Desde Chernobil queremos rendir un sentido homenaje a una de las mejores bandas de todos los tiempos, que no son otros que los épicos, genuinos, inclasificables e irremplazables New Model Army. El grupo surge en Bradford (Inglaterra) en 1980, fruto de las maquinaciones artísticas de Justin Sullivan (letrista y vocalista), Stuart Morrow (virtuoso del bajo) y Phil Tompkins (batería pronto reemplazado por Rob Waddington). Por el grupo han pasado otros componentes cuyos nombres no nos vamos a alargar ennumerando, pero pese a ello el estilo se ha mantenido bastante fiel a sus orígenes, exceptuando la lógica evolución en cuanto a calidad técnica, arreglos y ampliaciones instrumentales más elaboradas con el paso del tiempo. El nombre del grupo viene de un ejército revolucionario profesional de mercenarios de la Inglaterra de Cromwell que jugó un decisivo papel en las guerras civiles a mediados del siglo XVII.
NMA es un recorrido por la historia y la leyenda, la denuncia de un mundo de incomunicación, de cazadores y cazados, proyectando hacia nuestros tímpanos ecos de antiguas guerras del norte, tropas civiles en busca de liberación, echando por tierra dogmas de fe y levantando la voz contra la hipocresía de la vacua vida moderna de conformismo y alienación. Este grupo nos transporta a lugares y épocas que van del medievo al ahora, de poblados desérticos en tierras árabes a las verdes y frías montañas escocesas, de las entrañas al corazón del imperio, de la prisión al campo de batalla, de los rincones de la memoria infantil a la inminencia del ocaso. No faltan tampoco gritos de rabia, esperanza y revolución. Temas universales que no entienden de razas, religiones o condición, con los que cualquiera podría identificarse allá donde esté.
Canciones como '51's State', cuya letra está escrita por Ashley Carwright de The Shakes, les llevó a convertirse en una banda de culto en el movimiento antiimperialista al otro lado del charco, aunque también dificultó la concesión de giras al grupo en tierras yankis. En cuanto a estilos o géneros, sería muy difícil catalogarlos, pues cabalgan entre rock duro, folk céltico, rock gótico, paisajes ambientales de corte épico o incluso punk o rock más melódico. Sus letras están rebosantes de carga poética y compromiso político, no cayendo nunca en el panfleto o la obviedad. NMA siempre han sabido mantenerse fieles a su estilo, alejado a buen recaudo de la comercialidad que casi todo lo acaba estropeando. No obstante, cuentan con un público incondicional en buena parte del globo, especialmente en EEUU. Inexplicablemente, no tanto en España. El 5 de Noviembre de 2009 tuvimos la suerte de verles en directo en una pequeña sala del madrileño barrio de Carabanchel (Sala Live) con un público bastante limitado, y escuchar temazos legendarios como 'Vagabonds', 'The Charge', 'Here Comes the War' o 'The Hunt' a cuatro o cinco metros del grupo fue toda una descarga y un auténtico privilegio. Por una vez, y sin que sirva de precedente, no nos vamos a enrollar contando biografías y vamos a limitarnos a adjuntar la discografía básica y algunos vídeos, directos o audios con sus respectivas letras que hablan por sí mismas. Grandes NMA.
A Liberal Education (Sullivan/Morrow, 1981)
Take away our history
Take away our heroes
Take away our values
And leave us here with nothing
We were in the garden of Eden
Just as children mess around
We only leant against the tree
And the apple came tumbling down
You gave us what we asked for
But never what we wanted
We were only children
How could you have been so stupid
We went up to the steel walls
That guard the sacred town
We only whispered to ourselves
And the walls came tumbling down
We didn't want a victory
We just wanted to fight
But you wouldn't fight
You just gave in
You went and spoiled every game
You broke an everlasting chain
And nobody respects you for your weakness
Then say be yourself, please yourself
Express yourself some more
It's your right to do what you like
Because we can't really be bothered with you at all
We didn't want a victory
We just wanted to fight
But you wouldn't fight
You said it isn't nice to fight
You went and spoiled every game
You broke an everlasting chain
And nobody respects you for your weakness
_________________________________
No Rest for the Wicked (EMI, 1985)
Frightened (Sullivan/Morrow, 1984)
It's all out on the streets today but you, you've found a place to hide
Too busy with the ratrace, you pass by on the other side
Yours is the face of the brand new Britain with blinkers on your eyes
Find yourself position and cling on for dear life
You're so frightened, everybody's so frightened
The papers tell of rape and murder, everything that you want to hear
Bad tidings on the radio - you find a way to name your fear
So you never pick up hitchhikers, never talk to strangers
Believe the world outside your bolted door is evil
You're so frightened, everybody's so frightened.
