"The Tell-Tale Heart"

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I recently read Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart," and while I was reading it, I found a few interesting APP-related things.

The source for this part of the APP song (near the end of the song):

Heard all the things in Heaven and Earth
I've seen many things in Hell
But his vulture's eye of a cold pale blue
Is the eye of the Devil himself

is actually near the beginning in Poe's story.  Poe's narrator says, "The disease had sharpened my senses - not destroyed - not dulled them.  Above all was the sense of hearing acute.  I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth.  I heard many things in hell" and "One of his [the old man's] eyes resembled that of a vulture - a pale blue eye, with a film over it."  It's interesting that the APP changed "heard many things in hell" to "seen many things in Hell" - it emphasizes visual nature and eyes.  (There might also be some relation to later APP albums in that quote, specifically Vulture Culture and Eye in the Sky.)

Poe's "There was nothing to wash out - no stain of any kind - no blood-spot whatsoever" results in the APP's "And he won't be found at all / Not a trace to mark his fall / Nor a stain upon the wall."

Poe has a long section devoted to the sound in his narrator's head:

My head ached, and I fancied a ringing in my ears: but still they [the policemen] sat and still chatted.  The ringing became more distinct: - it continued and became more distinct: I talked more freely to get rid of the feeling: but it continued and gained definitiveness - until, at length, I found that the noise was not within my ears.

There's a paragraph break, and then the narrator says, "No doubt I now grew very pale…"

In the APP's "The Tell-Tale Heart," this is rendered as:

Louder and louder
Till I could tell the sound was not within my ears
You should have seen me
You would have seen my eyes grow white and cold with fear

The narrator's "eyes grow[ing] white" is not specifically mentioned in Poe's story, merely that "I now grew very pale."  However, the addition of the eyes is interesting because it provides a sort of comparison between the narrator's "white and cold" eyes and the old man's "eye of a cold pale blue."  Both sets of eyes (or, rather, the narrator's eyes and the old man's single eye) are "cold" and pallid.

In Poe's story, the old man's eye itself isn't described as cold, but rather coldness is the effect it has on the narrator:  "Whenever it [the old man's eye] fell upon me, my blood ran cold" and later "I saw it with perfect distinctness - all a dull blue, with a hideous veil over it that chilled the very marrow in my bones."

Sight is important not only with regard to the old man's eye, but also to the narrator's visibility.  In Poe's story, there are the lines "But you should have seen me.  You should have seen how wisely I proceeded - with what caution - with what foresight - with what dissimulation I went to work!"  There are two "you should have seen"s and also "foresight."  Likewise, the APP song has "You should have seen me / You would have seen my eyes."

Hiatus on Cyclical Listening

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For about four months now, I've been listening to one of the APP albums every Tuesday, cycling through them chronologically.  I think I've gone through two complete cycles (although, for some reason, I seem to have started with The Turn of a Friendly Card), but I'm not going to continue that, for the foresee-able future at least.  I have a lot of other projects that I'm doing, some of which I've been neglecting, and since listening to the albums doesn't seem to have helped very much in figuring out any parts, I'm putting that part of this project on hiatus.  I'm not sure how much I'll work on this now that I'm not consistently listening to the albums, though.

"Lucifer"

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After mentioning it a few days ago, I kept thinking about "Lucifer."  Last night I figured out the guitar parts for one section (I'm pretty sure it's doubled with auto-harp).  I might have the rhythm wrong in the second half though.  I figured out an-other part too, but I'm not sure what instrument it's actually played on.  I used electric piano, but the APP website lists only "synths," so…?

In looking that up, I've discovered that the rhythm in that part spells out EVE - the name of the album - in Morse code.  I'd been suspicious of something like that.

As a basis for my recording I used the early rough mix that's a bonus track on the CD re-issue, so there might be slight differences between this and the final version.

Ammonia Avenue

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A few weeks ago, I got Ammonia Avenue on CD (with bonus tracks!), so - excepting The Sicilian Defence - I now have all of the APP albums on CD.  I listened to Ammonia Avenue to-day, and I noticed two things:

There are recurring drum parts in "You Don't Believe" that sound really similar to recurring drum parts in "Lucifer" from Eve.  The first one in "You Don't Believe" is at about 0:20, and in "Lucifer," the first one is at about 1:28.  According to the APP website, Stuart Elliot played drums on both tracks.

The other thing I noticed is a line in "Ammonia Avenue" - the title track.  After the first verse, there's this couplet:

And who are we to criticize or scorn the things that they do?
For we shall seek and we shall find Ammonia Avenue

I think that the line "we shall seek and we shall find" is a Biblical reference.  I'm not really sure how it relates to the rest of the song, but at the very least, there's a strong resemblance between that line and Matthew 7:7: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you."

"You're Gonna Get Your Fingers Burned"

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When I listened to Eye in the Sky earlier this week, I thought the glockenspiel part from "You're Gonna Get Your Fingers Burned" sounded like it would be pretty easy to figure out.  I didn't have time until last night to actually do that though.

