No Respects Rev.

(1)

The Lords of the Senses (2)
Were coming up
Typical side road
It was fast and cold
It was fast and cold
On a day of old
Georgioso, (3)
Coming down!
Had to move
Had to move
No respect for G.B. (4)
No respect
For the lonesome cove (5)
No respect
Laughing you go
Fast and cold
You go on your roads
Censoring yourself 
Embracing your curtailment  (6)
The judge of your soul, God
We appreciate him (7)
In twelve years of repast

For twelve years in fast
For twelve years in fast
For twelve years in fast
For twelve years in fast
Respects
Going around
Reverberating
In eldritch and neon
In Georgioso's realm
The god and the dashed
Damned
In the words of...aaa...
In twelve years
Do you take
And set up in some cove 
Location in Whitby (8)
Engländer Schweinhund
Why are you here?
Why are you here?
Why are you here?

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1. This song was the subject of a very confusing paragraph in The Independent-- there it is implied that the song is the result of a contract that almost produced one of the oddest cultural pairings one could imagine--the Fall and the Twilight franchise. But recent evidence suggests that this may have been a journalist being sloppy, or anyway struggling to follow MES's train of thought at a pub, as whichever band member operates the Imperial Wax Twitter account says the song was "Cowboy George." This still needs to be discussed here, because it is just possible that whichever band member that is misremembers. But note that the Independent story doesn't actually say that "No Respects Rev" is the song in question, so it is by far the weaker evidence. 

To add to the confusion, MES's comments seem to fit this song--both lyrically and musically--better than they do "Cowboy George." It also has to be considered whether it's possible he recycled the story and tailored it to fit the song under discussion:

["Jetplane"] still pales before “No Respects Rev”. This turbo-charged, two-note riot of sound and vocal confusion is ripped open in the middle by a wordless collage of whimpers, shrieks and moans. No one treads the twilight zone of sense and sound like Smith, and rarely has he done it with as much power. He cackles. “Our publisher got this deal with that film Twilight. They said they'd give us $50,000 to come up with a song. So I said, I'll give them some horror…”

The contract dictated payment whether they used the song or not. They didn't, of course. “They don't know anything about horror, do they? It might frighten the children. But it is frightening, isn't it? I've fulfilled my bargain with Satan…” He clears his throat, leans forward, gesticulates. “There's no way they're going to put that in Twilight. But if they were good, they would. Orson Welles would've done it. It's horror.” He growls out the word, as if grinding it to dust. “Their horror is some guy like him” – he gestures to some young men behind us – “wandering through a forest with his eyes glazed.”

Note the pivot from "twilight zone of sense and sound" to Twilight. 

The lyrics are mysterious and hard to work out, and it is possible, in light of all this, that the horror angle is a red herring (however, see note 8 below). In any case, this is unfortunately one of those cases where the reader may get less help from me than she came here looking for.

Since the title is "No Respects," rather than "No Respect" (which Rodney Dangerfield made famous as a catchphrase), it is possible that the meaning of the phrase is a refusal to pay respects. Thus, if it is a vampire story, perhaps what is intended is that the vampires do not pay respects to those they kill, having no respect for them, or that it is inappropriate to pay respects to someone who is thought to be dead, because they are in fact now a vampire, and not really dead after all. 

The song first appears as an instrumental, simply entitled "No Respects," which opens Re-Mit. I assume "Rev." stands for "Revisited."

Of course MES's taste in horror runs more to Lovecraft than Twilight, and as Zack points out, "eldritch" is one of Lovecraft's favorite adjectives (like "gibbous," as Zack also mentions).

I have left various vampire references in the notes below, but of course this was kind fo a desperate gambit to begin with! The lyrics are rather impenetrable.

^

2. "Lord of the Senses" is sometimes applied to Vishnu (the Indian city Rishikesh got its name from a reported theophany on the site; Rishikesh means "Lord of the Senses"). It seems to me this is more promising as a possible source for the phrase than it is as a clue to its meaning, however. Twilight vampires have enhanced perception, as is usual in such tales, and it is possible the appellation suggests something of that sort. As I suggested in note 1, however, I wouldn't bet the farm on it. 

It is also somewhat plausible to read Nietzschean themes into the lyrics; in that case we could read the "Lords" as something like the lords or nobles from the ancient world that Nietzsche describes in On The Genealogy of Morals, a type that recognizes itself as higher and more noble than its plebian counterpart, and showing "no respects" for those who "Go on your roads/Censuring yourself/Embracing your curtailment," which could be a description of the priestly type in Nietzsche. Furthermore, this would not be in contradiction with a vampire theme, since vampires in fiction often see themselves as a higher type living among bestial humans. If there is, indeed, any vampire connection at all (see note 1). It's easy to start seeing vampires when the suggestion has been made!
 
