Heartland

This is just a post to announce that I am completely thick . Sometimes, I think about a Sisters song for a while, and something so blindingly obvious occurs to me that I can't see why I didn't see it before. noworrimean?

I remember Andy saying that the funny little noise at the beginning of Vision Thing was a sniff. Didn't think much of it at the time, thought he was a kind of sniffy person really . It was only listening to said song this morning that I worked out what the sniff meant.

God, I'm thick

You mean the sniff of a whiff of speed?

And isn't it great the way one can find little details still, after years of listening to the albums? That's one of many things that makes them so great.

See, everyone knows but me. But yes, the sniff of drugs (of cocaine, though, I think, given the colombia / war on drugs context). The snort of coke that sets the song in perfect context. A wonderful start to a song, no? I agree, this is what makes the Sisters so phenomenally wonderful, the eternal possibility that you can decipher another layer and transform your understanding of a song. Heh.

Actually, I wouldn't have known, or paid any attention to it, hadn't Von mentioned it in that interview. And ho-yes, a great way to start a song like that indeed.

Did you know that the original first line was:

"Twenty-five rooms in the whore next door"?

The Green Lantern wrote:And isn't it great the way one can find little details still, after years of listening to the albums?

After years of listening to the same old, same old you could find any reading you want in there. No, we just need new product

Yeah, you're right. Who am I kidding?

Red_Kola wrote:Did you know that the original first line was:

"Twenty-five rooms in the whore next door"?

That's tremendous. Is it true? If so, I wonder what made him bottle it and change the line? There has to be a demo / 'finished mix' with that line in it somewhere.

Dave Whelan wrote: That's tremendous. Is it true? If so, I wonder what made him bottle it and change the line? There has to be a demo / 'finished mix' with that line in it somewhere.

Somebody said so on Dominion years ago. Might even have been Edward Bax himself. If not, certainly one of the GPS central command. I always assumed it to be true...

sorry to be a pedant, but is the 'sniff' not just the high hat as can be heard on any alesis based drum machine, or more specifically on the Doktor???

It aint human in origin is it....

does that mean that this is all a little moot, as the high hat is traditionally used as a metronome when counting songs into the start.....

The Doubting Doktor.....

It certainly sounds like it, which is why I guess many people never thought about it much. However, Von says it is a sniff... He's led us on a wild goose chase before (see Neverland...), but once you hear that, it really sounds like it, and it seems to make a lot of sense in the context of the song...

i always thought it was a can of coke opening

I always thought it was a metaphorical sniff. Like the creative process began with a sniff. A really huge sniff. Of pure methamphetamine. Such a HUGE sniff that they were able to complete the writing and recordings in a little over one year... Surely an astonishing achievement by anyone's standards.

Red_Kola wrote:I always thought it was a metaphorical sniff. Like the creative process began with a sniff. A really huge sniff. Of pure methamphetamine. Such a HUGE sniff that they were able to complete the writing and recordings in a little over one year... Surely an astonishing achievement by anyone's standards.

like "going out with a whimper" rather than "a bang"? i always assumed that's what he meant when he made the "starts with a sniff" comment.

T S Eliot again, eh?

ryan_w_0000 wrote:i always thought it was a can of coke opening

Looking for the can in the candy store?

MrChris wrote:T S Eliot again, eh?

indeed.

http://www.quotemeonit.com/tseliot.html

This is the way the world ends.
Not with a bang but a whimper.

and this is how the album starts, not with a roar but with a sniff.



i also like these lines:

Only those who risk going too far can
possibly find out how far one can go.

You are the music while the music lasts.

Some editors are failed writers,
but so are most writers.

incidentally:
also, from the eliot poem:

Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;

and the sisters' "on the wire":

Now the ground come up too fast
Too fast to meet you

May The Road Rise With You
J. Lydon

Quote>This is the way the world ends.
Not with a bang but a whimper. <

Also a quote by Dennis Hoppers photo journalist in Apocolypse Now. (when talking about Kurtz to Willard)
Another possible source of his original line of thought perhaps?

Not with a bang, but a Wimpy

John Cooper Clarke (Cycle Sluts c. 1977)

Red Sunsets wrote:Not with a bang, but a Wimpy

John Cooper Clarke (Cycle Sluts c. 1977)

"The f**k- ing Speed is f**k- ing Surf"

He was playing Irvine - yes IRVINE - with the Fall this week. How the mighty...

and nobody told me about the Renfrew Ferry gig...

I missed The Ferry gig cause my lift's wife was baby sitting (figure that one out). Peeved

I think some of you people have too much time on your hands.

Black Shuck wrote:I think some of you people have too much time on your hands.

Is that about JCC and The Fall or this thread BS?