Song Lyric Sunday: Flying Thingies

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I’m not sure where he got the idea from, but for this week’s Song Lyric Sunday Jim is inviting us to play a song that mentions an insect. His post tells all. Naturally, being of my vintage, my thoughts first turned to the wonderfully creepy Boris The Spider by The Who, but I thought that might be chosen by others so I’m leaving it to them. Instead, I’m being my usual indecisive self and, being unable to choose between two songs, I’m playing them both.

Both go back to the Seventies and are from favourite bands, starting with this one:

Ian Anderson at his scary, manic best! And if you need the lyrics, these are they:

 

Oh the leaded window openedbut you moved the dancing candle flameand the first moths of summersuicidal came, oh suicidal came.
And the new breeze chatteredin its May-bud tendernesssending water-lilies sailingas she turned to get undressed.
And the long night awakenedand we soared on powdered wingscircling our tomorrowsin the wary month of spring.
Chasing shadows slippingin the magic lantern’s lightcreatures of the candleon the night’s light’s rite.
Dipping and weaving,flutter through the golden needle’s eyein our haystack madness,butterfly stroking on a spring-tide high.oh, on a spring-tide-high
Life’s too long (as the lemmings said)as the candle burned and the moths were wed.And we’ll all burn together as the wick grows higherbefore the candle’s dead.
Oh the leaded window openedbut you moved the dancing candle flame.And the first moths of summersuicidal came, oh suicidal came,to join in the worshipof the light that never diesin the moments reflectionof two moths spinning in her eyes.
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Ian Anderson
Moths lyrics © The Ian Anderson Group Of Companies Ltd

 

Moths was a track on Jethro Tull’s eleventh album, Heavy Horses, which was released in April 1978 and is generally considered to be the second in a trilogy of folk-based albums, following 1977’s Songs From The Wood and ahead of 1979’s Stormwatch. With my folkie leanings I would probably say that these are my favourite Tull albums, but there have been many others that I’ve loved too. The album peaked at #20 in the UK, #14 in Canada and #19 in the US, and went Gold in both the US and Canada, and Silver in the UK. This is one of my favourite tracks on the album, but they are all good: the title track is a nearly nine minute masterpiece, and another favourite is One Brown Mouse – if you’re watching, Jim, I think a week of tunes about rodents might be in order! Before writing this I would have said that no singles were taken from this album, but Wikipedia claims that this one was: on further checking it appears that this was only in The Netherlands, and it didn’t chart anyway. It did strike me as a strange choice for a single!

I promised you a second tune for today. If you thought that first one was a little obscure, how about this next one – and this was released as a single! From the band’s ‘interim’ period:

Go on, tell me, how many of you remember Dragonfly? This was a single released by Fleetwood Mac in March 1971, the first they gave us after the departure of Peter Green, who had been part of the band’s name until then. The song was written by guitarist Danny Kirwan, who sings lead vocal. The lyrics are based on a poem by the same name written by W.H. Davies in 1927 – Danny borrowed and rearranged them, then added/subtracted a few bits, to give us a lovely song about the transience and delicacy of the titular insect.

This was also the first release to feature Christine McVie as a full, band member, and represented a move away from the earlier incarnation’s blues rock roots and the first step towards their reinvention as an AOR juggernaut in the mid Seventies. It made #52 in the UK (the ‘bubbling under’ chart), so it appears that I wasn’t the only one to buy it, but wasn’t released as a single in the US until 2014, when a special limited-edition vinyl pressing of 3,000 copies was made for Record Store Day: it sold out, and made #9 on their Hot Singles Sales Chart. The song has never appeared on a studio album but was included on a 1971 Greatest Hits compilation, which reached #36 in the UK. To me, it is a true forgotten gem, and the guy who made the lovely AI video that I’m playing clearly agrees with me. And so did Peter Green, who said it was the best thing Danny ever wrote.

That’s today’s twofer, and I’m off to try to find some football to watch: in a week of international matches that isn’t always easy. Hopefully I’ll be lucky, and hopefully you’ll have a good day too. See you again for Tuesday Tunes? 🎶

42 thoughts on “Song Lyric Sunday: Flying Thingies”

  1. Pingback: That Was October | Take It Easy

  7. Moths was never one of my favorite songs but it fit the theme for today very nicely. Fleetwood Mac’s “Dragonfly” was, as you predicted, a new one for me. It was wonderful and the graphics in that video were fantastic. Nice choice, Clive.

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  8. So here I am listening to Heavy Horses and smiling broadly. What a wonderful album. IA has – I’m sure you will know – just completed three new JT albums in three years and they are of the very highest quality. Long may it continue!

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  12. Clive I like both of your selections and appreciate the background info you give on each. I have and love Songs from the Wood, but haven’t listened to Heavy Horses or Stormwatch (yet!) or know they were a trilogy. There is something mystical about how the people transform into moths and flit about.

    The Fleetwood Mac song has an almost tropical feel to it. Not well-versed at all in their Peter Green or immediately post-Green era. I came to them with the juggernaut addition of Buckingham-Nicks.

    Thanks for good listening this morning 🙂

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  13. Clive, I had no idea that there were so many songs about rodents and in a quick search I found lots of them like BEN – Michael Jackson, Rat in My Kitchen – Sleepy John Estes, Great King Rat – Queen, One Brown Mouse – Jethro Tull, Rats – The Kinks, Rats in the Cellar – Aerosmith, Rat Trap – The Boomtown Rats, Rat Race – The Specials, I Think I Smell a Rat – The White Stripes, Rat – Train, My Pet Rat St. Michael – Mark Eitzel, Rats – Pearl Jam, Ghost – Rats, I Came As a Rat – Modest Mouse, King Rat – Modest Mouse, Year of the Rat – Tristania, Rats – Say Anything, Muskrat Ramble – Louis Armstrong, Cheesy Rat Blues – L.L. Cool J, Mighty Mouse Tesla, Rat Race – Bob Marley, Decadence in the House of Rats – Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean, Bullet With Butterfly Wings – The Smashing Pumpkins, Rats Eyes – Black Flag, Like Rats – Godflesh, The Rat – The Walkmen, Rats!Rats!Rats! – Deftones, Rats – Clutch, Return of The Rat – Wipers/covered by Nirvana, Rat in Mi Kitchen – UB40, and 4 songs by the Grateful Dead He’s Gone – Throwing Stones – Wave That Flag – Wharf Rat.  We will finish off the year with December 28, 2025 – Tunes about rodents suggested by Clive of Take It Easy.

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  15. This was the first time I had ever heard anything by this incarnation of Fleetwood Mac- as I was like 14 when Rumors was released- so that was my introduction. Both wonderful choices- and you were right to warn us of scary Ian Anderson! Those eyes! Why he never made a horror flick is beyond me.

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    • This was the middle incarnation of Fleetwood Mac. When they were Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac they had several hit singles here: Albatross, Oh Well, Green Manalishi, and one of my all time top two favourites – by anyone – Man Of The World. They also did the original of Black Magic Woman – far better than Santana’s cover.

      Ian Anderson is still a character – I’ve seen them live and his between songs chats are very funny.

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