I recorded this just on (fake) piano because the fake glockenspiel sounded weird.  Eventually, I'd like to get a real glockenspiel, but I don't have the money for it.

"The Turn of a Friendly Card (Part One)" and "The Turn of a Friendly Card (Part Two)"

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When I listened to The Turn of a Friendly Card two days ago, I got to wondering about the "wheel in perpetual motion" that's mentioned in "The Turn of a Friendly Card (Part One)" and "The Turn of a Friendly Card (Part Two)."

It's in the first verses of both songs.  Verse one of Part One:

There are unsmiling faces and bright plastic chains
And a wheel in perpetual motion
And they follow the races and pay out the gains
With no show of an outward emotion

Verse one of Part Two:

There are unsmiling faces in fetters and chains
On a wheel in perpetual motion
Who belong to all races and answer all names
With no show of an outward emotion

Since the whole album is about gambling and casinos, I thought at first that that "wheel in perpetual motion" was a roulette wheel.  But then I realized that it could also be the wheel of fortune.  I first learned about this in my Shakespeare class when we were going over tragedies.  The idea is that people are on a wheel that's turned by fortune, so at one point, someone might be on the top of the wheel and in good fortune, but then the wheel would turn, and he'd be somewhere else is worse fortune.

Judging by the context in "The Turn of a Friendly Card (Part Two)," specifically the "faces in fetters and chains / On a wheel," the wheel of fortune makes more sense than a roulette wheel.  The song itself deals with luck and chance (fortune) more than roulette.  Cards are mentioned in the lines "your whole world depends / On the turn of a friendly card," and while I don't really know anything about roulette, I do know that cards aren't used.

Still, within just that line, the "wheel in perpetual motion" is an ambiguous image that could be a roulette wheel or the wheel of fortune.

"Games People Play"

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Yester-day, I listened to The Turn of a Friendly Card.  I listened for parts I thought would be easy to figure out, and I think I just sussed out the phrase that cycles throughout "Games People Play."  Because of the speed at which it's played, I'm pretty sure it's a loop.  I don't think a person could play it at that speed and not mess up (which is why I'm not even going to attempt to record an example).  I'm fairly certain it's the same four notes (B, D, F#, B') for the whole song (except for when the loop is faded out in the middle).

"I'd Rather Be a Man"

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I listened to Eve to-day, and I found what I think is a self-referential line in "I'd Rather Be a Man."

According to the APP website, the last line is "I'd rather be a man cause I wouldn't wanna be like you," which has the same phrase that recurs in "I Wouldn't Want to Be Like You" from I Robot.

"Breakdown"

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While listening to I Robot yester-day, I remembered something I'd noticed earlier about "Breakdown."

The second verse starts with the lines "Any time it happened I'd get over it / With a little help from all my friends," which is either a pretty obvious reference to some lines from the Beatles' "With a Little Help from My Friends" ("I get by with a little help from my friends") or an incredible coincidence.  Since Alan Parsons had some experience working with the Beatles (as a tape operator during Let It Be and Abbey Road), I'd have more confidence in the former.

Pyramid

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I've been listening to one of the albums every Tuesday (going in chronological order and starting over with Tales of Mystery and Imagination after Gaudi), but I just got Pyramid on CD yester-day (I'd had it only as a record), so I'm switching this week (which was supposed to be I Robot) with next week.

"A Dream within a Dream"

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Listening to Tales of Mystery and Imagination earlier this week, I thought the recorder part in "A Dream within a Dream" sounded like it would be pretty easy to figure out, so I figured it out yester-day.

I actually have a recorder, but it doesn't sound like it should (I think there's dust in the fipple, and I'm either going to have it fixed or just get an-other one), so I did this with the fake recorder setting on my keyboard.  At some point though, I'm going to re-learn recorder and do it right.  This is only four notes, so it should be a pretty simple thing to start with.

"(The System of) Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether"

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This post contains some spoilers for the Poe story "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether."

The other thing I noticed when I listened to Tales of Mystery and Imagination a few days ago is in "(The System of) Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether."  I'd previously noted that the melody from "The Raven" appears near the end, but it wasn't until now that I realized the implications of its reappearance.

It's not really revealed in the APP song (although looking at the lyrics just now, I noticed that the line "At the far end of your tether" Spoonerizes "Tarr" and "Fether" to "far" and "tether" [albeit missing an R]), but in the Poe story "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether," the narrator comes across a party in a house, and he later discovers that the house is an asylum and that the party-goers are the inmates who have escaped their cells (I read it about two years ago, so I might have a few things wrong, but that's the basic story).

The significance here is that "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether" involves an asylum.  Since the melody from "The Raven" reappears at the end of the APP song, it indicates either that the singer/speaker of "The Raven" was so overcome by the bird that he's now in the asylum or - based only on the APP lyrics and disregarding Poe's story - the titular system is something that the singer/speaker of "The Raven" is trying to benefit by.  Of course, it could be both too (or neither).