You are just a victim of your own bad dreams
While people are the same as we've always been
But through the blindness in your eyes
For just one minute I see them shine
Love me . . won't you love me? But they all turn away
You never fight for anything, you always turn your face away
And you never get involved in trouble let all evil have it's way
So as the girl screams in the street below, you turn up the television
Perhaps you'll see it on the news - well it's nothing to do with you
You're too frightened, everybody's so frightened
Why is everybody so frightened?
_________________________________
The Ghost of Cain (EMI, 1986)
The Hunt (Sullivan/Heaton) 1986
We went into town on the Tuesday night
Searching all the places that you hang about
We're looking for you
In the back street cellar dive drinking clubs
In the discotheques and the gaming pubs
We're looking for you
You will pay the price for my own sweet brother
And what he has become
And a hundred other boys and girls
And all that you have done
We picked up the trail at the Seven Crowns
One of your cronies, he was doing your rounds
We followed him
Just a silhouette figure up Market Pass
Where the headlamps shine on the broken glass
We followed him
Over the bridge by the old canal
Where the shadows dance on the lighted wall
He stopped to light up a cigarette
And we dived into a doorway
Ch: No police, no summons, no courts of law
No proper procedure, no rules of war
No mitigating circumstance
No layers fees, no second chance
There are lasses getting trouble on their own home beat
There are old folk battered in the open street
In this city of hours
There are eyes that see but say nothing at all
There are ears that hear but they don't recall
In this city of hours
So we followed your man back to your front door
And we're waiting for you outside
'Cause not everybody here is scared of you
Not everybody passes on the other side
Ch: No police, no summons, no courts of law . . .
And we could spend our whole lives waiting for some thunderbolt to come
And we could spend our whole lives waiting for some justice to be done
Unless we make our own
Thunder and Consolation (EMI, 1989)
Vagabonds (Sullivan) 1987
We follow the tail-lights out of the city
Moving in a river of red
As the colours fade away from the dusky sunset
We roll for the darkness ahead
Ch: We are old, we are young, we are in this together
Vagabonds and children, prisoners forever
With pulses a-raging and eyes full of wonder
Kicking out behind us again
Night-time City Beat the radio is calling
The lost and lonely in vain
Out here we are running for the wide open spaces
The road-smell after the rain
Ch: We are old, we are young, we are in this together
Vagabonds and children, prisoners forever
With pulses a-raging and eyes full of wonder
Kicking out behind us again
And watching as a boy alone at the quayside
The ships loading cargo in the night
Their names all calling to faraway places
The years go past, the miles go by
And still this childhood romance will not die
Impurity (EMI, 1990)
Purity (Sullivan) 1990
The rains move in eastwards, in waves of succession
Drawing lines of grey across the sky
With history just as close as a hand on the shoulder
In hunger and impatience we cry
The battle against corruption rages in each corner
There must be something better, something pure
And the call it is answered from the caves to the cities
Come the dealers of Salvation on Earth
We've seen the restless children at the head of the columns
Come to purify the future with the arrogance of youth
Nothing is as cruel as the righteousness of innocents
With automatic weapons and a gospel of the truth
Ch: Revolution for ever, succession of the seasons
Within the blood of Nature, all raised to rot and die
This purity is a lie
Now immaculate conception in sterilised laboratories
How the vanity goes on
Or in the message of the preacher with his morals and obsessions
The wars that we wage upon ourselves
Purity is a virtue, purity is an angel
Purity is for madmen to make fools of us all
So forgive yourself my friend, all this will soon be over
What happened here tonight is nothing at all
Ch: Revolution for ever . . .
