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Peter Hammill: A Black Box

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Sofa Sound Records
Released: 1980.08.01
Time:
 40:54
Category: Progressive Rock
Producer(s): Peter Hammill
Rating:
Media type: CD
Web address: www.sofasound.com
Appears with: Van der Graaf Generator, David Jackson
Purchase date: 2012
Price in €: 1,00





 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


[1] Golden Promises (P.Hammill) - 2:56
[2] Losing Faith in Words (P.Hammill) - 3:40
[3] Jargon King (P.Hammill) - 2:43
[4] Fogwalking song review (P.Hammill) - 4:04
[5] The Spirit (P.Hammill) - 2:38
[6] In Slow Time (D.Ferguson/P.Hammill) - 3:26
[7] The Wipe (P.Hammill) - 1:45
[8] Flight (P.Hammill) - 19:38
        Flying Blind
        The White Cane Fandango
        Control
        Cockpit
        Silk-Worm Wings
        Nothing Is Nothing
        A Black Box

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


Peter Hammill - Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards, Electronic Drums, Producer, Arrangement
David Jackson - Saxophone & Flute on [4,8]
David Ferguson - Synthesiser & Tambourine on [4,6,7]

David Lord - Engineer, Mixing

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


1980 LP S-Type Records PHS 1
1989 CD Virgin Records Ltd. CDOVED 140 (UK)
1991 CD Caroline, CAR 1690-2 (US)
2006 CD Virgin Records Ltd./EMI PHSCDR 1 (2006 remaster)

Recorded at Sofa Sound, Wiltshire, Nov '79 - Apr '80. Mixed at Crescent Studios, Bath, Apr. 6-13, '80.



Another emphatic, powerful and technically excellent production from Peter Hammill. More rocky than PH7 or Silent Corner and the Empty Stage, less techno than Sittings Targets, this recording smooths a path between the '70s and the '80s. The lyrics are searching, poetic, psychological. It is difficult to choose a highlight: the hypnotic "Fogwalking" makes an instant impression, while the multipart "Flight" spans all aspects and facets of Hammill's talents: from gentle through loud and brash and back to gentle again, studded with the inimicable sax of David Jackson. The multipart piece is one of Hammill's trademarks: he takes a lyrical theme and expands it, story-like, through several short, connected pieces. Another good example of this type is "Headlong Stretch" on Roaring Forties.

Ali Sinclair - All Music Guide



For this record Peter parted company with Charisma Records and released "A Black Box" on his own label S-type Records. 'In terms of the way the record biz would go, we were ahead of the game; but of course, we didn't have anything like a commercial product.' "Flight", the continuous second side of the (vinyl) album is clearly the most important piece on "A Black Box". 'This was the first time that I'd attempted a long-form piece outside the environs of VdGG and I was trying to stretch my solo writing, playing and arranging skills to their limits. Being a serious young man, I viewed this very seriously indeed. As if "Flight" wasn't bonkers enough, I decided to stick this piece together with half a dozen 3 minute songs which ranged from pure sonic assault to straight ahead guitar. This is a rum, rum mix, I'm happy to say'.

PicadillyRecords.com



A Black Box is an album by Peter Hammill, originally released on S-Type Records in August 1980. Hammill performed nearly all the instrumentation himself, including the drum parts, a task he had first undertaken on his previous album pH7. His ex-Van der Graaf Generator colleague David Jackson also made a guest appearance, along with David Ferguson of the new-wave band Random Hold, whose debut album Hammill had produced. Side 1 of the record featured a collection of songs, while side 2 was devoted to "Flight", a lengthy multi-section song. This was the first time Hammill had included a lengthy song of this type on one of his solo albums. The short-lived S-Type label (the name was a pun on "stereo-type"), on which the album was originally released, was set up by Hammill and his then manager Gail Colson. Colson had formerly been a director at Hammill's previous record company, Charisma Records, who had dropped him from their roster just prior to the recording of A Black Box. The S-Type label does not appear to have been a successful business project, and the album was later licensed to Virgin Records, who have since also acquired Hammill's Charisma catalogue.

Wikipedia.org
 

 L y r i c s


GOLDEN PROMISES

Besieged in the battlements of Babylon,
still looking for a hat-peg you can hang your head upon -
now you've found a place you think is Avalon:
you can talk to anyone here.
You can throw your arms around your nearest neighbour
and the smiling ones'll tell you that you've saved her,
that she's saved you....
They offer the golden promises,
the instantly divine;
you swallow the golden promises
hook, sinker and line.
        
If you choose to throw your soul around the attitude
reasoning and independent thought go down the tube
as you go slavering after every inane platitude -
how weak you find yourself here.
Do you really need to lose yourself completely?
How come you seem to rate it all so cheaply?
It's so weak-kneed
to go for the golden promises,
mail-order holy vows;
you go for the golden promises -
I think you really ought to know better by now.
        
