WHEN you’re a teenager and you idolise rock or other music stars from a distance of about 16 000km while stuck on the southern tip of
This was a time, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the world was experiencing a musical renaissance such as had never been witnessed before. I became aware of Cat Stevens from his early hit songs, Matthew And Son and Lady D’Arbanville, probably in the late 1960s while still in primary school. But it was his two “Tea” albums that really catapulted Cat Stevens into our lives – Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat.
So when, probably around 1973, we went to see a Pink Floyd midnight movie at the Colosseum Theatre in East London – or perhaps it was at one of the smaller ones, for there were several, including a 20th Century – little did I think that Cat would be among the highlights. It was that Floyd concert at
I’m almost sorry, in recent years, that I bought a DVD, Magikat, but I did so out of such a strong sense of curiosity that I really had no choice. Recorded in 1976 on his Earth Tour, this was already many years after the short period when he was among the musicians we most revered. It was great to see him playing live for the first time since seeing that short ahead of the Floyd film, but it also burst the mystique somewhat. There is something about those perfectly honed songs on his albums which sets them apart. There is no way he, or really any other musician, can achieve the same levels of excellence on stage – unless they’re Neil Young, many of whose best songs, like Needle And The Damage Done, were recorded live.
We were well “over” Cat Stevens when he became a Muslim in 1977 and changed his name to Yusuf Islam in 1978. It mattered little to me, because he had ceased to be of any importance, though obviously he was still revered in his former persona for the incredible albums he produced. But was his name ever even Cat Stevens? Let’s see who this enigmatic man was/is.
Steven Demetre Georgiou
Ja, as I suspected. There was no Cat Stevens. But one Steven Demetre Georgiou was born in
Wikipedia says that at the outset of his musical career he adopted the name Cat Stevens, but does not say how he arrived at it, though the surname is obvious. He has sold over 60 million albums, with “his most notable original release albums (being) Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat”. Both sold over three million each, while Catch Bull at Four sold half a million in the first two weeks of its release and was the No 1 LP in the
I knew there was a Greek connection – his looks were an obvious give-away – so it is no surprise to read that he was the third child of a Greek-Cypriot father (Stavros Georgiou) and a Swedish mother, Ingrid Wickman. It was a working class family, which lived above the restaurant they ran, the Moulin Rouge, in
While dad was Greek Orthodox and mom a Baptist, Steven went to a Catholic school. But his young life was to experience upheaval when he was just eight, with his parents divorcing, though bizarrely both continued to run the restaurant – and live above it, says Wikipedia. The young Steven had already learnt to play the piano by the age of 12, when he first picked up the guitar and started to write songs. His interest in art took off when his mother brought him back for a while to
In the tradition of the likes of Dylan, Donovan and many others, he began performing in clubs and pubs, but decided early on that a Greek surname would not be memorable, so decided on a stage name. He started calling himself Cat Stevens, “reportedly chosen”, says Wikipedia, “because a girlfriend said he had eyes like a cat”. It was clearly a masterstroke, the name becoming one of the most recognisable in pop music history. And in 1966, aged just 18, manager/producer Mike Hurst had him record a demo and helped him secure a record deal. He was an instant hit, with the first singles, I Love My Dog and Matthew And Son (title song of his debut album from 1967) reaching
The range of people his music appealed to – I remember my mother having a soft spot for him – was vast and illustrated by the fact that over the next two years, according to Wikipedia again, he recorded and toured with artists ranging from Hendrix to Engelbert Humperdinck. He was “considered a teen pop sensation”, with some of his success thanks to pirate radio station Wonderful Radio London, which promoted him. It would close in August, 1967. However, that December, his second album, New Masters, failed to chart in the UK, but the single, The First Cut Is The Deepest went on to become an international hit for the likes of Rod Stewart, Sheryl Crow and others.
Living a “fast-paced pop-star life”, he was just 19 when, in early 1968, he became very ill with tuberculosis. He took a year to recover, and during that time took up meditation and read up about other religions, while also becoming a vegetarian. He also never wasted that year, churning out some 40 songs, which Wikipedia says were “much more introspective than his previous work”. These were among the gems which would appear on albums over the next few years. Clearly Cat had found his niche, that unique stamp of a sensitive soul who cares about his fellow man, animals and the planet, which characterises his finest work.
He was ready to take the world by storm, with the hectic hurly-burly days of the Sixties finally over. Or, as Wikipedia puts it, having recovered from TB, and “armed with a new perspective on what he wanted to bring to the world with his music, and a catalogue of introspective songs, the stage was set for international stardom”. As a first step in 1970 he signed a new contract with Island Records and released the folk-based Mona Bone Jakon album, which was a far cry from his earlier pop style songs. It was here that the song Lady D’Arbanville was to be found – and I see it was written for his girlfriend at the time, actress Patti D’Arbanville. I wasn’t that familiar with this album, which I see also featured a song called
But it was Tea for the Tillerman (also 1970) that was his first international breakthrough album. As noted earlier, it was a number one Billboard hit which achieved Gold record status (500 000 sales) within six months of its release in the
Suddenly, he was a superstar and started touring as a main act instead of just opening for other acts. He was, says Wikipedia, romantically linked to singer Carly Simon, who wrote the song Anticipation about him.
With a “signature sound” established, says Wikipedia, he enjoyed a “string of successes over the following years”. The Teaser and the Firecat (1971) reached No 2 in the
Here’s something worth looking out for. Wikipedia says in 1971 several of his songs were used for the soundtrack of a movie, Harold and Maude, which became a cult hit and brought Cat’s music to a wide audience well after he stopped recording.
So Cat was on a roll, and Catch Bull at Four was released in 1972, becoming his “most rapidly successful” album, reaching gold status in just 15 days and staying at No 1 in the
But all good things come to an end. Though Wikipedia says his subsequent releases in the 1970s “also did well on the charts and in ongoing sales”, the best, as far as we were concerned, was over. A Greatest Hits album from 1975 sold a whopping four million copies in the
As noted earlier, I’m not particularly interested in his subsequent life. This is about music, not religion. But let’s take a brief journey with Wikipedia into the post Cat Stevens years…
Yusuf Islam
It was a near-drowning experience at
Wikipedia covers at length the scrapes he got into as a product of his conversion, especially at a time when the
After that last 1979 concert he abandoned his career as a pop star, with some interpretations of Muslim jurisprudence seen to oppose the use of song and musical instruments. His request to record companies to stop distributing his albums was rejected.
Using the funds from his music career, he embarked on philanthropic and educational causes, says Wikipeida, building an Islamic primary school in north
The problems of attaching oneself to a dogma-driven religion soon started to plague him, however. Asked by university students in 1989 about his views on the fatwa against author Salman Rushdie, he reportedly only stated the legal consequences from the Qu’ran, that blasphemy is a capital offence, while not actually supporting the fatwa. Says Wikipedia: “Newspapers quickly denounced (his) ‘support’ for a possible assassination of Rushdie.” And isn’t that the ongoing problem for Muslims in the face of fundamentalist excesses? If the Qu’ran supports assassination of Rushdie, and you follow the Qu’ran, then ipso facto you too support such a step. The next day he released a statement saying he was not personally encouraging such vigilantism. But guilt by association is difficult to shake off. Indeed, Wikipedia quotes several cases where he appears to endorse punishment of Rushdie for writing the Satanic Verses. He much later claimed the application of the fatwa “is not to be outside of due process of law”.
He was also outspoken following the September 11, 2001, attacks on the
Then there was that bizarre incident, on September 21, 2004, when he was flying on a United Airlines plane from
In the 1990s he did a few Islamic music recordings, and a didactic children’s album for young Muslims. With his Cat Stevens albums re-released in 2000, he backtracked on his decision not to perform in English, and in 2003 recorded Peace Train for a compilation album which included songs by David Bowie and Paul McCartney. Then, of course, he came to
In 2005 he explained his return to secular pop music and his revived recording career, saying initially he was “unsure what the right course of action was”. That year he did a song,
And his musician son, Muhammad Islam, who performs under the name Yoriyos, is reported to have inspired Yusuf’s return to secular music when be brought a guitar back into the house.
