Favorite track on Peace and Love

[philipchevron]

Steve wanted to call the album World Music

I think Hell's Ditch deserves this title more that Peace and Love

Ok, but whether it does or not, Steve wanted to call it WORLD MUSIC before World Music as a phrase or cultural reference point became common in the UK or, for that matter the World. It took off big time soon later, but at the time our album was released, it would still have been more associated with The Pogues than with a specialist page in Folk Roots. In the end, we felt it was asking too much of both the phrase and the intentions the phrase was intended to convey.

So we called it LOVE AND PEACE instead. And then reversed that for no particular reason, though traditionally, we have tended to accept all fictional ones as correct.

[Shaz]

I listen to Peace and Love a lot, and for me it's a pivotal album in The Pogues pushing the boundaries of (ahem) world music and proving that they couldn't be lazily pigeonholed as an entertaining thrash punk folk group with Irish influences. OK, so not all the songs on the album do work, but I'm glad they're there, if that makes sense.

Hell's Ditch is the album I listen to the least (aside from the final one which wasn't really The Pogues!) I like a lot of the songs on there (Summer in Siam is just so beautiful), but it never quite gelled for me. And I always remember a reviewer's comment about it being an album of Shane's holiday snaps.

[Shaz]

Just remembered, as well, the story of my brother buying a faulty copy of P&L from Virgin in Birmingham. He took the tape back and the bloke at the counter stuck it on, played a bit of Gridlock and said: "Ooh yes mate, it is faulty, isn't it? Go and get another off the shelf." My brother never had the heart to tell him that that wasn't the faulty track.

[AllBusiness37]

I'm a relatively young listener and, compared to a lot of you on this forum, a newer fan of the band. Peace and Love was the last Pogues album I picked up, and I have to admit, it was the hardest for me to get into. I initially got the brilliant first three albums, and what is there to say? There's no beating them. Hell's Ditch has a different worldly/pastoral/summer feel that has been discussed in-depth elsewhere, and while I feel that I'm able to appreciate the band's final two albums—because they do contain some really good songs—they certainly occupy the lowest positions of my ranking.

Peace and Love was a peculiar situation though. I had finally filled in the gap in the band's catalog that had been missing from my collection for so long. Like others have already said, Gridlock really impressed me upon first hearing it, like Metropolis taken to the next level, jazz-wise that is. I'd heard White City before, and I still thought it was a great song as I did when I first heard it. I don't know why, but it always seemed kind of short to me for some reason.

Young Ned of the Hill is good, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn't do the trick for me like other Terry Woods numbers do. I think this song works better live than on the album anyway. From taking a look at the CD sleeve with the lyrics laid out against a picture of a foggy bridge scene (which I assume is an actual photograph of the titular bridge), Misty Morning Albert Bridge seemed to me to have been intended as the "new" Fairytale of New York for Peace and Love, the new stirring romantic love song. It's a fine song, but I just can't get into it as much as I would have liked. Cotton Fields definitely rewards repeated listenings. I thought it was really weird the first time I heard it, and I still do. I love the continually descending melody.

Like someone commented earlier, Blue Heaven is just a fun song. I agree that it shouldn't be taken too seriously. Perhaps the lost rehearsal rendition of it could have been (if ever it was meant to be), but as for the album version, just sing along and have a laugh with it. I think Down All the Days falls short of the mark. I've said it before, but I feel like this song could have been really good. It just doesn't feel like it was every fully developed.

USA, however, has emerged as one of my top three favorites of Peace and Love, surprisingly. I never would have thought this would come to be the case upon my first hearing the song. It doesn't sound like anything the band had done up to that point. It's somewhat dark, gritty, rousing, boisterous, and dare I say, "epic." It brings to mind the drudgery of work and the summer’s heat. I love the imagery in the song. The cold bright needle metaphor, graveyards, maggots/gods, Shane's unique habit of switching pairs of words that would have made better sense the other way around (I "burned" across the delta. I "swam" across the ford.): It's just so damn good!