So I do my best and I do my nut,
I try to explain all these angles
but you turn away.
Oh, now you're looking in the white of my eyes,
and you know what I'm going to say:
don't go for the golden promises,
don't go for the easy way....
It's right here on the doorstep:
fool's gold - don't throw your life away.


LOSING FAITH IN WORDS

I just can't see why you can't see what I mean,
but I can't make things any plainer,
the words get in the way -
is that quite what I mean?
If not now, then certainly sooner or later
we've got a problem with communication -
look, I scrabble with my hands
I try to get some head-room from the elevation
but you just don't understand
        
Most of the things we say mean we most of the time
treat our speech with derision,
flap our hands in body-telegram - I know that gets through
so much better than anything said with precision.
We've got a problem with communication
and it's getting quite absurd...
well, I think I'm going to flip out from the sheer frustration,
yes, I'm losing faith in words.
        
We've got a problem with communication,
only getting through in anagrams -
I try to get some linkage from articulation,
I try to get some head-room from the elevation,
I try to pull back something from my education...
Yes, I try to, try to, try to but I just don't understand,
I try, I just don't understand,
I talk, you just don't understand.
        
Sometimes I don't know why I bother,
but I'm bothered.


THE JARGON KING

He prescribes the subject
he proscribes outsiders
his terms have a golden ring.
He wants to find some order
quantifying chaos
in words that all the children sing.
He tabulates the lexicon
vocabulary minimised
bow down to the Jargon King.
        
All questions become so simple
if we eat the inane answer
if we all agree to ju-ju speak
we fit into the formula
we all without exception
approve the rule.
        
We don't understand
he must be clever
he must be clever
he must be right
he must be right
we don't understand
        
Closed the ranks and barricades
imposed the secret language
complexity all catch-phrased
word-drugged any anguish
pigeon-holed allusions
shut the vault behind us
It's an obvious conclusion
we'll be the chattels of His Highness.
        
Bow down to the Jargon King
and his minion code-words.
        
Here comes the reign


FOGWALKING

Everything clumsy slow-motion,
I look for the source.
Buildings loom up like icebergs
on collision course.
I don't want to go in there,
I just want to be alone,
unpick the stitches of time
in London
in the no-go zone.
        
I've been kicking around like a dog,
lost myself in the blank mass of fog,
it's some kind of service.
All humanity's fall-out is there,
slumped in doorways
and mouthing cold air -
I have heard this.
        
Fogwalking, fogwalking.
        
Since the curfew
the streets are half-dead,
all the good folk asleep in their beds,
it's so easy to go off the rails
when the fog spores
are breeding inside by head.
        
Fogwalking: there's a presence that I sense
Fogwalking: the neck muscles tense
Fogwalking: it's right here inside me,
try to find a defense - oh, no.
        
Fogwalking through the wreckage,
fogwalking through the worm-eaten
Night Apple,
fogwalking through what used to be
Whitechapel.


THE SPIRIT

Such distance to the tips of the fingers,
the ganglion loom jerks inside;
the body grows steadily stranger
but the spirit won't be denied.
        
That sharp halogen flash jars the eyeball,
the limbs pump in overdrive;
the body grows seemingly weaker
but the spirit won't be denied.
        
Yeah, the ash-mark stands out on the forehead
as the vacuum sneaks up on the eyes;
the body becomes a constant traitor
but the spirit won't be denied.
        
And they call that living a normal life,
but normality's not standardised.
Though the body gets ever more root-bound
the spirit won't be denied
        
Yes, the spirit survives.


IN SLOW TIME

Dance the dance
till show time
the show goes on
Dance the dance
in slow time
if that's what you want
        
Dance the dance
in the back of the car
in the cocktail bar
till show time let it ride
Dance the dance
I feel I've been here before,
this could be anywhere at all
in slow time.
        
Danced the dance, or it soon will be;
danced the dance, I'll be back here with me
in no time.
        
In no time danced the dance
It's show time dance the dance
in slow time.


FLIGHT

         Flying Blind
        
         I always forget how crazy things are
so sometimes it catches me off my guard
when they make sense.
The line on the road trail the arrow in the sky,
I search for the mote in my brother's eye
beneath the pence...
a time of blunt instruments.
Still uncertain when I've woken
or what constitutes a conscious mind,
though the thought remains unspoken
I know I'm flying blind.
        
Breaking into cold sweat on the white-hot coals
the pennies from heaven drop through my soul:
it don't relent.
At the back end of dreams I'm amazed to awake...
I offer my theories but just can't shake
that seventh sense
to which there's no defense.
It seemed the time was for action,
it seemed so cool to be that kind...
my tongue writhed to form some retraction
but I knew I was flying blind.
        