His son did the art work on the cover of An Other Cup (2006), his first new pop album since 1978. The artist was listed as Yusuf, with a cover label saying he is “the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens”. He defended the dropping of his surname, saying “Islam” did not have to be sloganised, says Wikipedia. Furthermore, use of the first name was “more intimate”. The additional use of Cat Stevens was because “that’s the tag with which most people are familiar; for recognition purposes I’m not averse to that”. He added that the name was “part of my history, and a lot of the things I dreamt about as Cat Steven have come true as Yusuf Islam”.
But, it seems, the knives were still out for him. In 2005 he was nominated for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but not voted in. In 2005 he was named the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP’s) Songwriter of the Year and received a Song of the Year award for The First Cut Is The Deepest. This award was repeated in 2006, while in 2007 he received the Mediterranean Prize for Peace in
Having heard the interview with him on Magikat, it seems to this observer that Cat Stevens, being a Londoner, saw the need to relate directly with the more marginalised sectors of the global community. He clearly found spiritual direction in his new faith, and no one can begrudge him that. As far as we, his fans, were concerned, by 1978 he had ceased to have any real impact. The world was full of new names, faces and sounds. But his life thereafter has been very different to that of most other pop stars. While some have ploughed back funding to help the poor, one always gets the feeling this is something of a sop for their consciences. Perhaps Cat Stevens needed to immerse himself in a religion which in a sense isolated him from his former lifestyle. Maybe it was a way of escaping the rat race. But, as noted earlier, there can be no doubting that he became a symbol of Islam in the West, and paid the penalty, having to carry on his shoulders the burden of guilt for all the excesses committed by clearly anti-Islamic forces in the name of Islam. One question does arise, though. Did he ever feel the need to speak out, clearly and forcefully, against the authoritarian rule of so many Islamic states.
But enough of politics and religion, let’s get back to the real reason most of us “got into” Cat Stevens: his music.
Matthew And Son
It was the single, Matthew And Son, off the album by the same name from 1967, which was our first introduction to Cat Stevens. We did not have the album and I don’t think I ever heard it, but that song was a real pop classic. Indeed, it would have been interesting to see where he would have headed had he not got TB and become so introspective. Just a (heretical?) thought. That song was typical of the sort of music that was pouring out of
Next up, also from 1967, was New Masters, which as we saw above, was not a great success. However, it did contain The First Cut Is The Deepest which, “although it did little for Stevens himself”, says Wikipedia, gave hits to the Rod Stewart and Sheryl Crow. While we never had this one either, I did pick up a copy of a vinyl album, from 1972, called Very Young and Early Songs, which contains tracks mainly from this album, plus two from that first album. The cover of this Deram album claims it is “released for the first time in U.S.A”, though it is an SA (interpak) pressing.
Having just given the album a fresh listen, my general impression is that Cat was trying too hard – trying too hard to produce hit songs, which is understandable. That, after all, is what the industry was about in the Sixties. Unless, of course, you had reached the heights of the Beatles and were able, up to a point, to experiment. Sadly, Matthew And Son is not on this album, but the two from that album are Hummingbird and The Tramp, and it is the latter which comes closest to the direction Cat was destined to follow. The key element here is the dominant role of the acoustic guitar and a strong voice-driven melody. There is some good folk-style guitarwork here and he sings about his subject with a passion not found on the more saccharine tracks, of which there are several. Okay, the lyrics are not up to the level he would achieve, but they sound good, especially those opening lines: “He sleeps alone in the damp / and rests his head upon a door / the only bed he knows is the floor / The Tramp.” The use of the double negative attests to an attempt at identifying with the uneducated: “Turned up collar and worn out shoes / he doesn’t care ’cause he hasn’t got nothing to lose.” The last verse is also weak: “No companion to take him home / his only friends are the kind that just leave him alone / no one knows just how lonely his life has been / in a world that lives in a dream.” It’s like he’s just finding convenient rhymes and building a little story around them. But musically, there is much of the Matthew And Son quality about this which makes it endearing.
Hummingbird starts promisingly, with bass and piano, but over-instrumentation soon swamps the good intentions. Some interesting acoustic guitarwork, for instance, is buried under layers of strings and horns, while Cat’s voice becomes almost like that of a generic ballad singer, without his distinctive vocal qualities.
New Masters
The 10 songs from New Masters are not all bad, but most are. Again, the hit, The First Cut Is The Deepest, is not on the Early Songs album, which is a pity. But the others are no doubt a fair reflection of what Cat was doing in 1967, a time when Bob Dylan already had half a dozen superb albums under his belt. Here Comes My Wife is an attempted pop hit, saddled with strings and other instrumentation. “Well here comes my wife / and that’s the story of my life …” And similar inane lyrics don’t help.
Where else had I heard the title The View From The Top? It was certainly not just on this song, buried on an early Cat Stevens album. Anyway, this is one of the more memorable tracks from the album. It starts promisingly, with acoustic guitar and a very Cat-like voice: “The view from the top can be oh so very lonely / And you can be missing such a lot that could be yours.” Is this the “top” he achieved in a couple of years as a “pop star”, one wonders. The arrangement for many of these songs is similar, with the sudden infusion of heavy orchestration, followed by quieter sections. These coincide with the chorus, and those words, “the view from the top”. The verses are not well written: “Why can’t I stop forgetting myself? / Why am I always trying to be like somebody else / Why can’t I love you? / Why bother flying high above you / I know where you are.” And then, to cap it, the song ends with some really heavy drums and probably one of the few electric guitar solos on a Cat song, which is totally inappropriate and incongruous.
The folksy Blackness Of The Night is another bland, almost schamltzy song, a foot-tapping ditty with no real direction, while the final track on this compilation album, also off New Masters, takes the cake for syrupy nonsense. Baby Get Your Head Screwed On reminded me of that pop song, Baby Makes Her Blue Jeans Talk, but is littered with some of the most insipid rhymes in pop history – words like “spice” and “nice”, “neat” and “sweet”.
Mona Bone Jakon
I asked rhetorically earlier what might have become of Cat had he not had that TB-enforced break and kept playing commercial folk-rock. Clearly, the TB couldn’t have come at a better time. While we did not have his next album, Mona Bone Jakon (1970), its hit track, Lady d’Arbanville, is indicative of the progress he had made.
Wikipedia says the album is “notable for the emergence of Stevens’s distinctive voice: a rich, variable baritone”. As, I think, was evident on that previous album, Stevens was not at home trying to make pretty commercial pop songs. Wikipedia says he had “become disillusioned with the music business”, before falling ill with TB and spending a year convalescing – and writing music. It says he “returned with a folksier, more reflective, and emotionally straightforward sound”. I’d love to hear this album, though I’m fairly sure I would have done so a few times in my youth. Notable is the fact that he uses very sparse backing, with himself on guitar, keyboards and vocals, Alun Davies on additional guitar, John Ryan on bass, Harvey Burns on percussion, and one Peter Gabriel on flute. It was, says Wikipedia, Gabriel’s only non-Genesis appearance before he went solo in 1976.
