tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3637487074030262802.post8679109904301916735..comments2022-03-20T11:27:27.777-07:00Comments on The drunkenness of things being various: ABC - All Of My Heart (1982/ No. 5/ 8 weeks/ Neutron)Billy Smarthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11808866217501456210noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3637487074030262802.post-42344207165935381072011-02-26T16:30:58.487-08:002011-02-26T16:30:58.487-08:00Yes, '4 Ever 2 Gether' is odd, isn't i...Yes, '4 Ever 2 Gether' is odd, isn't it? I always find it a bit ugly-sounding, frankly. It feels like 'Beauty Stab' has arrived 18 months early to me!<br /><br /> I only ever hear that song as something of an afterthought. When I listen to Lexicon of Love I'm still reeling from the breathtaking effect of 'All Of My Heart' when it plays... Just when '4 Ever 2 Gether' starts to grate with me then we get the wonderful outro, which I imagine as the end credits theme.<br /><br /> I'm not quite sure that I've ever really heard Martin Fry as a storytelling songwriter, more as a drama student spinning out a series of evocative phrases and images for spectacular emotional effect, songs about the idea of being in love as much as the narrator's actual experiences with women. This is probably largely because I was nine when this album came out.Billy Smarthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11808866217501456210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3637487074030262802.post-23136761231092110492011-02-26T15:33:55.801-08:002011-02-26T15:33:55.801-08:00Not sure you've cracked this one. (Maybe it ca...Not sure you've cracked this one. (Maybe it can't be cracked - the second verse may have just needed more work by Fry to be coherent.) You make a good fist of saying the second verse is a reverie/flash-back to the salad days of the relationship we're at the end of in the verse 1, but it's as least as natural to imagine the situation in verse 2 as temporally in sequence as follows: <br />Fry is trying to be friends with his former beloved (they didn't work out but she's remains the most interesting, fascinating person he's ever known or probably ever will know), including allowing himself to be hooked up by her for dates with other gals (her friends say). She, of course, being Ms Wonderful has many new suitors and is well and truly moving on. Fry and his former beloved, then, are both back on 'the market' (so there's a weird symmetry and intimacy between them still) but she's ahead of him as always, and Fry's stuffed. He's not going to be able to cope with seeing her getting dolled up and going out with others so he's reduced to arguing (pathetically) that she's going to lose his friendship and in any case her new thing inevitably will fall apart anyway, and be a disappointment to her,so what will she have gained?<br /><br />Other readings of verse 2 are possible including (but not limited to) yours, but I doubt whether any reading that excludes my basic picture can be right.<br /><br />Which brings up my other main point. You seem to have the running order of Lexicon of love wrong. You say AOMH comes after 8 tracks and 35 minutes, but it doesn't. It comes after 7 tracks and 30 minutes (the whole of Lexicon is only 37 minutes, and 4 Ever 2 Gether and the outro Look of love come after AOMH). My way of reading AOMH fits well with 4 Ever coming next: what *is* that song? I used to think it was Fry's vengeful fever-dream of Ms Wonderful's next relationship falling apart,but now I tend to think it's just Fry brooding, angry probably sloppy drunken, embarrassing scene-making out (possibly involving treating his own date shabbily and stupidly confronting Ms W and her beau out somewhere - 2's a party 3 a crowd you'd be surprized what gets allowed - all in The Tatler meets Fellini finery).<br /><br />Lastly note how Lexicon gradually becomes Ann Dudley's record. Her contribution is a good 30% of AOMH and then she finally gets a writing credit for 4 Ever.plaguehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04079889317620618164noreply@blogger.com