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Peter Hammill: This

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Fie! Records
Released: 1998.10.26
Time:
 49:45
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: 2001.06.15
Price in €: 17,99





 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


[1] Frozen In Place [fragment] (Peter Hammill) - 0:46
[2] Unrehearsed (Peter Hammill) - 7:05
[3] Stupid (Peter Hammill) - 4:26
[4] Since The Kids (Peter Hammill) - 5:56
[5] Nightman (Peter Hammill) - 6:17
[6] Fallen (The City Of Night) (Peter Hammill) - 5:37
[7] Unready [fragment] (Peter Hammill) - 0:42
[8] Always Is Next (Peter Hammill) - 3:58
[9] Unsteady [fragment] (Peter Hammill) - 0:58
[10] The Light Continent (Peter Hammill) - 14:02

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


PETER HAMMILL - All Instruments and Voices

Except:
MANNY ELIAS - Drums, Percussions on [2]-[3],[6],[8]
STUART GORDON - Violin, Viola on [2],[5]-[10]
DAVID JACKSON - Saxophone, Flute on [2],[3],[5],[8],[10]

RidArt - Design, Art Directio

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


1998 CD Fie! FIE 9118

Recorded, mixed and mastered at Terra Incognita, Bath Jan-Jul 1998.



'This' is the fortieth album for which Peter Hammill has been responsible...some would say guilty. It is released on the eve of his fiftieth birthday, after thirty years of music making. The seven songs (and three instrumental 'fragments') on 'This' mark a clear statement of intent to continue pushing at boundaries within the overall context of The Song. Many features of the soundscape will be familiar to those who have followed Peter's music over the years: shape-shifting changes of mood and temperature; lots of "how did we get here from there;" instrumental colouring by turns delicate and brutal; trademark washes of backing vocals; the juxtaposition of the tightly arranged and the purely improvised. Instrumental contributors are his long-term cohorts Stuart Gordon (violin), Manny Elias (percussion) and David Jackson (saxes and flute). The lead voice is, as always, insistently to the fore, with the passing of time and rites of passage remaining the central lyrical concerns.

To some, Peter is barking mad; to others, an eccentric of genius. What is clear is that his appetite for the fray remains undiminished. Moments here such as the guitar-driven nastiness of 'Always is Next,' the languorous development of 'The Light Continent' or the piano-based meditation on parenthood of 'Since the Kids' offer proof that This has not stopped yet....



The history of this man could fill books I guess. From VDGG v1 and v2 to the K-group, and his many many solo albums, This album is the fortieth. A hallmark and still going strong, yet different. Knowing that Hammill was still 49 years old at the moment of release of this album, the album length of 49 minutes and 49 second makes one wonder.

Starting with an overall remark: I tend to think of this album as a compilation in style of the previous albums. There's some Everyone You Hold here, some X My Heart, some The Noise even and some Roaring Forties as well. On the disc are three short "instrumentals", Frozen in Place (choirlike vocals in a soundscapish way), Unready (Gordon's violin) and Unsteady (acoustics, vocals). The first real song is Unrehearsed featuring both the saxophone of Jackson as well as the violin of Gordon while Hammill plays the piano. The song opens rather quietly and has a rather dark feel to it. Lyrically it seems to be about someone having to take his/her own responsibility, at first I thought he was singing about the relation towards some or one of his daughter, but I can't be sure. In the middle the song becomes more involved and after a minute or four there's even a The Noise-like rock part, rather chaotic. Then a naked riff is left and the music starts to become more melodic again and the quieter vocals return. Something's definitely wrong in Stupid (autobiographical?). He refers in this song to "this pilgrim" (see VDGG) and making errors. I'm not sure whether he refers to some error he made, but he also generalizes to people making mistakes in their lives. The music is in a way rather disjointed. I'm not too fond of the "IIIII-hIII-hII'm so stupid" vocals here. The music is rather quiet, with some injections on saxophone and on the whole the music is rather moody, but also a little uneventful. Not my favourite. A great song is Since The Kids. I guess this is about the separation between parents and kids that hurts most on the side of the parent and I guess also the implications of having children. This song can be compared to Curtains in its sense of drama. The vocal melody of this song is quite good, and is only accompanied by a lone piano (and Hammills own eerie backing vocals). A moving song. Acoustic guitar and violin make up Nightman. The song has elements of earlier songs of Hammill and especially one melody I seem to recognize, but like you might have guessed with such an amount of music it is hard to figure out exactly what it is. Fallen (the City Of Night) also seems to do so: the first verses features the moody violin of Gordon, while afterward the music tries to pick up, but then the music becomes a little chaotic with vocals, percussion and violin all moving through each other. After a return of the quiet part it becomes again chaotic like at first, but then from this chaos emerges something that is both melodic and strange, both appealing and complex as he plays on the keyboards. Very exciting and intense is Always Is Next, strangely enough the shortest song on this album. With lyrics like "his push, her pull, the slushy genderpool" it is obvious what its about (I will not give you the meaning of title though). This is definitely a guitar song, but the vocals are so very untypical and in a way refreshing that I really like this song. The closing title is the long The Light Continent, over fourteen minutes long. Opening with something akin to soundscapes this is a very, ery moody and consistent track with the slow moving rumblings of a continent. The music on this track fits so well with the title: it is both light and desolate with little variation, just like those icy plains. The saxophone and violin also have their place here, but they also do nothing to fire up the music or break the spell. As it is, it remains unbroken.

