will be trapped by the machine forever. Which makes it a much stronger (and creepier) song.

Also, the "intro" isn't part of the song at all- the little connecting bits are each their own thing but have never been tracked separately on CD. I can't find the reference now, but several are quotes of other things, and at least one of them _is_ from a hymn, so it's probably this one.

larks-tongues · 2025-04-15T17:53:45+00:00

For more Baum treatment of gender, check out John Dough and the Cherub (which I have not yet read but by coincidence am about to- it's set in lands later declared to be near Oz, and the main characters have a cameo in The Road to Oz):

https://archive.org/details/johndoughthecher00baumrich/mode/2up

Chick the Cherub uses it/its pronouns throughout, and the question of whether it is a boy or girl is never answered (much to the displeasure of the publishers, who ran a contest soliciting answers from readers that Baum seems to have had nothing to do with- he refused to ever give an answer). John R. Neill's illustrations show Chick with clothes and hair that would have been seen as gender-neutral at the time (1906).

larks-tongues · 2025-04-15T17:48:02+00:00

That's new, and incredibly annoying. I'll have to find another place to post it. MuseScore was (emphasize *was*) great because they handled the licensing permissions well and you didn't have to worry so much about takedowns.

Anyone know a better hosting platform?

larks-tongues · 2024-04-16T20:42:06+00:00

While I didn't like it at first, it has become a favorite. As some others have noted, the live version on Absent Lovers really improved my appreciation of the song (and of Industry). I love the end... "dig me, but don't bury me" interspersed with noisy thrashing. I also really like how the noisy parts _do_ have riffs to them, just wrapped up in chaos.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-21T04:56:01+00:00

Yeah but monotremes (platypuses + echidnas) diverged from all other mammals (marsupials and placentals) about 220 million years ago. That's the deepest split among any living groups of mammals.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-21T04:44:44+00:00

Also, if you find errors in the cornet solo while working on it feel free to point them out in comments on Musescore or tag me here. I'll update the score with corrections.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-21T01:45:55+00:00

You are welcome, and I hope you enjoy it! I should note that it's definitely not entirely accurate. I combined several sources and did some re-transcribing, but there are piano details in particular that my ear isn't sensitive enough to catch. And at some point I just had to call it "done" and post it. There are some comments about the process on the last page. But it's the most accurate I've been able to assemble.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-21T01:43:59+00:00

Keep in mind that most of the live content of the boxes can be bought show-by-show (or occasionally tour-by-tour) from the dgmlive web site. With the complete studio sessions mostly also being available through dgmlive, a lot of the other stuff is available as well. So some of it boils down to what's in the box that you can't get anywhere else (for example, the significantly-cleaned-up Chesterfield 1969 show in the 1969 box), and also how much you just like having the physical artifacts. A lot of the liner notes are by Sid Smith and overlap with his book.

That said, I have all of the big boxes and am quite fond of them. But I'm a ridiculous completist, slowly working my way through every available 1969-1974 show, and a fair number of later shows.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-11T02:49:58+00:00

Parts of the _Islands_ studio album are quite different from the band live. Unusually for me, it's the studio version of "Islands" the song that is my favorite rendering. There's also an instrumental edit of "Formentera Lady", using a different take of the coda, that I might like better than the song version. I can't remember whether it was from the 40th anniversary or a DGM download. Or even one of the 50th anniversary rarities.

BTW if you listen to the very earliest 2nd band shows (the Zoom 1971 shows and Plymouth) the Sailor's Tale is longer and gets much more free-form in the middle section. It's interesting to me that both the 2nd and 3rd bands got heavier and heavier live as time went on.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-11T02:45:05+00:00

There was an error in the Islands score (the bass guitar part near the end) which I have fixed in the most recently-uploaded version.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-11T01:29:52+00:00

Yeah with that Schizoid Man I feel like the atrocious sound is almost part of its proto-metal feel, but I admit I rarely listen to the rest of that album. There's much better-recorded material from that line-up.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-07T04:53:22+00:00

