Demon Lover

Zoë and I have been discussing dinosaurs and feathers and the likelihoods of different possibilities.

I think T-Rex is red. Because red is the color of DANGER!

Zoë's favorite song, these days, is "Demon Lover", off of Steeleye Span's Commoner's Crown. She can sing the chorus, winningly, with intermittent accuracy, as 4-years of age goes:

I'll show you where the white lilies grow
On the banks of Italy
I'll show you where the white fishes swim
At the bottom of the sea
Seven ships all on the sea
The eighth brought me to land
With four and twenty mariners
And music on every hand

She set her foot upon the ship
No mariners could behold
The sails were of the shining silk
The masts of beaten gold

That's the spirit!

Comments

[ben wolfson]

T-Rex is definitely green.

[Staircase Witch]

Sweet child, to be brought up on Steeleye Span. Guess it will be a while before you introduce her to Maddy Prior's version of "The Black Freighter," heh.

[ben wolfson]

So is "The Demon Lover" a version of "The House Carpenter" (or vice versa), or are they just very similar?

[Carlos]

Steeleye Span, eeeee. When Zoe is fifty-something, do you really want her to be listening to old Loreena McKennitt CDs, living alone in her house with her fifty cats?

At least dig out an old Comus album. Now that's kids' music!

[ben wolfson]

Yeah, if you can get Zoë singing "drip! drip! from your bloody lip!" or "yes, 'twould be a last physical communion" in Roger Wooton's goblinesque voice, you'll truly deserve some kind of parenting award.

[jholbo]

goblinesque! Good adjective! I'm not sure what "The House Carpenter" is. Carlos, we'll have to take our chances with the cats.

[ben wolfson]

The House Carpenter. Clarence Ashley does a good version, as do the Faun Fables. Compare this tale of James Harris.

[Daev]

Whee! Steeleye Span. That's the best music ever, the great secret that few (Americans, at least) know about.

I discovered Steeleye Span in college when an acquaintance of mine in the S.C.A. played me "All Around My Hat," and I couldn't get it out of my head for days. I hunted down a greatest-hits disc, which soon led me and a hard-core group of friends to hitting the music library at the U of Illinois, looking for the words and meanings of these strange and wonderful songs. (These were the days before the Web -- if you wanted to find it, you researched it.)

Investigating Steeleye Span led to Francis Child's books of ancient ballads in all their variants (and yes, "House Carpenter" is an Appalachian version of the original British "Demon Lover"). Then from there out to the world of old music and the traditional folk revival, modern Celtic bands and elderly rustics with incredible voices. It opens doors heading in all directions, all various flavors of cool.

It's really Steeleye Span, and the interests sparked by them and always returning to them, that drove me to study abroad in Britain, to visit the Hebrides and Cecil Sharp House, and to learn Welsh in rural Wales ... which led me to Berkeley and linguistics, which led me to Belle.

You are raising your children right. When they know Steeleye Span they'll never lack for friends and lovers. And they'll have the best songs to sing to their own kids.

[belle waring]

steeleye span is the greatest. I was raised on steeleye span, and things would have to go pretty far south for me to suddenly turn cat lady.

[Carlos]

Fair enough, Belle. Correlation does not imply causation, thank goodness.

I will say that I am often fairly creeped out by the uses of musical folk antiquarianism and revival. (I say this as an owner of a nice old 8-in-4-volume set of the Child ballads, which I keep next to my Vuk Karadzic. [Which are better.])

In some parts of the world, instead of being the music of choice of medieval studies majors whaling on each other with rattan sticks, it's accompanied death squads at work. Keeping the folk pure, you know.

On the other hand, Ceca! so maybe it does balance out.

[bob mcmanus]

"'twould be a last physical communion" in Roger Wooton's goblinesque voice"

Jeez, youse guys are tough. People who know the Comus lead singer and can quote lyrics off the top of their heads...I give up.

[Daev]

The idea of Steeleye Span fueled Death Squads is going to be haunting me all day.

Maybe it's just my limited understanding, but I always thought of death squad commandoes out in the hills of Guatemala and El Salvador killing off the "traditional folk." Or gunning down Victor Jara in Chile. Are there traddie armies who shoot you if you can't sing all
ten verses of "Thomas the Rhymer"?
Anyway, the old ballads are so strong and yet so remote that it seems like every seven years we get to go through another revival, when adventurous bands exploit the archives and young music fans get to discover just how cool this stuff is.

It happened with Uncle Tupelo when I was in school -- old-timey Appalachian meets hardcore punk -- but by that point I had already been through the Steeleye Span experience and wasn't impressed. (I'm changing my mind there since I got to hear "Anodyne.")

[Carlos]

The Balkans, Daev. Goodness, Ceca married Arkan, which is a little like Joan Baez marrying William Calley, if JB had great tracts of land and dressed to show it, and WC killed twenty times more people.

I should blog about the origins of the song Misirlou. It's enough to start another war. My money is on the surfers.

Also, if you want old music that will manipulate your spine in new ways, look up Geechie Wiley. She recorded three songs and vanished. I once played them for a friend whose musical tastes had been entirely formed by the German classical tradition. They shocked the hell out of him.

[Julian Elson]

Check out what T-Rexes look like when the weather is cold. You've seen a spherical, puffed-up bird, but have you seen a spherical, puffed-up t-rex?

http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/28884237/