A good album I think with something, you might say, for everybody. To me it sounded like a cross between Everyone You Hold and X My Heart, but also harkens back to older days at times. Personal favourites are Since The Kids and Always Is Next.

© Jurriaan Hage



Qualität hat einen Namen: Peter Hammill. 'This' ist der gelungene Balanceact zwischen Solo- und Band-Hammill. Klar, daß es immer noch deutliche Referenzen an seine ehemalige Band Van Der Graaf Generator gibt, zumal ja David Jacksons Saxophon auch auf diesem Album ein erkennbares Trademark ist.

ME/Sounds 12/98



Moody and very personal album by former VDGG frontman. The album ranges from mellow tracks with sparse instrumentation, concentrating on the vocal part, to really chaotic and disjointed tracks. Since this is written by someone who´s a real novice in the field of Hammill and VDGG I can´t really tell if it resembles any earlier albums. I have read though that it sounds like a mix between Everyone You Hold and X-My Heart.
 

 L y r i c s


FROZEN IN PLACE

(fragment)

Instrumental


UNREHEARSED

Time for the unrehearsed entrance.
show  show a leg you can break,
          down the cocktail
          while it's laughing at you for heaven's sake...
I can't be your protector
from these deliberate mistakes.

Between the "can't" and the "maybe"
a lifetime's hovering in the wings:
grasp the nettle, bite the bullet
push your own buttons and pull your own strings.
               Name your poison
               while you've got the power, 100 proof.
I can't be your protector
from self-neglect or abuse.
This is not a rehearsal
and fear is not an excuse.

And if you won't step out on the boards
you'll find your place already on the shelf -
you can only find the sum of your parts yourself.

Unprepared and unready,
is that an excuse or point of view?
You can block out the words in anagrammatical sword play
but it's your own life you'll be running though.
                  Time to drink a cocktail
                  of your own invention for pity's sake.

I can't be your protector,
I won't be there when you wake
to honour all the hidden intentions
in your deliberate mistakes,
behind your deliberate mistakes.

Deliberation could be mistaken for coldness of the heart;
Procrastination won't get you anywhere except aloof and apart;
what's the golden opportunity on here for -
isn't it just this?
Go! Start!

Unrehearsed and unready
that's what we are,
what we've all been cast into...
It's not four square, the beat's unsteady
but this is this
and making something of it's up to you.

An unexpected exit's always waiting
although you think it's something you'll bluff your way through.
Spit that wooden spoon out of your mouth
and eat up - the moment's long overdue.
                Take your medicine
                and face whatever the future brings
I can't be your protector,
can't keep you under my wing.
This is not a rehearsal,
this is the real thing
this is the real thing.
This is for real.


STUPID

I'm
(so stupid)

Along this pilgrim's accidental progress
I'd bump into the walls as like as not;
It's no surprise I didn't notice when I lost the plot.

I went and did something
(so stupid, so dumb)

Error-message ever more intensive,
red lights were burning on the air -
no I can't say that I was consequentially unaware

when I did something
(so stupid, so dumb)
I saw it coming
(so stupid)
now all I want to know is how come
(how come?)
we're all fingers and thumbs?

Confused but not entirely aimless,
though you might find comfort here is faint;
if we lived lives that were quite blameless then we'd all be saints;
I don't think so.

Get a life:
you've got to do something
(so stupid)
we all do something
(so dumb)
self-seed our own destruction
nobody understands it, how come we're all fingers and thumbs?


SINCE THE KIDS

It was simple, we were man and wife;
something happened to change everything in life
and made us fell small but we were giants nonetheless
and here we are all in the family portrait.

I've been sliding in a 2, 4-wheel skid:
something happened to me and since the kids
all time's gone awry, direction's askew...
I never thought that I
would ever feel so used up.

The sense of wonder, the note of panic, demands you just can't ignore
nothing prepares you to be a parent,
looking to join the strands of the broken chord.

What you wanted, what I couldn't give...
something happened to us - oh, but since the kids
inherit the earth
we had to plough and drill the field,
nurture the shoots with our hopes and fears,
never wonder about the future yield.

