This ‘mothball’ website is the archive for hotlipsmusic.net, which closed down in April 2023. Thanks to all the contributors and everyone who has taken an interest.
What a great song! Originally written and released by Norman Greenbaum in 1969, this has become a rock standard, with other cover versions by Doctor and the Medics and Gareth Gates . Greenbaum (who was raised Jewish) apparently wrote the song in about fifteen minutes, blending some generic gospel sentiments from music he had heard on TV with wording that he had spotted on a greetings card about native American beliefs. Greenbaum had been a working musician in the folk style for years, playing with Dr. West’s Medicine Show & Junk Band, who released the novelty song ‘The Eggplant That Ate Chicago’. It looks fair to say that the religious message of the Spirit In The Sky did not draw on the composer’s deep personal convictions. And yet …
Something about it captured a popular sentiment – a lingering hope for life in the hereafter based on half-remembered Christian beliefs; Greenbaum says Spirit In The Sky is still one of the most requested songs for use at funerals. Now, over fifty years after the original release, the song is used as a clap along crowd pleaser as in this performance by Evol Walks.
There is a complicated interaction between the composer’s original, conscious intent and the influences received during the writing and created by the performance. Then, much later. the song is performed by someone else in a different situation and the song gains a new meaning for that time, place, performer and audience. When Greenbaum wrote the song in late 60’s America, there was ongoing racial tensions and other civil rights campaigns, the background nuclear terror of the Cold War, the triumph of the moon landing, the Woodstock festival and the grinding horror of the ongoing Vietnam war.
So maybe the song is a real prayer, if you make it a real prayer for you. I hope you do.
Here’s a song we shared at a recent online ‘On The Edge Together’ session.
My song was Elvis singing Always on my mind. Chose it as I loved the emotion he was portraying in his voice, and the feeling of love which I feel transfers to other listeners. Sung with love, passion and feeling, reminding me of how Jesus was.
Kos Kailou
“And now I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” John 13:34
This piece is a best-selling modern pop song based on an Old Testament lament from Psalm 137. Jewish exiles weep for their beloved city Jerusalem, from which they had been torn and transported to Babylon. The verses were set to music nearly 200 years before McClean recorded it, and I first heard it. The modern version has a few differences, and is built up in layers of a single voice with a minimal, repetitive banjo accompaniment. It is very short, and the result is hauntingly beautiful. It’s adapted from the original 4-part canon by Philip Hayes of 1786.
This song reminds me that lament has always been a vital feature of Jewish and Christian worship and prayer. When we are in despair, we can cry out to God and be assured that he hears us – because, as the story of Christmas and Easter tells us, in Jesus he weeps with us.
Here’s Lenny Kravitz Live in Hyde Park, 9th September 2018. Look at the size of the crowd. The landlord would definitely book you again if you brought that number of customers in to buy the beer! Anyway, the audience are loving it and singing along.
What a star! Lenny won the Grammy award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance four years in a row from 1999 to 2002. Early in his career he played support for greats like David Bowie, Bob Dylan and Tom Petty. The Virgin record label president described him as ‘Prince meets John Lennon’.
Lenny identifies as a Christian according to Wikipedia, and there is definitely a religious message in this song. In a 2018 Guardian interview, he explains that it is about Jesus Christ. My reading of the lyrics is that they are sung actually in the persona of Jesus, who is making an appeal to us, the listeners, for a faith commitment. I wonder if the crowd singing along understood that or what it might cost?
Special bonus – here’s the official music video – 47 million views and counting. Love those dreads.
The video here is of The Police performing at the Oakland Coliseum, California USA on 10th September 1983. This chilling song had been omitted from what was to be their last studio album, Synchronicity, apparently for reasons of space on the vinyl release and it became instead the B side of the hit 45rpm single ‘Every Breath You Take’.
It was recorded in one live take at the AIR studios owned by legendary Beatles producer George Martin on the island of Montserrat. According to lyric-writer Sting, “A few years later this volcano would destroy half of Montserrat, but on this day it was just bubbling quietly and throwing up a strong smell of sulfur. The words formed in my head and that pungent smell of sulfur continued to cling to the song: Jimmy Swaggart, the TV evangelist, publicly cited it as an example of the devil’s work. He condemned it colorfully while entirely missing its irony and its satirical content. The devil indeed!” Sulphur has long been associated with the devil and demons in folklore, suggesting the smell emanating from the fiery pits of Hell. [thanks for the help, Songfacts].
I love the unusual jazz style chord progression – I’d like to play the song but I’m not sure about BbMaj#11, nor indeed F#7#9! The guitar has a lot of flange effect on it which creates a slightly disturbing sense that the pitch is never quite right.
Much more disturbing are the lyrics and the message of the song. To my reading it is a clear criticism of the UK government and the way in which it’s policy had caused distress and even death. In 1982 unemployment stood at over three million partly as a result of Thatcher’s de-industrialisation strategy with whole regions blighted by decline and poverty. I think we are still living with the consequences forty years later.
Today I read desperate news headlines: migrants in small boats who have drowned attempting to reach safety in England, starving babies in Afghanistan and thousands dying from Covid in poor countries where the vaccines have not been made available. It’s not inevitable, or just ‘how it is’. It is because powerful governments and leaders have decided to make it so. It’s murder by numbers.