I want things to be fast, down to the power-dive;
I want the zero-gravity heroes to play dead,
but stay alive.
We want it to be slow, all the way to stall;
we talk about a thousand things that never change at all.
No, it never change...
        
It was then that I knew I'd been thoughtless,
something had slipped my mind:
I'd strapped myself into the Fortress
but the Fortress was flying blind.
We got full clearance,
so someone down there ought to know
the truth of our disappearance -
If even that still shows it accuses and blames me,
but nothing was quite what it seemed.
Sometimes things work out so strangely
that it might as well all be dreamed.
        
         The White Cane Fandango
        
         The White Cane Fandango in Morse code,
try to shake through the message,
shake the load;
only venial sin, running on the spot
till the dance begins.
        
Where does a man go when the muscles cramp?
Try to write out a postcard on a postage stamp
with a drawing pin punching out the Braille
for the whole within?
        
Upset the contango on your future stock;
paying backwardation, hold onto what you've got -
such a sideways grin!
Some day you may need
to trade that in.
        
If we ride this right
the future will fall in our hands.
If we survive the flight
the future will work out -
nothing's that black and white.
        
         Control
        
         The colour-coded charts are spread,
but we're still gliding deep into the red,
the radio is dead
every valve blown open.
The radar screen flicks monochrome,
air traffic controller wants to get on home,
waiting for a phone call
to release him from responsibility.
Nobody goes to see him any more
except for the man from the ministry.
        
He wanted to be, he wanted to be
the man at the helm, in command of the flightpath;
he's flying a chair, quite beyond control;
he's going to have just one more chance
at a barrel roll.
        
All in a dream, all as a dream,
the colours too bright, the music too deafening -
the black-out world has just begun to show.
These cracked-out words I offer...
but I still don't know.
        
Cool blue suffuse the colour gun -
oh come in, come in number one:
your time's nearly run.
Speed-freeze the frame,
the present and the past hold fast....
It's too fast, the thing don't,
the thing won't,
the thing don't last.
        
         Cockpit
        
         The rolling dice clash together, never make up the score;
that old device, the ejector seat, glued to the floor.
Everybody waits for everyone to make a show,
no-one wants to be the first, admitting that they know
how anythings that's gone down here
could fit into an analytic groove.
Wait for the tactical move,
wait for some action we all can approve.
        
Too much to drink, for the cup reaches down to the sea;
too much to think, the barometer pressuring me.
Rolling down the weather for an Easter parade,
reeling out the Maydays in the hope of being saved,
but the radio ham's out giving blood -
no, no, he's not listening.
The cricketer knows his "Wisden",
the pilot has got his "Jane's",
but the sum of this factual wisdom
don't help us to fly the plane
(no, and it never will...)
Beneath the tartan two-piece something rips undone...
Wait for the ladder to run
wait for the snake that the ladder becomes.
        
A passenger hits the cockpit, willing to chance his game:
pulls out his gun and cocks it
in the hope that it all might change.
(Oh, but it never will...)
A fly-leaf from the library shows others have been here before,
tried, failed and kicked out the door;
the aircrew don't care anymore.
Now they just wait
for the beat of the silk-worm wing,
wait for the heat to come down on us
full force of the law.
        
         Silk-Worm Wings
        
         Full force of gravity pulls me down,
I'll be better off out of there;
aerobatic spin around,
I'll take my chances in the open air.
        
Sycamore silk-worm wings
or Roman Candle to the ground,
there's only one thing for sure:
when the balloon goes up
the aeronaut calm down.
        
         Nothing is Nothing
        
         He say nothing is quite what it seems,
he say nothing is quite what it seems;
I say nothing is nothing.
        
         A Black Box
        
         Softly, the angels sing their time and space refrain:
there's something in everything if you can only pin down its name
Aerobatic thoughts at the back of my mind -
Is it nothing but the looping line we all follow?
Nothing but the spiral twist of DNA?
There'll be no looking back from tomorrow on today.
        
So the wire is tripped, split-seconds defect to their successors;
the umbilical cord is ripped -
here we all are in free fall.
I stall where I am, as if to see where I've been,
only running down the looping line we all follow,
only chasing down the spiral twist of DNA.
There can be no looking on to tomorrow from today.
        
Life/death/night/day...
cold breath will surely fly away.
Is the empire of sensation locked in a black box
deep in me, encoded there somehow?
It fires the imagination to fly on a wing and a prayer
through my life. Is that how it is?
(There'll be no looking back on this....)
This is now, which will be then?
Is this the means?
All I know for shure is
this is the end.
        
No looking back from tomorrow,
no, there'll be no looking back on today;
better be looking on to tomorrow...
better think on today.

 M P 3   S a m p l e s


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