I like the power pop influences audible in Lorelei, and I think it fits well with the here and there nature of the album. I wish the vocals would have had a bit more of the grit and fury that I have heard Philip muster on live recordings. (I've at least heard some intense renditions of Thousands Are Sailing although maybe not Lorelei.) Gartloney Rats is a fun song, but it does seem to be kind of a parody of itself. It’s a fun song nevertheless. Boat Train is enjoyable in much the same way, but I like this one a bit more. I think it's a solid addition to the album.

Tombstone and Night Train to Lorca have never really grabbed me, but I do enjoy the atmospheric elements of the former. Finally, I think London You're a Lady is a great song as a whole. My comments on it are the same as those previously made by others. The melody is unbeatable, but the lyrics kind of waver. I cringe especially at the "Your piss is like a river..." part. Still, I think it's arranged beautifully, and I love the flow and structure of the song: simple intro, body with vocals, and the long instrumental conclusion. Along with USA and White City, I'd say it's among my favorite songs on Peace and Love.

I'm hesitant to suggest that the album may have been better with other songs or without any of the ones already on it because then it would indeed be a new album and not the Peace and Love that I know. Star of the County Down, the Limerick Rake (maybe a bit more beefed up), Train of Love, and Everyman is a King are all awesome songs, and perhaps they could have served the album well, but we have what is. Overall, I enjoy Peace and Love, but it took me a while to arrive at this point. It eventually won me over. One can easily enough observe the band’s development from Red Roses for Me through If I Should Fall from Grace with God, and it’s an interesting and rewarding progression. However, I’m glad that Peace and Love was not simply “If I Should Fall from Grace with God, Part 2.” Regardless of the issues some may take with the album, as a fan, I am glad the band offered us a change of pace.

[philipchevron]

Yeah, that would get confusing probably.

On the other hand, I´m not sure from which world it would be To me, it feels like some songs from urban background, but from different space (it may be the mix I guess). And at places, it feels damn cold, although the words are warm.

First three albums sound like irish, Ditch sounds more like mix of Asia and something, but I just can´t find a place where Peace and Love could "happen". Maybe UK...I know little things about feeling of the era - of course it´s being said and written, but it´s not the same as it´s being felt (and music can transmit that better than words I think).

When he puts a chorus or narrator type character in one of his plays, William Skakespeare often does so to focus our attention, not to further complicate the imminent difficulties which playwright and audience now face. Time himself, in The Winter's Tale goes to some lengths to explain his vital importance in the second half of the play. This is unexpected, not just because Shakespeare's skills as an author make us rather doubt that he should ever need to resort to Narration. But his very act of doing so creates precisely the effect he needs - and Brecht, a big Shakespeare man himself would, 400 years later describe this as the "alienation effect", a device by which you demand of your audience that a new level of concentration and perception is, if only temporarily, required of you. Equally, as Pyro appears to suggest, Shakespeare's command of music will find him other modes of secondary and primary storytelling as his writing career draws to a magnificent close. None of which has anything much to add to "P+L" but, well, it jut might.

[Pyro]

Yeah, that would get confusing probably.

On the other hand, I´m not sure from which world it would be To me, it feels like some songs from urban background, but from different space (it may be the mix I guess). And at places, it feels damn cold, although the words are warm.

First three albums sound like irish, Ditch sounds more like mix of Asia and something, but I just can´t find a place where Peace and Love could "happen". Maybe UK...I know little things about feeling of the era - of course it´s being said and written, but it´s not the same as it´s being felt (and music can transmit that better than words I think).

When he puts a chorus or narrator type character in one of his plays, William Skakespeare often does so to focus our attention, not to further complicate the imminent difficulties which playwright and audience now face. Time himself, in The Winter's Tale goes to some lengths to explain his vital importance in the second half of the play. This is unexpected, not just because Shakespeare's skills as an author make us rather doubt that he should ever need to resort to Narration. But his very act of doing so creates precisely the effect he needs - and Brecht, a big Shakespeare man himself would, 400 years later describe this as the "alienation effect", a device by which you demand of your audience that a new level of concentration and perception is, if only temporarily, required of you. Equally, as Pyro appears to suggest, Shakespeare's command of music will find him other modes of secondary and primary storytelling as his writing career draws to a magnificent close. None of which has anything much to add to "P+L" but, well, it jut might.