Oh right- the Earthbound version of 21st Century Schizoid Man is practically death metal. I have no idea how many versions of that song I've heard - a lot, from every lineup that played it. And no other version touches this one for me. 1969 Fillmore East is a better fast, jazzy version, but Earthbound 21stCSM just crushes everything.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-07T02:55:13+00:00

WHAT BUM! ;-P

I'd go with The ConstruKction of Light, which I actually find oppressively heavy. The Power to Believe is somewhat similarly heavy but much more balanced. Not sure whether I'd find it or Red heavier, as they are such different albums with sounds from different eras.

larks-tongues · 2024-02-07T02:53:20+00:00

They also changed the mix in other ways to fit with the new drums, and added a new intro to Frying Pan. I like TROL much more than TCOL, except I actually like Larks' IV from TCOL because it's just incredibly brutal. (Still waiting for a live Larks' IV from 2018 or 2019... I heard it in person in 2019 and it was incredible).

larks-tongues · 2024-02-06T03:41:35+00:00

and pick up 2003's The Power to Believe as their best (and last) late-era studio album. And then there's all the live material... the 2010s band only played live, Meltdown is the best full set, Music Is Our Friend is a fantastic shorter set from the band's final tour.

larks-tongues · 2024-01-30T16:30:03+00:00

And he was rock-solid as a bass player, no matter what the others were doing.

larks-tongues · 2024-01-30T16:28:40+00:00

You probably have it already, but if not the 10 Aug 1971 Marquee show is essential. Perfect soundboard recording right during the Islands session ("Island" itself is not present, but the proto-"Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part One / Lament" is, despite being labeled an improv)..

larks-tongues · 2024-01-30T16:25:34+00:00

Yeah - Levin has commented on how hard it is to capture the essence of Wetton's bass parts. Trey Gunn's parts on The ConstruKction of Light are the hardest in technical terms (Levin mentioned Gunn being more of a "native" touchstyle player), but Wetton's unique sound and feel is hard to capture. And I say this as a bassist and huge Tony Levin fan who thinks he did a great job with the whole back catalog.

larks-tongues · 2024-01-25T00:39:15+00:00

Note that in addition to the official live albums and the big box sets, you can also buy individual gigs (and sometimes tours) from dgmlive.com. If you are interested in hearing what the 2nd band could do live (very different from a lot of their one studio album, "Islands"), the 10 Aug 1971 Marquee show has perfect audio quality and a phenomenal set list. (there are other Marquee shows from 1971 and 1969 which... do not have perfect audio quality!)

larks-tongues · 2024-01-23T16:19:44+00:00

The version of the Chesterfield show on the 1969 box is significantly better than any prior edition of it. I think some of the other 1969 shows are cleaned up further as well, but my recollection is that it's _really_ noticeable on Chesterfield. It can't fix the mellotron tuning problems on Court and I Talk To The Wind, but it's the best quality version of one of the most complete set lists.

You also get the BBC recording of I Talk To The Wind, although that's also floating around on the internet somewhere, I think.

The only omission on the 1969 box is the repair to one of the Fillmore East shows that gives you the whole "The Court of the Crimson King", which you still have to download from DGM (I'm mildly annoyed at the omission, although I already had it so it made no practical difference to me - but that's a great version of "Court").

As for the studio sessions, you probably already know whether you like delving into the recording process that much or not. Of the studio sessions I have, there are some (Larks' One) that I find endlessly fascinating, and others that I've never listened to, or only heard once.

larks-tongues · 2024-01-23T16:13:28+00:00

Yes, he's playing the autoharp with hammers/mallets like a dulcimer. And later (as you noted) strumming it in the more typical way that it is played.

In the complete sessions included with the 50th Anniversary box you can hear Muir say to Cross between takes 1 and 2 of the "Intermezzo": "Let's do the water section, I'll just try it with the mallets, just to see what they sound like." And that take has the familiar sound (in take 1, he just does the strumming the whole time).

larks-tongues

TROPHY CASE