I will always see Brendan at that broken down piano
His fingers thick and red, shaking on the keys
Battered by the years of alcohol and working
Still playing with the faith that never leaves
So sit us down, buy us a drink, tell us a good story
Sing us a song we know to be true
I don't give a damn that I never will be worthy
Fear is the only enemy that I still know
_________________________________
Here Comes The War (Sullivan/Heaton/Nelson) 1992
Today, as you listen to this song
Another 394,000 children were born into this world
They break like waves of hunger and desire upon these eroded shores
Carrying the curses of history and a history yet unwritten
The oil burns in thick black columns, the buzz saws echo through the forest floor
They shout give us our fair share, give us justice
Here comes the war
On a grey morning to the south of here
Two young men in makeshift uniforms peer into the misty light
And figures dart behind the trees
As a snap of rifle rounds echoes out across the fields
They hardly know their sacred mother tongue but they know their duty
To defend the flag hanging limp and bloody above the village church
While a thousand miles away, in a warehouse complex down by the river,
Young money men play paintball games
Here comes the war - put out the lights on the Age of Reason
So blow out the candle and tell us another of those great stories,
the ones about serial killers. Let dreams flow into savage times.
Do you hear the sirens scream across the city?
We've had three hot nights in succession - the riot season is here again
Dear Lord, lead us back into the Valley of the Shadow of Death,
Here comes the war. Did you think we were born in peaceful times?
Faster, faster, like a whirling dervish spinning round
Faster, faster, until the Centre cannot Hold
You screamed give us Liberty or give us Death
Now you've got both, what do you want next ?
Here comes the war - put out the lights on the Age of Reason.
________________________________________
Curse (Sullivan/Heaton) 1990
Another foggy night in hometown
Cruising the backstreet pubs with a friend or two
I guess we were laughing how we made it through the bad old days
When across the bar I caught a glimpse of you
Sometimes they ask me why I don't sit with you
I guess they'll never understand
I don't need to have my heart broken another time
Or to have to shake your useless wasted hand
So tell me - what do you dream about?
And tell me - how do you shut it all out?
And how do you live with yourself now?
And I hope that she's really happy now
Now she's got her cake and she went and ate him too
Heads down, out on 47 Poison Street
With all the ghosts just sitting there with you
Beethoven - he was a deaf man
And Jesus Christ was a Jew
But of all those little twists of irony -
My favourite one is you
And if our eyes ever have to meet for more than just one second
Then if you weren't already there, I would tell you to go to hell
But if I spent my whole damn life trying to think of a curse for you
It would never be as bad as the curse that you dealt to yourself
So tell me - what do you dream about?
And tell me - how do you shut it all out?
And how do you live with yourself now?
What do you dream about?
And how the hell do you shut it all out?
And what do you feel about it now?
_________________________________
Wonderful Way To Go (Sullivan/Heaton) 1996
The wolf he howls, howls up at the moon,
out on the steps beneath my hotel room.
Was in the woods behind this little town
we went flying up through the silhouette trees,
then crashing down. Colours brighter than I've ever seen,
More wired than I've ever been - and the faces turn to stone . . .
On through the gates again - what a wonderful way to go . . .
What a wonderful way to go.
Tell me your story, tell me no lies;
we touch each other - but only with our eyes.
Some kind of game, to play with desire;
it's just beneath the skin that I'm alive.
Colours brighter than I've ever seen - more wired than I've ever been
And the faces turn to stone - on through the gates again;
what a wonderful way to go - what a wonderful way to go.
Tonight the moon, she lays a silver path across the blackened sea,
I'm swimming out against the tide, the waves are breaking over me;
and deep beneath the waters in the darkness I can hear her
as she calls for me to come. . .
The wolf he howls, howls up at the moon;
some day coming - some day soon
Onto his shoulder, to carry me home;
flying up through the silhouette trees and we'll be gone
Colours brighter than I've ever seen - more wired than I've ever been;
And all the faces turn to stone - on through the gates again . . .
What a wonderful way to go - what a wonderful way to go . . .
________________________________
Eight (Atack Attack, 2000)
Orange Tree Roads (Sullivan, 1999)
It was late, we were driving home in the rain
I thought I saw something flying across the two-lane
It was white like an angel - or like curse
There and gone in a second in front of us
In our house all the trophies are gathering dust
All the things we remember - but only just
We won't need them anymore
Ch: Once we were lost but we can be found
On the Orange Tree trail, on the roads heading south
Standing in the sun, in the fields of grain
Will you still love me when everything is changed?
