Mountain Energei
Lyrics
Mr Blairstowe and Mr Partridge (2)
They said to me
To get a mortgage
You need an income lid;
I thought it was free (3)
Dolly Parton and Lord Byron
They said patriotism is the last refuge
But now its me (4)
And water's flowing down the mountain
But a tree is blocking the water flowing
So I went fishing
A note from a fish said:
"Dear dope, if you wanna catch us
You need a rod and a line
Signed, the fish." (5)
Water is flowing down the mountain
But a tree is blocking the water flowing
Went to the car rental
They said to me
You need a log book and licence, son (6)
Water's flowing down the mountain
But a tree is blocking the water coming
Mountain energei
And water's flowing down the mountain
Notes
1. The word, as sung, is clearly "energy." "Energei," as far as I can discover, is not a word in any language; there is an Italian "Gruppo Energei," where the word is apparently a combination of "energia" and G.E.I., an acronym for a company name (however I haven't found any information about this in English so the details remain obscure). TamFG submitted an excellent comment about the word:
"With regards to note (1), it's probably worth pointing out that the German word for 'energy' ('Energie') is very nearly 'energei,' having only the last two letters exchanged. This would of course change the pronunciation of the German word entirely, but given Mark E. Smith's well documented fondness for bastardised German ("Bremen Nacht," "Reformation!" and "Das Vulture Ans Ein Nutter-Wain" being prime examples), there must be at least an outside chance that we have a similar situation here, even if there's nothing in the actual sung lyrics to suggest this."
The song is built around a Gary Glitter-style riff (see also "New Big Prinz" and "Glam-Racket"). However, the music was written by drummer Dave Milner, and in its original incarnation (an engaging recording in its own right) it doesn't have the Gary Glitter feel to it yet.
Rema999 captures a theme of the song in a very pithy remark: "I always thought the song is about repressed or inexpressed potential, on how society’s rules and mundane tasks can cripple or obstacle the free flowing of ideas."
2. I could not ascertain who, if anyone in particular, these two gentleman are. MES is asked about it in a 2004 interview with Left of the Dial:
Blairstone and Mr. Partridge...is that Blair? Is that a political song?
No, not really. It's an objective song. Started off with, mmm, seeing Britain, and I think you have it here [in the US], as well....you get it on TV, y'know, "you can have endless credit" and all that. (Pause) Where I live, and I'm sure everywhere, there's people who actually believe it, y'know. But also...for instance, in Manchester, you probably get that here as well, "Water was always free" where I live, y'know. [Did MES do that thing with his hands? Or did the interviewer think it was a banal statement, and tried to rescue it by putting it in quotes? There's no telling.]
So that's just metaphorical? It's not directly political?
It turns into a political song in America. [...] Yeah, I just think of it like, uh, your average fellow approaching...
3. From the titanic 2006-08-11 rendition in Oslo, "How many techinicians/Does it need [sic]/To set up a mic stand/I thought it was three."
The idea in the previous lines seems to me just to be "You need an income"; I don't know what "income lid" is. Charlie Hughes suggests MES is using Liverpool slang for "friend" or "mate"; the question then becomes whether MES would use "lid" in this sense. It's hard to endorse the idea, but I can't reject it either, and it does make sense of the lyric in just the way it seems to want to be made sense of...
4. They must have been quoting Samuel Johnson, who famously said "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." Bob Dylan also (slightly mis-) quoted this line in "Sweetheart Like You": "They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings/steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king." The original Country On The Click version runs: "Lord Byron and Parton/They used to say/A scoundrel is patriotic/Now it's me they're blaming."
Dan: "In November 2003 Parton released For God and Country, an album of religious/nationalistic songs, apparently written in the wake of the plane attacks on New York and elsewhere in September 2001; maybe there was some comment by her in the press that year."
It is just possible, Dan points out, that MES is conflating Dolly Parton with Emmylou Harris, who said "Patriotism can be good or bad. Knee-jerk patriotism can be very bad. I'm patriotic almost to the point of self-consciousness, but I love my country the way I love a friend or a child who I would correct if she was going the wrong way" ("What I've Learned," Esquire, June 2004).
And he found the following quote from Lord Byron, in an 1823 letter: "Though I love my country, I do not love my countrymen."
5. In Warner Brothers' 1950 cartoon, "A Fractured Leghorn," a cat is fishing with no bait. The fish attach a note to his hook which reads: "Dear Dope--You can't catch us Fish without a Worm on the hook. signed, The Fish."
6. Sark/Smirk contends that the line is "...a license SORN." In England, a SORN, or statutory off-road notification, may be obtained if one has a vehicle that is kept off public roads, in which case one does not have to obtain insurance or pay tax on the vehicle. It seems unlikely that one would get one of these for a rental vehicle, though, and it sounds like "son" to me...
See the comments below for remarks about MES not being a driver...