(Never wonder, never wonder, this is real)

I've been thinking about all we did,
much mistaken but anyway, since the kids
are now almost grow with the future in their own hands
what's done is done - there'll be no unmaking our half-baked plans.

Here comes the gold watch, I'll take the pension, I want the lifetime award;
all for the best, with the best of intentions, the children are their own reward...

mend the broken chord.


NIGHTMAN

At the dead of night, I woke
with the sense that my dreams were escaping,
all uncannily unspoken
like words at the tip of a foreign tongue...

As for language, I have none
to express quite what strangeness overwhelms me:
something's changed and something tells me
to be still in the roar of the distant stars.
                The night's full of fire, ice and water;
                by day I'll have clay in my hands.

The book is open at a well-thumbed mark
the odds are stacked that I'm facing.
Eyes grown accustomed to light and dark
can't catch the shadows they're chasing.
Open, my heart, to the vital spark -
a disordered rhythm is racing,
it's a dance macabre I'm tracing.

As the fire feeds the flame,
as the tongue finds expression in its flickering,
does each breath inform a name
to be dispersed just a soon as it's exhaled?

Was it to myself I came
or to some other strange and parallel existence?
Will I ever see tomorrow,
to wake and begin it again?

Open, the book at a well-read page,
hope triumphs over expectation;
open, the secrets of seer and sage
in awe-inspired anticipation...

Open, my mind in the body's cage,
unchained in consecration;
open, my eyes, to the wider stage
the firestorm of liberation -
the night in conflagration.

With a shiver down my spine
I come back to the place where I started;
the sea of consciousness has parted
but stranded is all that I feel for sure.
                As nightsight declines into darkness
                by day there'll be clay in my hands.
                I may feel the clay in my hands.


FALLEN (the City of Night)

Streets half-familiar that I once called home...
the breath of phantoms now fogs the light;
the skin I shuffled strangely outgrown.
        Fallen, the city of night.

Lost geographics of mortar and lime
formed the arena for fight or flight;
all's buried under the leafstorm of time,
        fallen in the city of night,
        fallen the city of night.

        All of the fences overblown,
        all of the gardens overgrown,
        all of the towers overthrown;
        all that I knew shall be over,
        become unknown
        in the city of night.

        I know that I've been here before,
        I know that I've been here before,
        but that was in another lifetime.

What once seemed blessed now feels accursed
with words the spendthrift burned by candlelight
but now this miser's mouth is pursed:
        fallen, the city of night.

        I know that I've been here before
        but that was in another lifetime.


UNREADY

(fragment)

Instrumental


ALWAYS IS NEXT

Ill met, ill starred, the sweat, the scars,
    the back seat of the car, caught up in the sex,
the ties that bind, his thoughts, her mind,
    why something doesn't connect...
the rush, the drool, his push, her pull,
    the slushy gender pool, survive and protect.
Ill met, the lips, the tongues that dart apart
    for whatever's next.
        
Well, now, what then, they count to ten and sense
    the current direct.
This heat, this burn so sweet, they've learned
    this stuff will never turn out as they expect.
Well then, what now? Again they've found what somehow
    still resurrects:
a fit, a freeze, a pretty please,
    drop down upon the knees and...whatever next
        
Whatever's next, what ever's next.
        
A clenching fist, a wrench, a twisted kiss
    will salvage this wreck.
The steam, the windows stream and in
    the back seat of the car they never suspect -
out in the dark the Demiurge Avenger
    auto-elect....
Ill met, the gun is cocked. Though once
    they swore they'd be forever...always is next


UNSTEADY

(fragment)

Instrumental


THE LIGHT CONTINENT

All the fields that you overflown are frozen,
they flow like glass down the frame in formlessness.
Only the fragile fluttering of you heart still marks you chosen,
chosen to dare, your face defiant of the featureless.
               Your face defies the featureless,
                You're facing the featureless.
A horizon of light blurs the boundaries of whiteness
as the distance is shimmered into timeless brightness now.

And the slow flooding tide is begun as it's ended -
the barometer dropping and the fog descended
down, down.

In the endless day, at this hour long-appointed,
subterranean humming and the compass unpointed,
the compass disjointed, the compass down.

Deep in the core the heart of ice forms,
a tempo of life like that of stalagmites,
a flood of the frozen,
the flux of the blood
aflame in antartic white.

Any marks that you made only scratched at the surface
only retinal image ties you into the circuit now.

In this empty expanse every shadow is shining
the indifference of nature: your significance tiny now.
Dive down.

All the fields &c.

Timeless the day, absorbing every wavelength of the light.
Frozen in place, our footfall on the ice.
What have our shadows meant
in the light continent?

 M P 3   S a m p l e s


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