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Laughs,
Giraffes & Epitaphs
Blackberries
Seasick
Clocks,
Cobwebs & Chalk
Retreat
Washing
Machine
Big
Dig
Rumble
Mountain
No
More Heroes
Residue
My
Sofa
Peg,
Picture, Piece - The Square Pegs
:- Some Answer & That Hammer;
Unfit!
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Rumble
Mountain
words
& music by Ed Hooke, 1991: recorded December 1994 - ©
Ed Hooke 1991
- dedicated to great societies past, present &
future
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E P I
T A P H
Back to being
an impressionable schoolboy
for the origins of this
song.
Tales of Pompei,
a city buried under the ash
of the
erupting volcano Vesuvius.
The theme and structure of this
song
are similar to those of
Clocks, Cobwebs & Chalk
- both feature 'flashbacks'
- or 'flashforwardses',
depending on
how you choose
to look at them.
Musically this song features
"a swarm of Bs"
in the "the higher they climb"
section, as well as a snippet
from a certain national anthem
which
suggests
an alternative historical context.
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We
have conquered Rumble Mountain.
Fine cloth and sweet wines have
we.
- shaped and fashioned precious metals
- trained the land
and tamed the sea.
Thus
read the inscriptions in books
on shelves in houses in the
dead town
where dwelt the people now forgotten
since Rumble
Mountain shook them down.
Glittering
treasures we have gathered
- sown seeds and reaped from the fields
-
coined the faces of our leaders
- suckled young with honey and
cream.
Such
words emblazoned stone tablets
and torn papyrus found in
the buried town
of a long past civilisation
since Rumble
Mountain shook them down.
And
the higher we climb the nearer comes the sky.
World history archivers
will marvel at this hour.
We stand outside the shadows cast by
heads that shake and sigh.
Such bountiful harvests do produce
a few grapes that are sour.
Nature
learned to be our servant.
Her offerings we graciously receive.
The
rumbles of our humble mountain
serve to fanfare all that we achieve.
These
faded impressions adorned
the walls in streets in what was
once a town.
Whoever dwelt there is long forgotten now
since
Rumble Mountain shook them down.
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