More Information
Mountain Energei: Fall Tracks A-Z
The Left of the Dial interview has interesting bits about several songs
Comments (59)
Income LID, I think?
http://thefall.org/news/pics/05winter-lotd/index.html
"It's an objective song. Started off with, mmm, seeing Britain, and I think you have it here as well... You get it on the TV, y'know, "you can have endless credit" and all that. (Pause). Where I live, and I'm sure everywhere, there's people who actually believe it, y'know. But also... for instance, in Manchester, you probably get that here as well, "Water was always free" where I live, y'know."
So from that, I kind of get two things. One is that the perspective of the narrator in the song is not necessarily that of MES. And secondly, that credit is being treated metaphorically like water - plentiful and free.
Dan
Mr Partridge would immediately suggest Steve Coogan's dumb but didactic TV presenter Alan Partridge, but that doesn't seem to have any bearing on this song...
as for the car rental... you would def. NOT need a log-book to rent a car, BUT if the car was a 'loaner' while your own car was being repaired, you'd likely need both the log-book (of your own disabled vehicle) and a note for the insurance Co proving it was 'off road'. Just saying...
But he's 100% saying 'Son'.
http://thefall.org/news/pics/05winter-lotd/index.html
You have to read the whole bit.
Dan
https://vimeo.com/68416931
Also, I always thought the song is about repressed or inexpressed potential, on how society’s rules and mundane tasks can cripple or obstacle the free flowing of ideas.
But that’s just an interpretation!
This is what MES says in Renegade:
No mention of a car accident.
The first is online here.
The second one of these I haven't yet refound, but I wrote this on the FOF about it in 2005:
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thefall/last-commands-of-xyralothep-via-m-e-s-t6021-s68.html
Rema999--I think your interpretation is square on the mark, at least on one level I think that's exactly what the song is getting at.
So, if you ask me, it does fit in context, Dan--but I am not convinced it's right...
I think you're right it's a filler word to give the required number of syllables to the line.
156
Once again inspiration. When productive energy has been dammed up for a while and has been hindered in its outflow by an obstacle, there is finally a sudden outpouring, as if a direct inspiration with no previous inner working out, as if a miracle were taking place. This constitutes the well-known illusion which all artists, as we have said, have somewhat too great an interest in preserving. The capital has simply piled up; it did not fall suddenly from heaven. Incidentally, such apparent inspiration also exists elsewhere, for example, in the domain of goodness, virtue, vice.
"Lad" would make more sense, especially since later on he says "You need a licence and a logbook, son"
The first verse appears to be be connected to MES's widely documented financial problems at the end of the 90s and the beginning of the 00s when he might literally have had to approach banks to remortgage his house, and got knock backs because his self-employed income was precarious and unpredictable. Mr Blairstowe and Mr Partridge might have been versions of two out of several mortgage advisors who refused him help at the time.
"Income lid" sounds like a half remembered version of something a mortgage advisor might use as a reason for not supporting an application on the basis that an underground band leader's self-employed income is not fixed, there could be windfalls and long fallow periods, and band expenses are not finite either, with no "lid" on them, although I appreciate the line talks about income rather than expenses.
MES would have been entirely liable for band expenses at that time, he didn't appear to have a manager or a record company providing funds in between Artful and Castle/Slogan (I think the arrangement with Action would have been ad hoc without much of an advance provided) and the band itself was no longer a financial partnership with liability shared with Steve Hanley.
There is a deliberate pun on "lad" as well though, which links with "son" in the car rental verse.
Incidentally, I've just noticed that the mammoth live version from the LA Knitting Factory 2016 on YouTube has another verse at around 8 minutes in about going to the doctor's which I can't decipher.
https://youtu.be/VFs5mlwfEw0
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Fractured_Leghorn
8 Clothorn Road is an address in Didsbury, Manchester.
It seems an unremarkable address, but I've discovered that the landlords of the address in (I think) the 1960s, Mr and Mrs Deutsch, were the models for the narrator’s landlords in WG Sebald’s “After Nature”.
Source: Saturn's Moons: W.G Sebald, a Handbook, edited Jo Catling and Richard Hibbitt (2011).
More on Sebald: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/jul/06/poetry.shopping
Whether that's anything to do with why Milner titled the song the way he did I have no idea, but it is at least interesting. Isn't it?
see this explainer : https://edisonaccounting.com/MelbourneFLCPAaccountantSelfEmployedMortgageletter.php
I do like the explanation that “lad” has “son” as its parallel. An income lid makes little sense to me, since it doesn’t seem to be a thing.
Thanks for your great site.
Here it is again: https://edisonaccounting.com/MelbourneFLCPAaccountantSelfEmployedMortgageletter.php
Also you can just google “self employed income letter mortgage” and I’m sure you will find an explanation of what I’m talking about. Thanks again
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Under the rocks and stones, there is water underground
Into the blue again after the money's gone
Original title, Clothorn Road, which is in Didsbury. Didsbury is on a flood plain and has had serious flooding in the past.
And note also the Highsmith teeth column mentioned in comment #29.
WG Sebald (who died in 2001) wrote a novel, Austerlitz, which apparently (I've not read it) makes much of water as a metaphor for time and in which Noah's Ark appears at least a couple of times.
See Wikipedia and https://www.mctague.org/carl/writing/ark/ark.html