The second track of what is a powerful trip through many heartfelt causes will certainly go over the listener’s heads, as it has seemed to go over mine. Americans may be truly ignorant about the world outside our own, but that shouldn’t be used to excuse ourselves for why it is that we don’t know what Nick Jones (aka Nicky Wire) is asking us to digest. If items aren’t on the front page of our daily or in the first five minutes of the news, we often walk out on the rest of the world. Born in the Welsh mining community of Blackwood, Gwent, Jones takes on the tragedy of Hillsborough in “S.Y.M.M.”. Then the flooding of Welsh villages to siphon water to Liverpool in that second track, “If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next”, and he strikes out for the volunteers of the International Brigade who fought the fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Now that’s heavy.
It puts a rather bleak look on the album, but trust me, if you forget what I just told you about the songs’ meanings, then you will never know that it has such dark roots. It only takes one run through each chorus to have you singing along with almost every song. The lavish choruses are pitched from go in the first two tracks, “The Everlasting” and “If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next”. Aside from the deep thought needed to decipher the meanings, you’ll find the songs to be better than most of the rock singles on radio today.
“Ready For Drowning” is a deleted leap into a pool that isn’t ready for swimming. “Here’s a true story/ said someone to me yesterday,” James Dean Bradfield begins, and ends with lyrics like “deny it’s history” and “what have I to believe in?” before the chorus crashes into madness and rolls to the shore on “Tsunami”.
“My Little Empire” sounds off with what seems like the scraping of Civil War drums in the background, steadying the flow. I love how “You’re Tender And You’re Tired” starts with a chugging Wurlitzer that only bows to a chorus which puts it further and further out of reach. “Born A Girl” isn’t more preachy hyperbole, but maybe that is why it isn’t very good. Bradfield needs a rest. Dreaming of “changing this fragile body,” to the interrupting chorus, “I wish I had been a girl/ and not this mess of a man,” I don’t follow. The song goes nowhere and ends pointlessly. I refuse to play shrink, so you go buy the album and figure it out. “Black Dog On My Shoulder”? What in the hell is that about? Depression, I suppose, but the song is close to being as bad as the title.
“S.Y.M.M” begins with “the subtext of this song/ I’ve thought about it so long/ but it’s really not the sort of thing/ that people want to hear us sing.” Perhaps he is right, but it does make for a nice sounding song. However, “S.Y.M.M.” is the acronym for the ‘South Yorkshire Mass Murderer’. Bradfield sings, “South Yorkshire Mass Murderer/ how can you sleep at night?” The song is eerie enough, but even more so when you know what the hell he is singing about. And it ends appropriately enough: “The ending for this song/ well I haven’t really thought of one/ there’s nothing I could ever say/ that could really take the pain away.”
As much as I find most of the album troubling, I also find it to be beautiful. The contradiction is what makes this work so amazing, sort of like Elton John’s “Candle In The Wind”. It hits you on the head, but aside from the meaning, the beauty is compelling. Sometimes it takes pain to produce beauty. Bradfield’s voice is powerful, and the accompaniment is just as stirring. And although the album drops off slightly toward the end, you surely must understand that it would be almost impossible to keep up such a staggering pace forever.
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