Well, that´s a very interesting point of view - and I believe there´s something about it. It probably felt weird at first, for people of Shakespeare era too, maybe some of them even didn´t realize the effect of such narrator.

Although it´s probably just me, P&L feels (it doesn´t sound, it just feels) like some King Crimson albums, which is strange, but I´m not the first one to say that. I guess there will be some connection with Lorca (oh, how I love this man) - as both bands have certain bonds to him.


Pogues24: I agree that Hell´s ditch is more "world music". And nice remark about Six to go - I see the opinion, it´s african, for the first time, but I can´t disagree.

[philipchevron]

and finally other global influences (Tombstone)

I've always understood "Tombstone" to be mainly Australian-influenced. Play it back to back with the Straight To Hell Returns version of "If I Should Fall From Grace With God", if you happen to have it.

[Pyro]

and finally other global influences (Tombstone)

I've always understood "Tombstone" to be mainly Australian-influenced. Play it back to back with the Straight To Hell Returns version of "If I Should Fall From Grace With God", if you happen to have it.

Yeah, but in Australia, there are people of many many countries from all over the world, so you´re both sort of right

[philipchevron]

and finally other global influences (Tombstone)

I've always understood "Tombstone" to be mainly Australian-influenced. Play it back to back with the Straight To Hell Returns version of "If I Should Fall From Grace With God", if you happen to have it.

Yeah, but in Australia, there are people of many many countries from all over the world, so you´re both sort of right

Yes that is so, but I rather think the image of "tombstone's against the sky" has more than a hint of the Aboriginal about it.

[Pyro]

Aha...I always imagined New York (or that sort of big city with lots of skyscrapers) about 50 years after people burned by H-bomb or that sort. Like last wakes of human civilization, which won´t be back (which is what tombstones are).

[philipchevron]

Aha...I always imagined New York (or that sort of big city with lots of skyscrapers) about 50 years after people burned by H-bomb or that sort. Like last wakes of human civilization, which won´t be back (which is what tombstones are).

Own it.

[The Duke of Ingmar]

And incidentally, the U2 connection mystefies me, truly!

Call me "The Mystifier".

I´m afraid I can´t quite remember why I got his connection. I think it was mostly the slow part of the song along with some of the more religiously flavoured lyrics ("my eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord").

[Pyro]

Aha...I always imagined New York (or that sort of big city with lots of skyscrapers) about 50 years after people burned by H-bomb or that sort. Like last wakes of human civilization, which won´t be back (which is what tombstones are).

Own it.

Uh...what? Sorry, english is my second language

[philipchevron]

And incidentally, the U2 connection mystefies me, truly!

Call me "The Mystifier".

I´m afraid I can´t quite remember why I got his connection. I think it was mostly the slow part of the song along with some of the more religiously flavoured lyrics ("my eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord").

I used to do quite a bit of hauling long discordant bluesy notes out of a dirty Gretsch put through a sustain pedal and then sent back through a scratchy Wah-Wah pedal. It gives a sort of - at least to my imagination - trapped wolf effect. I liked the idea of having a trapped wolf in the swamplands. I used this on "Cottin Fields" and to a greater extent, on "USA". I suppose it's almost the sort of thing you might hear from the Hedge, though I'm pretty certain his wolf would be a lot "cleaner", a lot more "digitally achieved", a sense that this beast has not yet gotten down with the other wolves.

[philipchevron]

Aha...I always imagined New York (or that sort of big city with lots of skyscrapers) about 50 years after people burned by H-bomb or that sort. Like last wakes of human civilization, which won´t be back (which is what tombstones are).

Own it.

Uh...what? Sorry, english is my second language

And American mine, sorry. If this is what the song tells you/says to you, then it's perfectly valid.