After that long break since Matthew And Son, it was Lady d’Arbanville which would have renewed our, and the world’s, interest in Cat Stevens. As noted earlier, it was a song about his girlfriend at the time, actress Patti d’Arbanville. I wonder where she is today? You only have to ask Google, or Wikipedia more specifically, to discover this
The next track, Maybe You’re Right, finds Cat Stevens in the incarnation which truly reflected who he was. Suddenly the voice is full, low and husky. “Now maybe you’re right and maybe you’re wrong / But I ain’t gonna argue with you no more / I’ve done it for too long.” He’s clearly discovered how to write songs that fit his voice: “It was getting so good / Why then, where did it go? / I can’t think about it no more tell me if you know. / You were loving me, I was loving you / But now there ain’t nothing but regretting / Nothing, nothing but regretting everything we do.” This is almost like a follow-up to Lady d’Arbanville, as he explores the pain of lost love. The rest of the album remains a mystery, including the title track. However, one day …
Tea for the Tillerman
Next up, the album that really put Cat on the map. Tea for the Tillerman was released in November, 1970, surely one of the greatest years in the history of modern music, when all these disparate talents seemed to reach a kind of joint fruition. Bizarrely, Wikipedia classifies the album as “rock”, when I’ve always thought of it as a gentle, whimsical sort of folk album. Interestingly, Wikipedia confirms that he did indeed break up with Patti D, “who later had a relationship with Mick Jagger”. They say the album’s songs “may have been inspired” by this break-up. Some of them, possibly, but many are surely far removed from matters of romantic love.
I’ll always remember the album, superficially, for its cover. The first vinyl South African pressing we probably got was an Island Records album, released in March, 1971. Cat’s wonderful painting shows an old tillerman drinking tea under a large orange sun as children play on a tree behind him. In the distance lightning strikes a tree, while a deer is shown on a hillock, sans its hind legs. Or, on second thoughts, is that the silhouette of a woman, her arms raised and dress flailing in the wind? On the back of the cover is a large black-and-white photo of a cat-like Cat – it’s not only his eyes, it’s also his mouth which is cat-like. Here, too, I notice that he has pared his backing group down to that second guitar, bass, drums and Jack Rostein on solo violin. There are subtle strings, arranged by Del Newman. A later local pressing of the same album, from 1979, which I picked up in a second-hand shop, features all the lyrics to the songs on the back, with that large portrait photograph of Cat now reduced in size substantially, but this time in colour. Would that we could have had those lyrics back in the early Seventies.
What set this album apart was the fullness of the sound. Where Do The Children Play? starts with gentle piano and acoustic guitar, with the bass bringing a lovely rounded quality which complements Cat’s vocals. I remember, generally, that this album evoked a sense of the fragility of planet Earth. It was an early activist album about protecting the environment, rather than a hankering for lost love. And this opening track set the tone: “Well I think it’s fine, building jumbo planes. / Or taking a ride on a cosmic train. / Switch on summer from a slot machine. / Yes, get what you want to if you want, ’cause you can get anything.” Isn’t that a gentle indictment of the consumer society which had already arisen by the late Sixties? Then that chorus, sung with such emotion: “I know we’ve come a long way, / We’re changing day to day, / But tell me, where do the children play?” It is a question we are waking up to too late today, as global warming becomes a real threat. The song keeps up the assault: “Well you roll on roads over fresh green grass. / For your lorry loads pumping petrol gas. / And you make them long, and you make them tough. / But they just go on and on, and it seems that you can’t get off.” There is real despair here at what modern man was becoming, and he lets off much steam in those choruses. “Oh, I know we’ve come a long way, / We’re changing day to day, /But tell me, where do the children play?” His style of singing has reached a
Then, as if those familiar with this album didn’t know, the mood quietens for a song about love, if not a love song. There is a vulnerable sounding “ah” as an acoustic guitar is gently picked, alongside subtle cymbals and gentle bass. Now strummed, the guitar quietens for the opening verse: “I’m looking for a hard headed woman, one who will take me for myself, / and if I find my hard headed woman I will need nobody else.” I’d always wondered what he meant by hard-headed, but I think I see it now. He doesn’t want a fickle woman, but someone solid and on whom he can depend. “I’m looking for a hard headed woman, one who will make me do my best, / and if I find my hard headed woman, ooh, / I know the rest of my life will be blessed, yes yes yes.” It is no flippant desire this. A stable relationship can free a person to become creative in areas where otherwise he or she would be bound up within the emotional trauma of bickering and jeolousy. “I know a lot of fancy dancers, people who can glide you on a floor, / they move so smooth but have no answers, wo. / When you ask them, ‘What d’you come here for?’ ‘I don’t know,’ ‘Why.’ / I know many fine feathered friends, but their friendliness depends on how you do. / They know many sure fired ways, to find out the one who pays, and how you do.” Again, on this song, it is the use of that word “wo” and others at the end of other lines which enables Cat to put his unique vocal stamp on the work.
Wild World became something of a hit. It starts with full bass, piano and strummed acoustic guitar, a hallmark of the Cat sound. Then he steps in with a la-la-la-la sound, before embarking on the song itelf: “Now that I’ve lost everything to you / You say you wanna start something new / And it’s breakin’ my heart you’re leavin’ / Baby, I’m grievin’ / But if you wanna leave, take good care / Hope you have a lot of nice things to wear / But then a lot of nice things turn bad out there.” Is it a warning to her, that she may be better off with him than chancing her luck “out there”? The chorus seems to reinforce that: “Oh, baby, baby, it’s a wild world / It’s hard to get by just upon a smile / Oh, baby, baby, it’s a wild world / and I’ll always remember you like a child, girl.” And there is that voice again, with the word “girl” given the full Cat treatment. “You know I’ve seen a lot of what the world can do / And it’s breakin’ my heart in two / Because I never wanna see you sad, girl / Don’t be a bad girl / But if you wanna leave, take good care / Hope you make a lot of nice friends out there / But just remember there’s a lot of bad and beware.” Clearly Cat has found his feet, and is producing lyrics of great quality.
Indeed, this album hasn’t a weak point. In fact, it is terribly hard to listen to it objectively, since I have heard it so often I can predict everything before it happens. Sad Lisa starts with a haunting piano solo, before Cat’s solicitous vocals reflect the sadness of the song: “She hangs her head and cries on my shirt. /She must be hurt very badly. / Tell me what’s making you sadly? / Open your door, don’t hide in the dark. / You’re lost in the dark, you can trust me. / cause you know that’s how it must be.” Then that lovely chorus: “Lisa lisa, sad lisa lisa.” The acoustic guitar, gently picked, adds to the texture of the song, as strings play alongside some rich piano bass notes. “Her eyes like windows, tricklin rain / Upon her pain getting deeper. / Though my love wants to relieve her. / She walks alone from wall to wall. / Lost in a hall, she can’t hear me. / Though I know she likes to be near me.” After the chorus, the final verse: “She sits in a corner by the door. / There must be more I can tell her. / If she really wants me to help her. / I’ll do what I can to show her the way. / And maybe one day I will free her. / Though I know no one can see her.” As the final chorus sounds out, there is some great solo violin and what sounds like a cello which brings the song to a fittingly fulsome conclusion.
The last track on Side 1, Miles From Nowhere, starts slowly with a strummed guitar. “Miles from nowhere / I guess I’ll take my time / Oh yeah, to reach there.” A piano strengthens the sound, as the journey continues: “Look up at the mountain / I have to climb / Oh yeah, to reach there.” Much of Cat’s new existentialist philosophy seems to be encompassed here: “Lord my body has been a good friend / But I won’t need it when I reach the end.” The tempo picks up as the singing becomes more resolute, less reflective. “I creep through the valleys / And I grope through the woods / ’cause I know when I find it my honey / It’s gonna make me feel good.” The mood continues: “I love everything / So don’t it make you feel sad / ’cause I’ll drink to you, my baby / I’ll think to that, I’ll think to that.” The bass, drums and guitar reach a mid-song climax here before, his energy spent, he again takes up a contemplative mode. “Miles from nowhere / Not a soul in sight / Oh yeah, but it’s alright.” He has found his direction: “I have my freedom / I can make my own rules / Oh yeah, the ones that I choose.”
