Got any interesting thoughts on a set of lyrics? Any that don't involve the word "indeed"? Find yourself struggling to decipher all those obtuse references Von makes? Read "1959 And All That" and still no clearer? Nope, us neither. Postcards found lying in a skip around the back of the Chemists can be found here... Don't say you weren't warned.
I've searched for any other threads on this song and couldn't see any.
I was just looking at the lyrics in the Sisters Wiki and noticed it has "And every fool will see his madness drowned."
Does this definitely originate from an official source? I've always heard it as "And every fool will see his madness crowned."
To me this makes more sense in the context of the rest of the song - eg truth is swallowed up, words are dust, reason is turned around, so it would seem that madness is increasing and gaining power, not being drowned.
I tried to tell her
About Marx and Eldritch, God and angels
I don't really know what for.
In the place through which we wander
Reason is turned around
And every fool who scuttles up
Will see his madness drowned
And every truth is swallowed up
By gently giving ground
What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and your trust lies broken
And the truth is drowned
I watch as you surrender
To silence-loving screams (replaced by "Because I know")
And now I know you will not see
The madness we have seen
And now I know you can not be
All that your flight has been
What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and your trust lies broken
And the truth is drowned
I stood but you just could not wait
These lines are driven straight
Through the circles of your hate
Because I know you can not be
All that your flight has been
What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and the truth is drowned
Everything is lost in the giving ground
mh wrote:
I was assuming it was in the sense of being crowned king, ie madness triumphant.
And this definitely makes sense - makes the song seem a good deal nastier with this reading.
I went for "crown" as opposed to "crowned" as it sort if inferred the "fool" could see the prize, but never actually got it.
That makes it a bit nastier to me
mh wrote:
I was assuming it was in the sense of being crowned king, ie madness triumphant.
And this definitely makes sense - makes the song seem a good deal nastier with this reading.
I went for "crown" as opposed to "crowned" as it sort if inferred the "fool" could see the prize, but never actually got it.
That makes it a bit nastier to me
Both are valid; I still hear "frown" meself but must dig out RSV and give it a re-listen.
For "crown" versus "crowned" I suppose it depends on if the fool even recognises the value (or lack thereof) of the prize once he's (if he's) won it. I like "crowned" because it reads as if the song is saying "you think you've won the prize but you haven't really, and you don't even know what the prize is worth anyway, if it's even worth anything" - a futile battle for a meaningless non-victory, in other words.
If I told them once, I told them a hundred times to put 'Spinal Tap' first and 'Puppet Show' last.
According to _Paint My Name..._, Boyd Steemson wrote the words to Giving Ground because it was a rush job to get the single out and Eldritch was off trying to get Werner Herzog to produce the next album?
"We're Hawkwind and this is a song about love." - , 1993
"We will miss them when they are gone" - M. Andrews, 2024
H. Blackrose wrote: ↑22 Nov 2021, 22:13
According to _Paint My Name..._, Boyd Steemson wrote the words to Giving Ground because it was a rush job to get the single out and Eldritch was off trying to get Werner Herzog to produce the next album?
I've just read this part in the book this morning and then saw your post.
It surprised me too but then looking at the album vinyl, it does say 'Words & Music written by Eldritch except for Giving Ground. Words: Copyright Control. Music: (Andrew Eldritch)'
I always liked the words on the album version; when I heard the original single version I thought "hmmm, not Von's best work, kind of too gothy if you know what I mean, I can see why he edited them on the album". It becomes even more clear now.
"We're Hawkwind and this is a song about love." - , 1993
"We will miss them when they are gone" - M. Andrews, 2024
...
(we might even say please) gave us the proper lyrics, 
, 1993
