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Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 11:41
by Steve
Hi Wanbli

Thank you for the reply and no slur on you was intended. It's just that when I left-click on that single download button beneath the play/pause line, it takes me to a site (http://adfoc.us/serve/?id=5678010907004) which appears to be a blank page, and nothing else happen: at least I hope there's nothing dodgy going on that I can't see. If I right-click the link, and go for "save target as", it just prompts me to save an htm file from the same adfoc.us site.

Perhaps I'm on the wrong side of the blue for it to work :(

Maybe some kind person would be able to send me the MP3, if it's not too big, in a PM.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 12:18
by Jordan~
Here you go, Steve. The download button is meant to redirect to that URL. It doesn't for me, either.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 13:40
by Steve
Thank you, Jordan~ ... You're a star. Now I can enjoy this recording in the best place!

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 21:12
by bispurious
Hi all, I spent an hour this morning figuring this monster out, and I think these chords are all right. Thanks to Andrew for getting started on this:

-----C--------D----F----
The cause is Ozymandian.
-----C----- D-----F----
The mapa sacra continent
--C-------------G------
is sanded and bevelled,
----Bb--------------F----
the land lorn and levelled
----Am------EbM7------------Dm7------EbM7---
by some unrecorded and powerful hand

(repeat sequence for all repetitions of this phrase)

--------Bb----------------Gm------------Eb-----------------Bb-----
where all of the twenty-thousand attending your footfall
----------Bb--------------Gm-------------------Eb------------Bb-----
and the causes they died for are lost in the idling bird calls,
----------Bb---------------------Gm------------
and the records they left are cryptic at best,
-----Eb-------Bb-----
lost in obsolescence.
-----Bb-----------------------Gm------------
The text will not yield, nor x-ray reveal
------Eb---------Bb-----
with any fluorescence
-------------F-------------Eb--------Gm---Db9--
where the hand of the master begins and ends.

(repeat sequence for all repetitions of this phrase)

-----Bb----
"It's alright,"
------C-------
and "It's all over now,"
-----Am7-----------Dm----
and boarded the plane,
------------Bb------
his belt unfastened;
----C------------------------------Am7---Dm----
the boy was known to show unusual daring.
-----------------Bb----
And, called a “boy”,
-----C--------------------------Am7--------Dm---
this older man confounding Tammany Hall
----------------Bb----
(In whose employ
------C------------------------Am7------------Dm---
King Tamanend himself preceded John’s fall).

The actual chords Joanna plays as the final section continues get a little more complicated--she drops lots of Bb2, Bb9, C2, C9, Bbsus, Csus...just variations on the ground that she's set up.

(repeat 'til end)

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 21:15
by bispurious
Oh, and one more lyrics thing: I think she may actually be saying 'lorn and levelled' instead of 'lone', even though one of the lines of the poem she's alluding to says 'lone'. Also, I think she's saying 'parades mark the passing of days', not 'age'. Thoughts?

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 21:34
by Andrew
thank you so much! :)

i think it sounds like it could be lorn or lone. I don't think it matters too much either way, lone just seems somewhat more likely to me. It surely is "passing of days"!

also agreed with ann, one of the best ever~

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 22:24
by dwaink
which plays along the monument
and drums upon a plastic(pack) bag.
The brave men and women, so dear to God
and famous to all of the ages' (rack)rag,

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 22:31
by dwaink
where all of the twenty-thousand attending your foot fall (ball)-this line still bothers me...

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 22:52
by bispurious
dwaink wrote:where all of the twenty-thousand attending your foot fall (ball)-this line still bothers me...


i think it's 'footfall', not 'foot fall'

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 23:49
by Jordan~
For some reason I love the "It's all right, and it's all over now, and boarded the plane" bit.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 18 Oct 2012, 23:55
by Andrew
Um, YEAH. That section just comes right the fuck up out of nowhere, and it's like, dizzyingly terrifying that those were his last words, but also brilliant and actually genuinely comforting. The way the melodic line changes and her voice goes softer; it's as if Joanna strips all irony and sarcasm from the line and I'm back being rocked on grandfather's knee after stubbing my toe, or something.