Side 2 keeps up the philosophical approach on the opening track, But I Might Die Tonight. With piano and bass sounding, it too starts with a la-la-la-la before slowing for the opening chorus: “Don’t want to work away / Doin’ just what they all say / ‘Work hard boy and you’ll find / One day you’ll have a job like mine’.” Was this a product of his upbringing, of the family’s expectations? “ ‘Cause I know for sure / Nobody should be that poor / To say yes or sink low / Because you happen to say so, say so, you say so.” After the chorus, he sings: “ ‘Be wise, look ahead / Use your eyes’ he said / ‘Be straight, think right / But I might die tonight!’ ” A key to this song’s success is the lovely choral backing, which enhances Cat’s own vocals.
Look, although he did pretty pictures on his album covers, it was clear Cat was no prude. And when he sang about a woman dropping her pants on the sand and going off with, of all people, a parson, it made a few testosterone-charged teens sit up and take notice. Because that’s what happens on Longer Boats. A bongo drum and hand-clapping accompany the opening chant of a song which was so incredibly different to anything anyone had done before: “Longer boats are coming to win us / They’re coming to win us, they’re coming to win us / Longer boats are coming to win us / Hold on to the shore, they’ll be taking the key from the door.” And here, of course, the Cat voice works more magic with that word, “door” – do-o-o-or. There is great depth in the lyrics: “I don’t want no god on my lawn / Just a flower I can help along / ’Cause the soul of no body knows / How a flower grows ... Oh how a flower grows.” Here, too, the word “grows” takes on a whole new meaning as he allows his voice to dwell on it over several chord changes. After the chanted chorus comes that rather naughty verse: “Mary dropped her pants by the sand / And let a parson come and take her hand / But the soul of no body knows / Where the parson goes, where does the parson go?” Even the use of drums and organ near the end fail to detract, as they would have on that earlier album, because this time things are properly arranged, with every instrument there for a reason.
As with all the great albums, a fast-paced, somewhat highly strung song is followed by something quiet and reflective, in this case the sublime Into White. If ever Cat’s voice was superbly showcased it is on this track, which again starts with subtle acoustic guitar and bass. A solo violin winds its way around the melody, while later a muffled trumpet, or is it a kazoo?, adds an interesting dimension. But what was this song all about? I know it had a kind of fairy tale feeling: “I built my house from barley rice / Green pepper walls and water ice / Tables of paper wood, windows of light / And everything emptying into White.” At least the apartheid government wouldn’t have been troubled. Imagine though if everything emptied into Black, with a capital B, nogal? “A simple garden, with acres of sky / A Brown-haired dogmouse / If one dropped by / Yellow Delanie would sleep well at night / With everything emptying into White.” This is idyllic, and colourful, forest life: “A sad Blue eyed drummer rehearses outside / A Black spider dancing on top of his eye / Red legged chicken stands ready to strike / And everything emptying into White.” It ends with the opening verse repeated. Beautiful.
There is some complex strumming and picking of acoustic guitars as On The Road To Find Out starts, with a big, booming bass adding to the uplifting sound. “Well I left my happy home to see what I could find out / I left my folk and friends with the aim to clear my mind out.” It is a journey of discovery in rhyming couplets: “Well I hit the rowdy road and many kinds I met there / Many stories told me of the way to get there.” Cat’s found his metier and is writing superbly as he sings the chorus: “So on and on I go, the seconds tick the time out / There’s so much left to know, and I’m on the road to find out.” Each verse ends with a sort of musing tone in his voice. “Well in the end I’ll know, but on the way I wonder / Through descending snow, and through the frost and thunder.” The mood changes: “Well, I listen to the wind come howl, telling me I have to hurry / I listen to the robin’s song saying not to worry.” Pacified, he continues: “So on and on I go, the seconds tick the time out / There’s so much left to know, and I’m on the road to find out.” Ah, and then the real purpose of the song: “Then I found myself alone, hopin’ someone would miss me / Thinking about my home, and the last woman to kiss me, kiss me.” These are trying times for a young man: “But sometimes you have to moan when nothing seems to suit yer / But nevertheless you know you’re locked towards the future.” After the chorus he has an epiphany: “Then I found my head one day when I wasn’t even trying / And here I have to say, ’cause there is no use in lying, lying.” And his conclusion: “Yes the answer lies within, so why not take a look now? / Kick out the devil’s sin, pick up, pick up a good book now.” Or should that read “the” good book? No. The lyrics on the back of that album cover confirm it is the indefinite article.
Then, as if the album hasn’t offered enough, comes probably the pick of the tracks, Father And Son, a dialogue between the generations. Again, it is a simple combination of strummed and picked acoustic guitar and bass, which slows for those opening lines: “It’s not time to make a change, / Just relax, take it easy. / You’re still young, that’s your fault, / There’s so much you have to know. / Find a girl, settle down, / If you want you can marry. / Look at me, I am old, but I’m happy.” The father’s lecture continues: “I was once like you are now, and I know that it’s not easy, / To be calm when you’ve found something going on. / But take your time, think a lot, / Why, think of everything you’ve got. / For you will still be here tomorrow, but your dreams may not.” That’s a telling point. How many of us don’t end up old and disillusioned, our dreams shattered? The son, somewhat vexed, responds: “How can I try to explain, / When I do he turns away again. / It’s always been the same, same old story. / From the moment I could talk I was ordered to listen. / Now there’s a way and I know that I have to go away. / I know I have to go.” It’s a truism of our generation. Children were told they were to be “seen, not heard”. Indeed, one sage cleric once called us the silent generation for this very reason. Although many, like the music stars cited here, did find a voice, for Joe Average we went from being a generation told to shut up by our parents, to a generation of parents whose kids now know it all, and also tell us to shut up. Still, I suppose it was our generation that broke the parental stranglehold by rebelling when we did. Today, I feel, kids can’t find anything to rebel against. Perhaps they need to open their eyes. But let’s get back to Cat’s story. The father responds: “It’s not time to make a change, / Just sit down, take it slowly. / You’re still young, that’s your fault, / There’s so much you have to go through. / Find a girl, settle down, / If you want you can marry. / Look at me, I am old, but I’m happy.” It’s frustrating. He’s not only repeating himself, he also isn’t hearing his son, who can’t be happy hearing that being young is his “fault”. The son becomes distant: “… away away away, I know I have to / Make this decision alone – no”, then he becomes more forceful again: “All the times that I cried, keeping all the things I knew inside, / It’s hard, but its harder to ignore it. / If they were right, I’d agree, / But it’s them you know not me. / Now there’s a way and I know that I have to go away. / I know I have to go.” The father now tries to keep him from heading off on his own: “… stay stay stay, why must you go and / Make this decision alone?” There is some excellent harmonising between two Cat voices which makes this a real tour de force, one of the all-time great songs of the modern era.
The title track leaves one pondering the genius who conceived this album. Just a minute long, it starts with bold piano chords and a trickle of notes, before Cat sings those mysterious few lines: “Bring tea for the Tillerman / Steak for the sun / Wine for the women who made the rain come / Seagulls sing your hearts away / ’Cause while the sinners sin, the children play.” Then a full-bodied chorus joins in: “Oh Lord how they play and play / For that happy day, for that happy day.” And so the concept is wrapped up, with the children, the future, having always been the key concern.
Was it one of the great albums of all time? Well, as mentioned, in 2003 Rolling Stone magazine put it at No 206 in its list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. However, it only reached No 8 on the
Teaser and the Firecat
Wow! I’ve just given Teaser and the Firecat a fresh listen, and would argue that this is Cat Stevens at his absolute prime. It is so wonderfully understated in a way only the British really seem to understand. Released in October, 1971, this was the second of his albums we got into in a big way. But I had always conflated the two, not realising, as I do now, the major progress that was made with Teaser. Wikipedia has precious little about the album, apart from saying it includes “hits such as Morning Has Broken, Moonshadow and Peace Train” among its 10 tracks.
Having bought that Magikat DVD, I became aware of the fact that he turned Moonshadow into an animated film, with Spike Milligan doing the voices. I read here that Cat also made a children’s book called Teaser and the Firecat, “which features the title characters from the album cover, top-hatted young Teaser and his pet Firecat, who attempt to put the moon back in its place after it falls from the sky”. In fact that’s what the animation is also about – and it’s something that would have appealed to Milligan’s goonish sense of humour. The book, I see, has been out of print since the mid-1970s and is surely a collector’s item.
As with Tillerman, the cover was a major part of what made this album so endearing. The young Dickensian lad sitting on the pavement, his boots resting on a cobbled street, holds a fishbone in his hand. A red-orange cat eyes it from nearby, while behind a full moon hangs above a wooden fence, full of gaps and knot holes. The moonlight shines off the white-haired Teaser’s boots and the cobble stones. In a brilliant move, the album title is not reflected on the front of the album, just the words Cat Stevens. On the back there is a lovely detail of Teaser’s blue-laced brown boots, under green trousers with blue stars. This offers a chance to see close-up how good Cat’s watercolour technique was. Here you find the album’s title, along with the track-list and details about the personnel on the album.
And what an album it is. While the list of musicians is longer than it was on Tillerman, the backing music is far less obtrusive here. Indeed, for the first time Cat’s producers seem to have realised that his voice is by far the strongest part of the act, so everything appears to have been done to enhance its impact. Complex finger picking, combined with incredible strumming on the acoustic guitar is a hallmark of this album. How many kids of my age didn’t try to play these songs on guitar? And one of the most tricky was The Wind, that hauntingly beautiful opening track.
“But never, ne-ver, never…” How does he get that second “never” to sound so rich and husky? The thing about Cat Stevens is that he was both a great singer and a brilliant songwriter. Many great songwriters don’t have great voices, though of course many do. But not as beautifully rounded as Cat’s was. “I listen to the wind / to the wind of my soul / Where I’ll end up well I think, / only God really knows / I’ve sat upon the setting sun / But never, never never never / I never wanted water once / No, never, never, never.” Simple, perfectly simple, and above all, poetic. It takes a few words, even one word, “never”, repeated, to turn lyrics into lyricism. Indeed, the second and final verse sums up that mood: “I listen to my words but / they fall far below / I let my music take me where / my heart wants to go / I swam upon the devil’s lake / But never, never never never / I’ll never make the same mistake / No, never, never, never.”
Given his Greek roots, it is fitting that a Greek instrument, the bazouki, should start to feature in his music, and it is the bazouki that lifts Rugbylove to another level. Two musicians are listed as playing the bazouki on the album: Andreas Toumazis and Angelos Hatzipavli. The song starts with strummed guitar, before the bazouki gives it a folksy air, like a breath of warmth from the
This album offers a sophisticated sound, understated, nuanced, never jarring. Two acoustic guitars take up the refrain for If I Laugh, one strummed, the other picked. Again, it is a crisp folk song, with a gentle bass fleshing out the sound. The vocals are again superb, especially during those la-la-la sections. The melody is excellent and expertly executed. “If I laugh just a little bit / Maybe I can forget the chance / That I didn’t have to know you / And live in peace, in peace.” I love this form of verse. One idea, couched in very basic language, yet offering insights that are universal and timeless. “If I laugh just a little bit / Maybe I can forget the plans that / I didn’t use to get you / At home - with me – alone.” Surely, as I’ve said before, no other emotion but love, and the loss thereof, can inspire writing like this, as it has done down the centuries. “If I laugh just a little bit / Maybe I can recall the way / That I used to be, before you / And sleep at night - and dream. / If I laugh, baby if I laugh / Just a little bit –” In the end, though, you get a sense that he’s just putting on a brave face.
I’ve been trying to inspire me eldest son, going on 18 now, with music from this era, and believe Changes IV would be to his taste. He’ll be impressed, as I was, with the almost Flamenco-style of strumming here. What I’d call the “chugga-chug” sound whereby the plectrum is pulled aggressively both up and down the strings. It’s a method which gives this song a great sense of urgency and lift. And how good doesn’t Cat’s voice sound here, where he sings things like “yesterday’s left behi-ind …” or “the eternal wo-omb…” But what was the song about, and why that title? It is a more assertive sound than the previous tracks, clearly more socio-political: “Don’t you feel a change a coming (chugga-chug) / from another side of time / breaking down the walls of silence / lifting shadows from your mind / Placing back the missing mirrors / that before you couldn’t find / filling mysteries of emptiness / that yesterday left behind.” Phew! That’s the first time I’ve looked objectively at those lines, and they are wonderful. I’m not sure what it means, but it is different to what I’ve been hearing before, because I was hearing the wrong words in some places. I heard “another side of town”, not “time”, which is far too prosaic. I never heard “mirrors”, or the next line. Indeed, the whole verse, for the first time, makes poetic sense. “And we all know it’s better / Yesterday has past / now let’s all start living / for the one that’s going to last / Yes we all know it’s better / Yesterday has past / now let’s all start living / for the one that’s going to last.” One doesn’t need to dissect the chorus to get a sense of a need for renewal. He charges back, that guitar whizzing away: “Don’t you feel the day is coming / that will stay and remain / when your children see the answers / that you saw the same / when the clouds have all gone / there will be no more rain / and the beauty of all things / is uncovered again.” This has a timeless, biblical quality, speaking of universal truths. The need for change is even further stressed in the final verse: “Don’t you feel the day is coming / and it won’t be too soon / when the people of the world / can all live in one room / when we shake off the ancient / shake off the ancient chains of our tomb / we will all be born again / of the eternal womb.” From life to death, from womb to tomb. Only here he’s reversed it, and we escape the chains of death through rebirth.
Appropriately, the next track is again a quiet, intimate, introspective love song. A slowly strummed guitar, with a plaintive wo-wo-wo from Cat initiatives this plea from the heart. “How can I tell you that I love you, I love you / But I can’t think of right words to say / I long to tell you that I’m always thinking of you / I’m always thinking of you, but my words / Just blow away, just blow away.” Ouch! How difficult is it not to make oneself vulnerable, to admit to someone that you’re in their power. That you “can’t live without” that person. Let’s see where he takes this: “It always ends up to one thing, honey / And I can’t think of right words to say / Wherever I am girl, I’m always walking with you / I’m always walking with you, but I look and you’re not there / Whoever I’m with, I’m always, always talking to you / I’m always talking to you, and I’m sad that / You can’t hear, sad that you can’t hear.” Cleverly, the “chorus” is one line which takes you ineluctably into another thought: “It always ends up to one thing, honey, / When I look and you’re not there / I need to know you, need to feel my arms around you / Feel my arms around you, like a sea around a shore / And - each night and day I pray, in hope / That I might find you, in hope that I might / Find you, because hearts can do no more …”
Why was Tuesday dead? The title of the first track on Side 2, Tuesday’s Dead, is one of those that needs probing. The song starts with some wonderfully whispy guitar strumming – apparently two acoustic guitars, which are joined by subtle bass and drums. “If I make a mark in time, I can’t say the mark is mine. / I’m only the underline of the word.” Well that’s the first time I’ve read that second line, about the underline, and it’s a revelation. He’s at his selfless best here, it seems, seeing himself merely as the conduit, his talents a gift from above. “Yes, I’m like him, just like you, I can’t tell you what to do. / Like everybody else I’m searching thru what I’ve heard.” How apt, at a time in the world when there was so much uncertainty. Then the chorus: “Whoa, Where do you go? When you don’t want no one to know? / Who told tomorrow Tuesday’s dead.” Again, the first time I’m seeing these lines. I’m still no wiser what it’s about. There is a Lewis Carrol-like playing with time here. “Oh preacher won’t you paint my dream, won’t you show me where you’ve been / Show me what I haven’t seen to ease my mind. / Cause I will learn to understand, if I have a helping hand. / I wouldn’t make another demand all my life.” He’s calling for spiritual guidance, a theme which clearly shaped his entire persona. “What’s my sex, what’s my name, all in all it’s all the same. / Everybody plays a different game, that is all. / Now, man may live, man may die searching for the question why. / But if he tries to rule the sky he must fall.” This apparent antipathy for political authority is admirable, but again I must ask how he squares this philosophy with a situation in the
As if to underscore his desire for just such a world, he next performs a Christian hymn. Morning Has Broken is probably one of his most famous songs, taken for granted by most of us since we’ve heard it so often. Yet, listen closely and you’ll experience its extravagant beauty. The opening piano work slows to a halt, before Cat cradles those beautiful lyrics in his voice: “Morning has broken, like the first morning / Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird / Praise for the singing, praise for the morning / Praise for the springing fresh from the world.” Take a good hymn out of the crusty environment of blue-rinsed church choirs and give it to a gifted singer like Cat and suddenly it is transformed, its underlying sentiments coming gloriously alive. “Sweet the rain’s new fall, sunlit from heaven / Like the first dewfall, on the first grass / Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden / Sprung in completeness where his feet pass.” Which makes one wonder which religious philosophy Cat really subscribes to. These feet are those of Jesus, whom many of us saw just a bit of in Cat Stevens, who seemed to radiate a goodness of the kind I would associate with Jesus. Perhaps it was the realisation of his apparently turning his back on that Jesus-like image which shocked so many people when he turned to Islam. It was not that we knew much about Islam at the time, indeed few who have grown up outside the religion can claim to speak with any authority on it. But sadly, as with many philosophies based on warped readings of Christianity – including apartheid – much seems to have been done in the name of Islam for which Cat, or Yusuf, cannot be proud. The bottom line, I think, is that he needed to escape the musty confines of a traditional English Protestant-dominated world. But let’s return to that lovely hymn, sung in an angelic voice by Cat, whose piano-playing provides just the right mood: “Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning / Born of the one light, Eden saw play / Praise with elation, praise every morning / God’s recreation of the new day.”
After that period of quiet reflection, fast strumming yields the melody for Bitterblue, which again, despite bass and drums, retains its subtle, understated quality. This is a higher-pitched, almost Bee Gees-in-their-disco-era voice. “I gave my last chance to you / Don’t hand it back to me bitterblue / No bitterblue / Yes, I’ve done all one man can do / Don’t pass me up oh bitterblue / My bitterblue.” Who, or what, is bitterblue? This clearly speaks of love and loss, but where is he heading? The chorus goes: “Cause I’ve been running a long time / On this travelling ground / Wishing hard to be free / Of going round and round / Yes I’ve been moving a long time / But only up and down.” This seems to be about the blues, the bitterblue blues. “I gave my last hope to you / Don’t hand it back to me bitterblue / My bitterblue / I’ve done all one man can do / Please help me lose this bitterblue / My bitterblue.” But the woman of his affection is somehow conflated with the mood he is experiencing – she becomes “bitterblue”. “Cause I’ve been waiting a long time / Aeons been and gone - / Looking at the horizon / For my light to dawn / Oh yes I’ve been living a long time / Looking on and on / I’ve been running a long time / Summers come and gone - / Drifting under the dream clouds / Past the broken sun - / Yes I’ve been living a long time / To be back beyond.” That is great verse. It speaks to me of disillusionment, of an endless and relentless pursuit of a futile dream, the bittersweet predicament of unreciprocated love.
The moon doesn’t have a shadow. Half of it is always in shade, and it casts shadows on earth, mainly via clouds in its path, or any other object. These are soft, night-time shadows, not harsh sun-shadows. So what is Moonshadow about? The gentle melody is picked delicately on the acoustic guitar, before Cat takes us on this journey, with the guitar later strummed, alongside the rattle of a tambourine. “Yes, I’m bein’ followed by a moonshadow, moonshadow, moonshadow / Leapin and hoppin’ on a moonshadow, moonshadow.” It sounds like carefree ramble outdoors under a full moon, yet it evokes in him a host of ideas about life itself, and the inevitable shedding of our earthly self – something everyone must come to terms with as they age. “And if I ever lose my hands, lose my plough, lose my land, / Oh if I ever lose my hands, Oh well ... I won’t have to work no more.” That, again, is the first time I’ve read those lines – lose my plough, lose my land. Sadly, life is not this simple, because sans work, plough and land, you might starve. But from a poetic point of view, this is sublime stuff. “And if I ever lose my eyes, if my colours all run dry, / Yes if I ever lose my eyes, Oh well ... I won’t have to cry no more.” The obvious flaw here is that he will also not see any more. “And if I ever lose my legs, I won’t moan, and I won’t beg, / Yes if I ever lose my legs, Oh well ... I won’t have to walk no more.” And who’ll care for him then? “And if I ever lose my mouth, all my teeth, north and south, / Yes if I ever lose my mouth, Oh well ... I won’t have to talk...” Nor will he be able to eat… Perhaps he starts to realise the folly of these thoughts, because a sudden mood swing now occurs, with more aggressive strumming heralding the following: “Did it take long to find me? I asked the faithful light. / Did it take long to find me? And are you gonna stay the night?” Whereupon, with not much more by way of insight garnered from those lines, he returns to that chorus. But clearly the general sentiments are admirable – it seems to be about faith, about letting go and trusting that even without our faculties, our own strength, a greater power will provide. It’s something most of us find impossible to achieve.
The final track is probably his most famous. It is what made Cat Stevens an iconic campaigner for peace in a troubled world. It added to his Jesus-like mystique, because he really did sound like he was launching a global campaign to end war. Complex picked acoustic guitar again introduces Peace Train. “Now I’ve been happy lately / Thinking about the good things to come / And I believe it could be / Something good has begun / I’ve been smiling lately / Dreaming about the world as one / And I believe it could be / Something good’s bound to come.” It’s so great finally to read the actual words, instead of relying on getting just the general gist. So here is an optimistic Cat, hoping for “something good” in a “world as one”. Let’s see if he remains so: “For out on the edge of darkness / There runs the peace train / Peace train take this country / Come take me home again.” Cleverly, he uses the image of a train for a votive force for peace, which he hopes will gather momentum and carry us to a new dawn: “Peace train sounding louder / Ride on the peace train / Hoo-ah-eeh-ah-hoo-ah / Come on the peace train / Peace train’s a holy roller / Everyone jump upon the peace train / Hoo-ah-eeh-ah-hoo-ah / This is the peace train.” I know there were cynics among us who baulked at the “holy roller” image. We were not going to be bible punchers on a holy roller mission, not even for Cat. The song had something of a Sunday school picnic quality about it: “Get your bags together / Come bring your good friends too / Because it’s getting nearer / Soon it will be with you / Come and join the living / It’s not so far from you / And it’s getting nearer / Soon it will all be true.” Despite these rather sadly optimistic sentiments, one has to ask whether such naïve goodness, in the end, isn’t the only bulwark against evil. Perhaps it takes such sweet innocence to overcome the forces of darkness. Cat knows what’s out there: “I’ve been crying lately / Thinking about the world as it is / Why must we go on hating? / Why can’t we live in bliss?” A good question, but regrettably one not likely to be answered, whether through religion or any other spiritual, or physical, interventions. Indeed, the reality is probably that Cat was experiencing true bliss merely by doing what he did best, creating these songs. And the impact that a song like this had on the youth would have been considerable. Many, far less cynical than myself, would have jumped upon that peace train without another thought.
I may have been a bit harsh on Cat on those last two tracks, but overall I believe this is possibly his finest album. Certainly, it proved commercially successful, reaching No 2 on the Billboard album charts in 1971, while Moonshadow, Peace Train and Morning Has Broken all performed well as singles.
Catch Bull at Four
His next album, Catch Bull at Four (1972), was one we did not have, but as a result it was one which I always delighted in hearing when visiting others who had it. For that reason it retained a mystique for me, like something not fully discovered, because one would never really come completely to terms with it while at someone else’s house. So it was great, a few years back, to pick up a CD version at a second hand shop, and finally bring that bull into my home. Wikipedia again insists the genre is rock, as it did for the previous two albums, but I just don’t associate Cat with rock. Gentle folk-rock, at times, perhaps, but if ever a man was steeped in folk music it was him.
But let’s give this album a listen before going any further.
It’s hard not to be hard on Catch Bull at Four. After the sublime Tillerman and Teaser albums, Cat Stevens probably had little really good material left. And that is probably why this album is a bit of a hotch-potch, without the sense of being a unity one experiences on those other two albums. And I fail to see the relevance of the title, unless it has some esoteric significance in eastern religion. The cover contains a small oval in the middle with a man holding the head of a black bull. Did Cat do it?
For once the Wikipedia description of the genre as “rock” is quite close to reality, though it is still more folk-rock than rock, and there are songs that are pure folk, and others that are pure rock. Unbelievably, it was his “most successful album in the
The first track, Sitting, is, for me, by far the most familiar on the album, with those opening lines, again, ingrained in my memory, though not nearly as deeply as the songs from those earlier albums. Immediately the song gets under way, though, you realise this is more of a rock album, with driving a rhythm section, and even Cat playing electric mandolin. Alun Davies keeps the acoustic guitar involved, alongside two pianos. Make no error, this is a very catchy song which showcases Cat at his best as a vocalist. :Oh I’m on my way, I know I am, somewhere not so far from here / All I know is all I feel right now, I feel the power growing in my hair / Sitting on my own not by myself, everybody’s here with me / I don’t need to touch your face to know, and I don’t need to use my eyes to see / I keep on wondering if I sleep too long, will I always wake up the same (or so)? / And keep on wondering if I sleep too long, will I even wake up again or something.” It is a bit of a rambling, over-wordy song – a shortcoming on most of the tracks – but somehow it works very well, with the backing vocals again adding to the fullness of the sound. But there are certainly some bizarre ideas here, including his feeling “power growing in my hair” – a bit like the biblical Samson. But it is interesting, nonetheless. “Oh I’m on my way I know I am, but times there were when I thought not / Bleeding half my soul in bad company, I thank the moon I had the strength to stop / I’m not making love to anyone’s wishes, only for that god I see / ’Cause when I’m dead and lowered low in my grave, that’s gonna be the only thing that’s left of me / And if I make it to the waterside, will I even find me a boat (or so)? / And if I make it to the waterside, I’ll be sure to write you
a note or something / Oh I’m on my way, I know I am, somewhere not so far from here / All I know is all I feel right now, I feel the power growing in my hair / Oh life is like a maze of doors and they all open from the side you’re on / Just keep on pushing hard boy, try as you may / You’re going to wind up where you started from / You’re going to wind up where you started from.” I get a strong sense of disillusionment here. It’s in your face. You push through the door and end up … where you started.
The next song is a long, allegorical tale which seems to speak of a possible early affinity with Islam. Boy With A Moon & Star On His Head sees Cat on Spanish guitar and synthesiser. There is a second acoustic guitar, organ and percussion on what is essentially a long folk song. It sounds beautiful, with the synthesiser providing a mysterious bass sound. But has anyone fathomed what the story’s about? “A gardener’s daughter stopped me on my way, on the day I was to wed / It is you who I wish to share my body with she said / We’ll find a dry place under the sky with a flower for a bed / And for my joy I will give you a boy with a moon and star on his head.” I mean, that’s quite explicit, really. Make love to me before you go and get married and I’ll give you a son, with that mark on his head which, if you think about it, is the symbol of Islam. So what does this man do? “Her silver hair flowed in the air laying waves across the sun / Her hands were like the white sands, and her eyes had diamonds on. / We left the road and headed up to the top of the Whisper wood / And we walked ’till we came to where the holy magnolia stood./ And there we laid cool in the shade singing songs and making love ... / With the naked earth beneath us and the universe above.” But after that bit of pleasure, reality impinged. “The time was late my wedding wouldn’t wait I was sad but I had to go, / So while she was asleep I kissed her cheek for cheerio. / The wedding took place and people came from many miles around / There was plenty merriment, cider and wine abound / But out of all that I recall I remembered the girl I met ’cause she had given me something that my heart could not forget.” Ah, the anxiety of the married man with a secret lover. “A year had passed and everything was just as it was a year before ... / As it was a year before ... / Until the gift that someone left, a basket by my door. / And in there lay the fairest little baby crying to be fed, / I got down on my knees and kissed the moon and star on his head.” So the promise was fulfilled. “As years went by the boy grew high and the village looked on in awe / They’d never seen anything like the boy with the moon and star before. / And people would ride from far and wide just to seek the word he spread / I’ll tell you everything I’ve learned, and love is all ... he said.” Indeed. And just who was he? A Jesus figure? Or Mohammed? Only Cat really knows.
After these two fine opening tracks, the album takes a bit of a dive. Angelsea is quite a loud folk-rock song, with lots of bassy synthesiser and drums. It seems to show the influence of Strawbs, possibly Bowie. Remember the song? “She moves like an angel / And seven evening stars / Dance through the window / Of her universal house.” Look unlike those early albums, the production process is excellent. But it’s not quite Cat. “Her voice a crystal echo / Lies humming in your soul / So patiently awaiting / For your ears to behold.” Even the lyric writing has again become a bit strained. The rhymes start to sound forced.
The next track, Silent Sunlight, starts quietly, with piano, a bit of acoustic guitar, pennywhistle, and later drums and strings. It is a folk song. Again, though, I can’t get too excited about it. There are also some very weak lines, like “When all things were tall, / And our friends were small, / And the world was new.” When I was small and Christmas trees were tall. You can’t rhyme small and tall without thinking of that early Bee Gees song.
Okay, so Can’t Keep It In is probably the most popular song on the album. It starts encouragingly, with a Jethro Tull-like acoustic guitar and electric lead guitar. Indeed, the strummed guitar really keeps this song rolling along nicely, and Cat’s voice works quite well in the folk-rock idiom. But again, I wonder, was this really “him”. Let’s see if there was substance to the lyrics: “Oh I can’t keep it in, I can’t keep it in, I’ve gotta let it out. / I’ve got to show the world, world’s got to see, see all the love, love that’s in me. / I said, why walk alone, why worry when it’s warm over here. / You’ve got so much to say, say what you mean, mean what you’re thinking, and think anything. / Oh why, why must you waste your life away, you’ve got to live for today, then let it go / Oh, lover, I want to spend this time with you, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do, if you let me know. / And I can’t keep it in, I can’t hide it and I can’t lock it away. / I’m up for your love, love heats my blood, blood spins my head, and my head falls in love, oh. / No, I can’t keep it in, I can’t keep it in, I’ve gotta let it out. / I’ve gotta show the world, world’s got to know, know of the love, love that lies low, so why can’t you say, if you know, then why can’t you say. / You’ve got too much deceit, deceit kills the light, light needs to shine, I said shine light, shine light. / Love, that’s no way to live your life, you allow too much to go by, and that won’t do. / No, lover. I want to have you here by my side / Now don’t you run, don’t you hide, while I’m with you. / ’N I can’t keep it in, I can’t keep it in, I’ve gotta let it out. / I’ve got to show the world, world’s got to see, see all the love love that’s in me. / I said, why walk alone, why worry when it’s warm over here. / You’ve got so much to say, say what you mean, mean what you’re thinking, and think anything. / Why not? / Now why why why not?” Phew! This guy was going through torment, man! He’s got all this love inside him – some might say lust – and this girl seems to be running him ragged, with all her deceit. Anyone who’s lived through such a relationship will identify fully with where the man’s coming from.
In fact, the more I think about the album, the more I’m starting to like it. There is a lovely opening couple of lines on
The same is even more true of Freezing Steel, which leaves one with a bit of a spiritual chill. Here he dives straight into a rock song, complete with searing lead guitar. I get the distinct feeling that the likes of Bowie, maybe also Billy Joel, influenced his direction here. Some of the gimmicky sounds, made on the synthesiser, also detract badly. But let’s see where Cat’s tortured mind was heading this time. Be warned, it’s another lengthy saga: “I’ve flown the house of freezing, the house of freezing steel / And though my body’s back I know it can’t be real / ’Cause I’ve been on that house without a guiding wheel / The house of freezing steel.” All a bit mindless thus far, methinks. “Oh where’s it going, picked me up at seven / When my eyes were weak from the light of the morning / Oh sister won’t you tell me what a man might want to know / This madness is fine, yes if you’re mad at the time.” It can’t, surely, be an attempt to out-Bowie
Then comes this completely odd contrast. Is O Caritas Latin? I’m only asking, because it’s Greek to me. Suddenly, Cat is on some Mediterranean shoreline discovering his roots and singing in this strange lingo to the strains of a strummed acoustic guitar and beautifully plucked bazouki. There is a full choir backing him and sounding like a bunch of monks. Skipping the opening Latin half of the song, we get to the English, and it’s not a pretty picture: “Ah, this world is burning fast / Oh, this world will never last / I don’t want to lose it here in my time / Give me time forever here in my time.” The translation of the Latin is equally forlorn: “I don’t want to lose the harmony of the universe / I see all things ... burning, I hear men ... shouting. / Now is the light of the world and the stars going out / Now does the blame for the disaster fall upon men. / Grief is heavy with sadness and tears / Great is the noise from the earth and the seas / O love, O love be with us always. / We who will perish salute death. / Life alone goes on.” Yet. Yet this is still Cat Stevens in the early 1970s, and his singing, let it be said, remains beautiful.
As if to remind us he still has a sensitive side, we experience all his pain and pathos in Sweet Scarlet, with just Cat’s piano for accompaniment. “Once she came into my room, feathered hat an’ all / Wearing a warm wool shawl wrapped around her shoulders / Two eyes like lights, milky marble whites looking up at me / Looking for a way, moons in an endless day / All I knew was with her then, no couldn’t see the time / As we drank down the wine to the last sweet scarlet.” Is this another tale of sweet seduction? “How was I to wonder why or even question this / Underneath her kiss I was so unguarded / Every bottle’s empty now and all those dreams are gone / Ah, but the song carries on ... so holy.” Cat starts to wax lyrical: “She was so much younger then, wild like the wind / A gypsy with a grin from an old far away country / But deep beneath her curls, / Beneath this misty pearl, there was more to see / She could move mountains in the dark as silent as a knife / She cut loose a life that she never no never really wanted / All those days are frozen now and all those scars are gone / Ah, but the song carries on ... so holy.” Again, the lyrics are clumsy, often nonsense, like saying there is “no bridge between us” when he means no divide: “Come let us drink again, before the second show / I want you so to know there’s no bridge between us / All those gates have opened now, and through the light has shone / Ah, but the song carries on ... so holy.” Nice to hear him singing backed by his piano, but this is not his greatest work.
Which only leaves the apocalyptic finale, Ruins. I almost gave up on this song early on, fearing yet another long diatribe put to music. Diatribe it still is, but it’s so disturbing you have to pay attention. It is another stream of consciousness effort, and is one of the great indictments of our consumer society. There is a disturbing, disquieting edginess about this song which makes you sit up and take notice. “It’s so quiet in the ruins walking though the old town / Stones crumbling under my feet I see smoke for miles around / Oh it’s enough to make you weep, all that remains of the main street / Up in the park on Sunday, dogs chasing and the children played / Old man with his head down, can’t see nothing more around ... no.” It’s certainly not Bob Dylan. There is no attempt to obfuscate or dissemble, no space for euphemism or metaphor. No, Cat tells the story openly and sincerely, without the veneer of poetry. The old man was the focus. “But he remembers how it used to be, back in the old days, / So nice to see you coming back in this town again / It’s nice to see a friendly face come peeping through having tea / In the afternoon, so nice to see you coming back in this town again...” Again, not great, easy-reading, smooth-flowing verse… “Ah but it’s all changed winter turned on a man / Came down one day when no-one was looking and it / Stole away the land, people running scared, losing hands / Dodging shadows of falling sand, buildings standing like empty shells / And nobody ... helping no-one else / Young child with his hands high, ain’t able to see no reason why ... no.” The chorus takes us back to the old man’s recollections: “But he remembers how it used to be, back in the old days, / So nice to see you coming back in this town again / It’s nice to see a friendly face come peeping through / You’d better know what you’re going through now / You came back here to find your home is a black horizon / That you don’t recognize, evil destruction has taken everything / You’d better walk on the side while you’re still walking / Just keep on walking on down the street keep your distance / From the people you meet. Oh Lord and you’d better watch your eyes / ’Cause if smoke gets in them, baby you won’t rise again. / Where’s it leading to freedom at what cost / People needing more and more and it’s all getting lost / I want back, I want back / Back to the time when the earth was green / And there was no high walls and the sea was clean / Don’t stop that sun to shine, it’s not yours or mine ... no.” As I said, a bit of a ramble, but who’d ever have thought Cat would attempt a Dylanesque talking blues song about Armageddon? This is a disturbing album all round. Deeper, in a sense, than those earlier efforts, but by no means as likable.
Wikipedia says the album was “well received both commercially and critically”. It says Rolling Stone magazine was “satisfied with the ‘gorgeous melody and orchestration’, while simultaneously disappointed by the lack of a single track comparable to Morning Has Broken”.
And, I’m afraid, it was here that I parted ways with Cat, or Yusuf. I missed out on Foreigner (1973), Buddha and the Chocolate
Cat was a phenomenon on those two choice albums from the early 1970s. He may well have produced great work subsequently, but it was those 20-odd songs which left an indelible mark on the souls of music lovers around the globe. He brought the feeling and prospect of peace to our hearts through his music, probably more than any other artist was able to do.
2 comments:
I'm doing a project in school about Cat Stevens and I really enjoyed reading this, its always nice to find someone else who is knowledgeable about Cat Stevens and his music and has an unbiased opinion of his work not clouded by a personal hatred for Islam. As a side note I was wondering if I was the only person who thought "Moonshadow" was somehow an almost political song expressing how Cat felt about Communism or more likely European Socialism?
Hello!! I really liked this Cat Stevens entry. I've been a fan since I was a child (I'm 37 now), my parents used to play him all the time. They also kind of left him before his lasts albums.
It was fun to read your point of views, because there were things I totally missed. Like how he was trying to make popular songs, and also how he was following at some points other influences, like Bowie. I discovered Bowie in my mid 20s so for me he belonged to another era!! By the way you should totally please do a Bowie entry at some point. He's my favourite singer ever.
But Cat Stevens... he may be number 2. And he was also the first "grown up" music I ever heard. And when I saw him live a couple of years ago in Chile (I'm Chilean) I just COULDN'T BELIEVE how great he was. I went with my mom and aunts and we all fangirled all night long, haha.
About the music, I agree that "First Cuts" it's a bad album. I ended up liking it because I had it in a time where music wasn't as accesible as it is today. But I really liked some earlier tracks like "Where Are You?", which you were right that sounds a little like James Blunt haha (being James Blunt who copied this time).
I only disagree in some points, like you liking the famous "Father and Son" that I've always have find boring TO DEATH, and disliking "Ruins" which I LOVE. And I agree that Majikat, like First Cuts, is not very good, with the difference that is just weird and doesn't even "try" to be likeable. But there are also good songs hidden in EVERY ALBUM. And "Foreigner" is one of my favourites, even though it's crazy long. And he still sings it now as Yusum Islam.
Oh and by the way, he chosed "Cat" (Stevens) as a name, because he had a girlfriend who said his eyes looked cat-like.
Sorry for my really really long reply, I just got so excited of reading this post. You made an anonymous fan on the internet very happy. I even sang the lyrics of the songs you described while reading them, hahaha.
Cheers.
PS: Just in case other Cat Stevens fan also read this, those are my favourite songs:
Post a Comment