Mickey took over my house for this one as that’s where the piano lives at the minute. We managed to move it into the sitting room, shifted a fair amount of furniture, covered the floor with plywood and set up a few microphones. After Mickey had twiddled for a fair while, we did three takes and that was that.

I always liked the idea of not messing about with this song – with little else going on it means you can only focus on the melody and the lyric. Plus with the song having been written in situe on that instrument it didn’t feel right to add any other layers.

The song is one that captures a point in my life – at which I’d just become a dad and I was becoming increasingly disillusioned with conversations between ourselves and people in the music industry. I got the sense that the lives of some of these people were just about a product, a profit or a process; chasing some sort of escapism, flanked by shady morals and all fuelled by the apparent love of money. It made us hope that it wouldn’t rub off. Luckily, the majority of people we work with and have worked with are lovely but it just takes the odd person to knock you out of kilter.

I know that we have to operate as a business in order to keep writing songs for a living but if it all became a hobby again, we’d still take solace in expressing through music – that felt a whole lot different to the pursuits of others and had the effect of casting a rather large shadow over us for a while.

I suppose the line in the song that means the most to me is about seeing the centuries in my little one’s eyes. Even though it is blatantly manifested from a Paul Simon lyric somewhere along the way, it is powerful to sing. I like being defiant in life, and this line is the foundation of it.

As the quieter little brother of In Blue Music We Trust, this song does a good job.

———————————-

Fortunately I have got
Enough to realise that
This is growing old
The promises you sew are
Shallow footsteps in the snow
That you cover up

Sumptuously I have seen
The centuries in his eyes
Now I’m growing up
It’s wealth that makes you proud
Well there’s no pockets in a shroud
You want showing up.
You need showing up.

I’m worn down by it all
I’m worn down by it all
Take my innocent relief
Take my shattered inner peace
I’m worn down

A culture cannot die
If it is already long dead
The only place for language is
The remnants of these bandages
That weave a futile melody
While they’re wrapped around my head
The subtle chill of dread that’s filling me
Is deep in each capillary

Fortunately I have got
Enough to realise
This is growing old.

I’m worn down by it all
I’m cut down by it all
Take my innocent relief
Take my shattered inner peace
Take my worry
Take my scorn
Take my enigmatic pause
Take the contents of my head
Take the remnants
Take my dread
For I’m worn down.

The Gentle EP by Little Comets available to buy on iTunes now!

This is going to have to be a quick blog – it’s the night before we go off on tour so I’ve got the obligatory suitcase pack and laundry check to do, a trip to pick up train tickets, paint a bass drum skin with lyrics, play with our 18 month old until the point of total exhaustion and then have a bath. That said, this song probably does need a little explaining…

Almost every day my heart gains a few beats when listening to the strains of trained politicians – totally career based, and taken (largely) from a very select male part of society – talking of new exciting ideas that they believe can solve problems – when actually they don’t even understand why they don’t give a shit about anything but themselves in the first place. At the zenith of this particular celestial sphere stands a man such as Iain Duncan Smith who pithily rejects the notion he would struggle to get by on a benefit whilst wielding a sword so covered in agenda that it reflects the wicked glint in both of his narrowing eyes. For him read Gove, Hunt, Osborne and Cameron – all intent on systematically destroying the welfare state, privatising education and healthcare, clad in the language of “cutting the deficit” and hitting the poorest. It’s actually wild.

That this all happens within a construct of a decaying electoral system, a disenfranchised electorate, an infantile and confrontational parliament (which won’t take a stand on lobbying), massive regional wealth disparity and a set of MPs that simply do not adequately represent the wonderful make up of our country in terms of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, birthplace, education, employment etc etc etc…

So I wrote a song about it, to be honest though you probably should just go and listen to some Billy Bragg.

———————————-

Food banks spring open
Like jaws dropping in time
The weight of man is measured
By the depths of a carrier bag

I’m frozen for ages
The same faces the same scars
It’s a shame all our sages
Are rotten to the middle

Someone better tell me when the lights go out
So I know where I should hide
Someone better offer me their salient thoughts
On a welfare state denied
Someone better smother me in disregard
So I’ll make it through the night
And there’s so many people
That feel the same as I do

So don’t listen to your heart
Listen to your soul
Listen to your common senses
I’ve been battered like a storm
Been run into a wall
Been vaulted like a row of fences
Don’t be surprised
When those wide eyes
Drill a hole into the present tenses
You should cherish even more
The things that make us raw
Stay loyal to the consequences.

And There Are So Many People
That Feel Let Down
Like I Do.