It has been suggested, however, that this is perhaps "The Lords of the census." This I doubt, but cannot refute... 

^

3. With a few exceptions, such as this one, I have mostly followed the first attempt at a transcription, by the27points on the Fall online forum,  which has "geology of soul" here. Smith's diction is fast and slurred, but it definitely sounds more like "Georgioso" (or Giorgioso). Trying to get something to fit (in perhaps the most misguided way possible--see note 1!), I discovered that one of the first historical personages to be suspected of being a vampire, one Jure Grando who lived in the 17th century in what is now Croatia, was originally buried, and subsequently confronted (according to legend) by a priest named Giorgio. This opens up another possible interpretation of the song's title: "No Respects, Rev[erend]."

Dannyno writes in the comment section: "Vlad the Impaler (aka Dracula) was most probably imprisoned at Oratia for 12 years. There is a place in Romania called Giurgiu. There is a statue of Vlad there, and somewhere in the area he was killed. Or 'killed.'"

Dan reports that on the "Mighty Fall" Facebook page, a photograph appeared with sheet of paper in Smith's handwriting that reads, more or less:

NO, RESPEKTS

Theme proposed.

For 'Twilight'

film.

It was fantastical [or fantastico ) ]

(Androgonronsou [Androngenous?]

georgioso

it was getting cold

It is even--remotely--possible MES got "Georgioso" from here and is having us on (very unlikely, but not unprecedented). If that's the case we must abandon all hope!

Bazhdaddy suggests that "Georgioso" is St. George. From Wikipedia:

"In the book Dracula by Bram Stoker, evil things are said to occur on St. George's Day, beginning at midnight. The date of St. George's Day presented in the book, 5 May (on the Western Gregorian calendar), is St. George's Day as observed by the Eastern Orthodox churches of that era.

(Excerpt from Dracula, 1897) 'Do you know what day it is?' I answered that it was the fourth of May. She shook her head as she said again: 'Oh, yes! I know that, I know that! but do you know what day it is?' On my saying that I did not understand, she went on: 'It is the eve of St. George's Day. Do you not know that tonight, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will have full sway?'"

Note I have "judge of your soul" 13 lines down (around note 7), which may also be "Georgioso." 

^

4.  Or "Judy," I guess; we had that for a few years. Both my ear and mind find "G.B." more likely, but it's hard to be sure. 

^

5. While this usage is now rare (except, apparently, in Australia), "cove" can mean a "chap," "fellow," or "dude."

However, this may mean a body of water (although it would be odd to have, or lack, respect for such), and perhaps even more specifically a cove in Whitby where Dracula made landing; see note 8 below.

Dan's comment comes pre-packaged with its own disclaimer:

"'The Secret of Lonesome Cove' is a 1912 novel by Samuel Hopkins Adams. I merely note the fact, which appears to be a red herring."

^

6. See note 2 above. It has been suggested that "censuring" may be "censoring," which my ears tell me is entirely possible.  ^

7. This echoes the "he is not appreciated" refrain of "Hip Priest" and "New Big Priest."  

^

8. Here we have a vampire connection: parts of Bram Stoker's classic horror story Dracula are set in Whitby, which is in Yorkshire. Dracula arrives in Whitby on a ship, having despatched the crew before landing. There is a "Smuggler's Cove" at Whitby. In 2012 there was a story in circulation about a real-life "Whitby Vampire" who had just arrived in town; the details of the story are the usual sort of thing, and no one seems to have taken it all that seriously.

^

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No Respects/No Respects Rev.: Fall Tracks A-Z

The Story of the Fall: 2013

The Tweet Re: Twilight and "Cowboy George":

Matt Melia‏ @DocMelia

@ImperialWaxBand Hello chaps. could you settle a fall related question for us? what was the track written for the Twilight film? was it one that ended up on Imperial Wax Solvent?

15:58 - 9. 2. 2019 od Lambeth, London

1.  
   • Imperial Wax‏ @ImperialWaxBand 10. 2.

     Víc

     Odpov?? uživateli @DocMelia

     We didn’t write it for the film. They wanted to use cowboy George exclusively for the film, meaning we would have to remove it from the album before it came out. Mark wasn’t keen.

   Note that "Cowboy George"  is on Your Future Our Clutter, not Imperial Wax Solvent.