I can't wait for a studio recording. Her performance is mostly some of her best ever but there are niggling little moments, like the way she says "fluorescence" and how her voice gets kind of shrill at "decipher".

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 19 Oct 2012, 00:23
by Ququuluru
:redx:

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 19 Oct 2012, 01:02
by claire
Andrew wrote:Um, YEAH. That section just comes right the fuck up out of nowhere, and it's like, dizzyingly terrifying that those were his last words, but also brilliant and actually genuinely comforting. The way the melodic line changes and her voice goes softer; it's as if Joanna strips all irony and sarcasm from the line and I'm back being rocked on grandfather's knee after stubbing my toe, or something.


I actually think that part of the song is really cheeky. Right before it starts, she says "the event lives only in print" and then the music becomes very simple and light, but sort of maudlin as she sings quotes from news stories about his death. And then the music builds back to something stronger and more emotional as she gets back into the philosophical themes of the song.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 19 Oct 2012, 04:11
by spasticelastic
It sounds like she's saying either "Go out!" or "Go on!" right before she says "I will the hunter to decipher the stone."

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 19 Oct 2012, 18:34
by Ann
Ququuluru wrote:I think it is very telling that some listeners heard her sing the words "...my cunt," which seems to be a jarring misinterpretation compared to what she is most likely saying (i.e. "...might count") as follows from comparison to a probable source text. She is lucky that there are a few people who actually care deeply about what she is saying, as this is only one example of how an overly intimate involvement with well-known 'dick-in-a-box',etc. could possibly devolve upon her. Perhaps she doesn't want people to get the misimpression that she is a stuffy, snooty intellectual; but maybe it is also an overcompensation with potential for creating the exact opposite misimpression. There is nothing wrong of course with being an intellectual, and there is also nothing wrong with being goofy or enjoying sex. And there is no accounting for taste, as they say. I'm sure it can be fun to while away the hours under the auspices of frivolous and carefree consumption, but please forgive me for saying that this kind of habit seems frightfully incompatible with the level of work that Ms. Newsom is capable of performing...
Go ahead and throw your tomatoes or flaming knives at me... I'm used to it


I don't think anyone genuinely thinks that is the line at this point. Someone initially appeared to, and then I heard it as well, though recognizing that it didn't fit in with the context of the song and was therefore likely just a mondegreen.

Once Andrew matched the line up to the line from the paper, I would say all confusion and mishearings were done away with.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 20 Oct 2012, 01:56
by ursulabear
When she says 'I call, I call for the doctor' I always think of THE Doctor.

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 20 Oct 2012, 13:14
by Ququuluru
:redx:

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 20 Oct 2012, 23:46
by erythrophyte
Thanks to those whose repeated listening provided us with tentative lyrics. I really hope this song makes it to her next album or single relatively unchanged. "Look and Despair" sounds like "Soft as Chalk" in mood and "Have One on Me" in structure but with the lyrical lushness of the songs from Ys(seems like she missed her intricate, private world after HOOM). Despite being relatively short, it's a very well-structured and complex song sonically; there's a lot of variation for your ears to chew on (sorry for the terrible metaphor). But man, does her voice struggle throughout the song; seems she's really pushing it to do things that it can't. Having said this though, if someone who had a good voice sang this, it would lose that certain undefinable something that makes the song hers. The recorded, official version I hope would offer her voice a little help. Despite this, the ending still gives me eargasm shivers.

Hahaha. I didn't notice that it sounds like "walk my cunt" near the end. We fans tend to take our gods way too seriously. :P

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 21 Oct 2012, 09:24
by queenofnerds
ursulabear wrote:When she says 'I call, I call for the doctor' I always think of THE Doctor.

Now that would be awesome

Re: New Song at Treasure Island (Look and Despair)

PostPosted: 21 Oct 2012, 17:38
by Ceb
This might be one of my new favorite songs. It should be mandatory for everyone to stand up tall starting from "it's alright, and it's all over now"...

Also, I wish my voice could hit that register.