In the shadows of the mountains we were watching the sky
Hale Bopp flying motionless out across the night
You turned to me and said with a smile
Everything these days seems to be some kind of sign
No one cares anymore where you've been
So you find a quiet place to shed that old skin
You won't need it again
Ch: Once we were lost but we can be found
On the Orange Tree trail, on the roads heading south
Standing in the sun, in the fields of grain
Will you still love me when everything is changed?
_________________________________
Lost Songs (Attack Attack, 2002)
Brother (Sullivan/Heaton/Nelson, 1995)
It's been a long dry season in tinderbox town
And the ghetto cars go cruising up and down and round and round
With tinted windows and the screech of tires
Poverty likes to ride in the best disguise
The boys get bored, set fire to the sheds at the end of my street
The thick black smoke rises up into the dusk
Sirens scream out across the hills
Turn into the close as the boys all swagger.
I've got no quarrel with you brother
But the war is getting closer
Down at the Union there we stood
And embraced like brothers should
The fire catches when your back is turned
And now we watch as the city burns
And now we watch as the city burns
We used to joke about the colour of our skins
We used to joke about the names of God
But now the racist cops come round
Put your cousin up against the wall
A little crowd gathers round and takes up sides
The white trash come out of their doorways and mutter
There's a macho stand off with sullen faces all around
And all the middle ground is washing away
And no one really wants it there anyway
It's a time of pack dogs brother
And the war's getting closer
Down at the Union there we stood
And embraced like brothers should
The fire catches when your back is turned
And now we watch as the city burns
And now we watch as the city burns
And I, I accuse you, you want so much
But you give nothing of yourself
And I, I believe you, you want so much
But you keep nothing of yourself
Too Close To The Sun (Sullivan, 2005)
I stared at the mountain, the mountain stared at me
I couldn't hold its gaze, I couldn't bare what I might see
Tell Mary I never chose to come but all too late
This time the time has chosen me
The fields of ice are blinding white, the crystal light so piercing
There's no air for us to breathe
Too close to the sun
Burning up, bleaching out
Too close to the sun
The calling has always been the same
To the source of light and beauty cast upon our lives
And desert hippies, warrior monks, addicts all
staring out from hollowed eyes
With melting wax and feathers falling
And far below the old world turning sad and slow
Too close to the sun
Burning up, bleaching out
Too close to the sun
Sweat cold upon my skin and pounding in my chest
Reaching out to touch - too high too far too fast too much
Too close to the sun
_________________________________
High (Attack Attack, 2007)
You saw a crack of light or was it a cause to follow?
You've been chasing ever since around these streets
For just the promise of a promise and nothing more to keep
You drove us like a crazy man through those narrow cobbled streets
You said "there's nothing to fear" and we all smiled
Round and round in that little car while the city lay asleep
The city lay asleep
With sky in your eyes, shy in your eyes
high on a cliff above the opal sea
And watched as the angry storms chased around the bay
and suddenly the wind rose up and the thunder cracked
and you looked like you were home with your
weather-beaten face fixed in some kind of ecstasy
When the lightning hit the road just a few yards away
We all jumped up and shouted out but you never moved
Just stared ahead like you'd seen a ghost
So who was the ghost?
And one part standing here with sky in your eyes
With the sky in your eyes, with the sky in your eyes
With your own colours tied to the mast
Setting sail for the far side of anywhere
Beyond and behind your thousand yard stare
With the sky in your eyes, with the sky in your eyes
Mambo Queen Of The Sandstone City
(Sullivan / Nelson / Dean / White / Gill) 2009
I get lost in the maelstrom
I lose concentration
I see fish in the water
But too fast for me
So I go climbing up the long road
That leads out to the backstreets
And in a great walled garden
Is the place that I'm looking for
I've come to see...
The Mambo Queen of the Sandstone city
She sees things that I cannot see
Breaks it down like a true punk rocker
Because nothing is ever what it seems
She's got a puritan angel
She brought back from the Congo
He stands guard over the virgins
He stands watching in my dreams
She sculpts things in the garden
Where there are trees full of wind-chimes
They start ringing when she walks by
Like a wild weather warning
She's the Mambo Queen of the Sandstone city
She reads signs that I cannot see
Breaks it down like a true punk rocker
To splinters of mirror glass at my feet
And I have always loved her
I just didn't realise
It's a world full of curses
That we carry to the grave
But she knows all about that
She takes weight from my shoulders
She breathes fire on the deadwood
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario