Trollheart

Yes, another one! I know: new Trollheart journals are about as rare these days as a racial/gender slur by Trump during a presidential campaign! But I have my reasons. Really, I do. This was originally envisioned as just being another section in my main journal, but as always the problem is that I want to keep it updated fairly frequently, and in the Playlist, that usually can mean once every six months! Honestly, stuff goes in there with the best of intentions, meant to be a recurring feature, and is not heard from again. If I absorbed this into my journal then the best I could hope for would be one entry every two or three months, and that would never do.

Why? Because this is an idea I had a long time ago but only remembered today, and it's nothing terribly original, like many of my ideas, but like many of them, I thought of it first (shut up Batty!) and so here it is. What's the idea behind it? Simple really. I choose a theme (hence the journal title) and then listen to as much music as I can within that theme. It will often be just a word, or a concept, though occasionally it may be something else entirely. As per usual with my ideas, I haven't really thought it through fully yet. But the basic premise is that I'll be trying to listen to albums, bands or even single tracks that fulfill the criteria I set down here.

How often it will be updated is also debatable, but I'm hoping to at least manage an entry a week. Suggestions are welcome, both as to music that fits this theme and also for further themes, though I will reserve the right to take or ignore suggestions as I see fit. In essence, yes, I tried this already in my journal with “Variations on a theme”, but there I only posted videos with a very short description. Here, I'll be going into a little more detail, and as I say, I'll be listening to whole albums. Not only albums, but there will be a lot of them. Not quite sure how deep the reviews will be yet but we'll see.

The interesting thing about this, for me anyway, is that it opens up all kinds of possibilities. Choosing one overarching theme means I can and hopefully will end up listening to a wide variety and selection of music genres. Today I could have an atmospheric black metal album, tomorrow a hip-hop one, the next day something by Bing Crosby. Who knows? I'm going to try to ensure, in fact, that I don't just listen to the same genre or subgenre, and sort of like with my “Love or Hate?” thread, I will discipline myself to listen to maybe only one album or song in a particular subgenre before trying another one, although this won't necessarily be a hard and fast rule.

How many albums/songs/bands before I move on to a new theme? Don't know. Probably play it by ear; when I get bored with, or feel I have exhausted all possibilities in one theme, then I'll probably start a new one. But as I say, nothing's carved in stone. As ever with me, I'm flying by the seat here so it could very well be a bumpy ride! But fun, hopefully, and also with a bit of luck somewhat educational, for me and for any of you who choose to come on this journey with me.

Only one question left to answer then at this point: what's the first theme? Well, it's quite simple. I've been preparing for this one for a long time, seeking out and downloading albums that all have this one trait in common. They all either have this in their name, sing about it or are linked to it in some way.


Yeah. Autumn. I do know some bands who have autumn in their name already of course, but hope to find out about a lot of new ones. So, if you know of an album, artiste or even a song that has autumn in it, or is based around autumn in the lyric, or in which the band or artiste is called or uses the word, let me know. I'm going to pre-disqualify any girls named Autumn, as that's not what I'm going for here. Also don't bother with The Fall or Fall of Troy or whatever; I know you Americans call it Fall but here it's Autumn and I am going to be concentrating on that word alone.

With all that in mind, my first album review will be this, though I have something else lined up for the very first review, see below.


Level Eleven --- Last Autumn's Dream (2014)

Before I get to my first album though I want to talk about this song, which is one of my favourite ballads, from one of my favourite albums from my youth, and was also a big hit at the time.

Title: “Forever Autumn”
Format: Single
Written by: Jeff Wayne, Gary Osborne and Paul Vigrass
Performed by: Justin Hayward
Genre: AOR/Progressive Rock
Taken from: Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds
Year: 1978
Acclaim: Rose to number five in UK charts

To a large extent, “Forever Autumn” is something of an anachronism on the album from which it's taken, as it's the only love song on the thing and the rest is basically concerned with describing how the Martians arrive on Earth and start wiping out humanity, and the author's attempts to evade destruction, culminating in the defeat of the aliens. There's little time for romance and reflection, and yet in a very real way this works, as the author (the journalist, played by the late Richard Burton) arrives at the house of his lover to find she has already fled, and then begins to reminisce about how things were with her in happier times.

As a singer, Justin Hayward of The Moody Blues has the perfect voice for this song, and indeed Jeff Wayne, when considering using it on the album (it had previously been written without lyrics as an advertising jingle) specifically wanted him, or as he put it, perhaps unkindly, “that Nights in White Satin voice”. Previously a minor hit for the two other co-writers, the song was turned into a massive success and appears on love compilation albums even now, nearly forty years later. It's a simple song at its heart, driven mostly on strings and flutes, as the singer thinks about the times he spent with his girlfriend, and wonders if he will ever see her again. It has some very telling, perhaps even twee lines, but they work within the context of the song: ”Like the sun through the trees you came to love me, like a leaf on a breeze you blew away” and ”Through autumn's golden gown we used to kick our way.”

It evokes memories of innocence and a time when anything seemed possible, and the idea that the two would be parted seemed very remote if it was at all considered. Hayward notes the change in the opening lines: ”The summer sun is fading as the year grows old, and darker days are drawing near” and at the end he cries that ”My life will be forever autumn cos you're not here.”. There's a pretty cool flute solo in the middle of the song, with lush strings accompaniment; it's probably synth-created, as I can't see any flautists credited on the album, but it works very well with the song.

Quite a lot of people think that either a) the song is Hayward's own composition or that at least b) it is a song by The Moody Blues, for whom he is the lead singer. Both views are of course false. From what I can see --- and I haven't researched this too thoroughly I must admit --- this song became Justin Hayward's biggest hit, certainly solo, and even with The Moody Blues it seems to have been his biggest success at least on this side of the pond, where the classic “Nights in White Satin” only reached number fourteen (third time of asking) though it did much better across the water, getting to number two in the USA. Nevertheless, if there's one song he'll be remembered for, I feel it is definitely one of the two, and many people will know him more for this, as it was released under his own name.



Things I like about this song:

1. The gentle flute melody, which suits it perfectly
2. Hayward's voice, which again fits the song like a glove: Wayne was right to seek him out
3. The lyric itself, very evocative of a love affair in danger but hoping to triumph against the backdrop of global alien invasion
4. The flute and string solo in the middle
5. The sort of false ending and restart for the final verse and chorus

Things I do not like about this song:

1. People tend to think it's a Justin Hayward and/or Moody Blues song, and Jeff Wayne tends to get little if any credit for it from those who are unaware of his work
2. Having heard it on the album, I am always waiting for the narration to break in, as it does on the album. It doesn't (there's no narration on the single) but I always expect it to.

That's all I can get, two things I don't particularly like about it.

And of course, I'll be rating everything I listen to. After what I've said above it will come as no surprise to anyone I'm sure that this gets the highest rating right off the bat...


Next up, a true legend and a song I have never heard.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018