But you can reach the top of your profession
If you become the leader of the land
For murder is the sport of the elected
And you don’t need to lift a finger of your hand
Justice is a recurring theme in the Bible and I have selected only one passage to represent it all. The prophet is speaking to the whole nation and its leaders whose “hands are covered in blood” in the book of Isaiah chapter 1. God help us.
This song came out in 1980, but the video here is at a concert in Berlin in 1995. I like this song because it has something to say and I sometimes use it in my live sets (it’s also easy to play and in my vocal range!).
Hungry Heart is one of Bruce Springsteen’s concert staples, and you can find several live versions online. As his career progresses, you can see him playing in increasingly large venues and the song becomes a sing-along crowdpleaser where everyone knows the words.
I think it is interesting to contrast the happiness of Bruce on stage, and the enjoyment of the audience with the fairly grim confession and insight in the lyrics.
Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack
Took a ride and I never went back …
For me, the song seems to connect with this gospel incident: Matthew 9:35-36.
Okay, I know it’s a cliched Disney track (Brother Bear 2003) and didn’t get the reviewers buzzing with excitement. “Allmusic described the song as a “future American Idol standard…devoid of craftsmanship”, adding it “positively radiate[s] Hollywood gloss — it’s simply indicative of pop culture’s voracious appetite for audio fast food”. Wikipedia
However, that doesn’t stop it from being a song that is meaningful to the listener. As a huge Phil Collins fan, who loves vocal harmony and a mean saxophone, it gets a thumbs up from me anyway!
“There’s a better place somewhere out there.
Ooh, just take a look through my eyes…
everything changes, you’ll be amazed what you’ll find if you look through my eyes.
So don’t run, don’t hide. It will be alright, you’ll see.
Trust me I’ll be there watching over you
Over the years I have appreciated the perspectives of friends and family who have been able to see a bigger picture. When my marriage ended I remember my brother telling me that one day I would be able to see things much more clearly; that it wouldn’t always feel like that. But what about an even bigger picture? It led me to read again one of the Psalms which talks about God seeing our thoughts, our actions, our circumstances. Psalm 139 v 3, 11, 12
You notice everything I do and everywhere I go.
Suppose I said, “I’ll hide in the dark until night comes to cover me over.” But you see in the dark because daylight and dark are all the same to you.
When all I want to do is run away and hide; when it feels like the present moment is just too overwhelming; when I just don’t understand what is happening…these are the times to have just a glimpse at how God views some things, because it helps to have someone around who can see the big picture; much deeper than the surface; much further than the horizon; much wider than our limited viewpoints.
This song is one of the all-time electronica/trance greats and so there are several versions and remixes available. One of the best is a live performance by the Dutch DJ Tiësto (here) which captures the excitement and immersion of the collective dance experience.
In the spirit of choosing the road less travelled however, I have used a different version here. This video comprises clips from the Japanese role-playing computer game Final Fantasy VIII, in which heroes battle a great evil, but also have to deal with their own relationships and internal struggles [sounds familiar?]. The song matches the images of tension and yearning so well that it could have been part of the original soundtrack (an epic in its own right), but it was not – the editor has just made a really good montage that is a sympathetic interpretation of the music.
This mix is the original from the 1997 album ‘Karma’ and it opens with Gregorian chant: ‘Gloria in excelsis Deo’ – glory to God in the highest which sets the scene for the singer to tell of her personal religious journey –
Heaven holds a sense of wonder And I wanted to believe That I’d get caught up When the rage in me subsides
In this white wave I am sinking In this silence In this white wave In this silence I believe
There seems to be an ironic contrast between the noise of the dance floor and a search for tranquility, yet for some people this could be a path towards God. The insistent rhythms of the trance style can have a calming effect leading to an inner peace and then, when the clamour has died away – ‘In this silence I believe’. It reminds me of this encounter between the God and the prophet Elijah:
“Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. (I Kings 19:11-12)
When I first heard this song, I was so surprised and puzzled by the strong emotional effect it had on me that I wanted to look into it further.
It was written by Carly Simon for the film ‘Working Girl’, a romantic comedy set in 1980s New York. The plot has a young woman secretary who is unfairly treated find justice and achieve success. Here we see Carly Simon singing interspersed with scenes from the film’s opening where workers are making their commute by ferry across the river to Manhattan. In the background is the Statue of Liberty and ahead of them the ‘silver city’. On the surface then, it is about their aspirations to succeed in the big city – materially and maybe romantically too.
For me though, the song transcends this context and speaks of a yearning that goes beyond hopes for material wealth or security. The words ‘New Jerusalem’ immediately lead us towards religious ideas.
Let The River Run was taken up as a theme by the international Women’s March in January 2017, held the day after the inauguration of President Trump in America to protest against his anti-women and anti-human rights policies. It seems to fit the great flow of humanity, joining together like tributaries into a mighty river surging towards justice.
The Bible has many references to rivers, but here is a famous quote from the prophet Amos:
Credit to BBC Soul Music Series 27, broadcast on 23 January 2019