Evening Of Swing (Has Been Cancelled) envisages the Apocalypse beginning during Wimbledon. Or something. I think.
See lyrics to Evening Of Swing (Has Been Cancelled)
Evening Of Swing (Has Been Cancelled) envisages the Apocalypse beginning during Wimbledon. Or something. I think.
See lyrics to Evening Of Swing (Has Been Cancelled)
grim
Not sure but would the pleasure grounds be more likely to feature a maze rather than a field of corn (maize)?
2 May 2008
chris
It would, but they love our maize mazes round here, and if it’s “maze”, it would need to be “a maze”. Which it isn’t. As ever, your mileage may vary.
2 May 2008
ian
I think it’s them lovely 10p a bag cheap maize crisps. We always referred to them as “maize” as kids. “space raiders” and such. A sled made of maize would have been our dream back then so it makes perfect sense to me
15 August 2008
Charles Exford
As a postscript to my comments in the National Shite Day Thread, I notice that the only other Biscuits number in dandelionradio.com’s Festive Fifty for 2008 is ‘Problem Chimp’ at number 35.
Hmm. Again, had there been a year of proper Peel shows, the results would surely have featured the immense, the TOWERING “Evening of Swing”, somewhere in the Top ten or fifteen, behind NSD in its rightful spot at number one ?
1 January 2009
Simon
Just in case you would like to see what it looks like between Glyder Fach and Glyder Fawr… http://www.flickr.com/photos/simon_holt/2572574105/
2 April 2009
Charles Exford
Now this is what I call quite tasteful, with the towering pomp of EoS in the top 15 not of the year but of the decade:
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/now-hear
31 December 2009
Charles Exford
Revisiting this thread to see what sort of nonsense I babbled whilst in my cups the other night, I happen to read the rest of the above comments for the first time.
Chris I can’t agree with your contentious point that it would need to be “a maze”. The sort of guidebook/leaflet/estate agent blurb that is being parodied would rarely have an indefinite article. Notice how few there are in, for example, a list like this one from a veritable doyen of topiary:
http://www.maze-world.com/BritainHedge.htm
Meanwhile, off at an entirely different tangent, I noticed some fairly obvious common ground between the idea of an “evening of swing” and the image of “a real rat pack” when I happened upon various websites mentioning this particular tribute artist.
http://www.monitormusic.com/other_bands/robbie.html
Can definitely imagine the sort of people that would book him, or indeed he himself, in a stretch limo, preferably at the bottom of a very deep ravine indeed.
5 January 2010
Asymptote
His light show is excellent though.
7 January 2010
Charles Exford
Blimey you go off at a tangent and end up on a bit of a learning curve.
Anyway two more parabolic thoughts.
1. should we open up the whole “had”/”hath”/”has” debate or not bother ?
2. anyone else noticed the Pere Ubu reference in this song ? Anyone know of any other Pere Ubu references in the works ? It’s a band I’ve always wanted to know more about so maybe this is my cue.
8 January 2010
Charles Exford
I asked about the “hath/had” thing and NB57 said no, all “has”. Might be ‘cos of double tracking on the vocals again.
I forgot to ask about my theory that the Behemoth & “seven score and nine” refers to “Cloud 149″, a seminal song by Pere Ubu, AKA David Thomas who used to be known as Crocus Behemoth. Probably one of me more bollocks theories to be fair though.
But anyway, look at this for sheer value for money in Snowdonia, very tempting.
19 March 2010
Charles Exford
Oh yeah, anyway I only came on to say it’s confirmed as “maze”.
19 March 2010
Norbert D
Yeah, I always assumed it was “maize”, thinking “maze in the shape of a sled? That can’t be right.” Just reread the lyrics, changed my mind, and slapped my forehead with my palm.
I was hearing it as “pleasure grounds…. with maize in the shape of a sled”. But in fact, surely it’s “pleasure grounds with maze… in the shape of a sled.” I.E. the pleasure grounds are in the shape of a sled, and they have a maze. Or to put it another way, “pleasure grounds (with maze), in the shape of a sled.” If you see what I mean.
19 March 2010
Ricardo
While pursuing my life’s goal of completing the entire works of PG Wodehouse (I am nothing if not ambitious), I came across the following in Lord Emsworth and the Girl Friend, one of the short stories in the Blandings Castle collection:
“A function like the Blandings Parva School Treat blurred his conception of Man as Nature’s Final Word.”
27 July 2010
Mac
When I listen to this I always think it’s
And Ezekiel punched Dan Brown
And the KNIGHTS are drawing in
as in The Knights Templar. A reference to 2007 book “The Ezekiel Code”
Or do I just need to go with the flow?
3 November 2010
Charles Exford
I like it, and why not indeed ? After all, it turned out to be “polishing the knave” in JDOG, where we had believed for aeons that it was “nave”.
Legend tells us that King Arthur’s knights sleep in a cave just a couple of miles from the boulders strewn between GF & GF, and why shouldn’t the boulders of Castell y Gwynt be the petrified warriors of old from some such legend ? The same boulders have served Hollywood as dragon scales after all.
So I’m with you, squire, the noisy campaign for a “k” is on. Where there is no “k”, there will be no peaceful nights. Unquiet slumbers for the sleepers.
[See also forthcoming "Biccipedia" entry examining the hidden meanings of references to Welsh hilltops in the Works of HMHB].
4 November 2010
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
The nights are currently drawing in since we put the clocks back so I’m quite happy with ‘nights’ but the whole The Ezekiel Code and Dan Brown reference has me slightly leaning towards ‘knights’ as it’s such a lovely image.
A bruised and blooded hack-who-struck-lucky, reeling after receiving an unprovoked thumping from an Old Testament prophet, being slowly encircled by a mysterious and secretive group of chivalrous and honourable knights out for revenge on the man who could come up with sentences as clumsy and clumpy as ‘ “The Knights Templar were warriors,” Teabing reminded, the sound of his aluminum crutches echoing in this reverberant space.’
Having suffered another beating from the vengeful Templers, Dan Brown stumbles away, confused and dazed, his mind unable to focus on anything, until he realises that as a final insult, his Evening of Swing has indeed been cancelled.
4 November 2010
llamafarmer
This is no time hair splitting! The good folk of Lincolnshire are suffering real and present swing cancellation!
24 June 2011
John Burscough
Not much better in that London, it appears.
24 June 2011
Richard Lovell
Ah, life is one PBR.
Just saw that Lloyd Cole is doing a gig in Buxton, went to the venue’s website and they are doing the play Equus. No sign of Mr Ed though.
7 November 2011
Dave Wiggins
Took the train up Snowdon, last Saturday, and then walked down from the summit. Tell you what, readers, Nigel isn’t wrong about them boulders. I also gurgled with pleasure when the pre-recorded commentary made reference – in proper HMHB lyric order – to Glyder Fach and Glyder Fawr. Sadly, I was unable to find an evening of swing taking place in the metropolis of nearby Llanberis.
18 July 2012
MIKE IN COV
@Dave – it had benn cancelled.
18 July 2012
Chigley Skin
Bit of self-reference going on in this one? The thought occurs that your evening of swing being cancelled due to the knights drawing in, isn’t a million miles away from your am-dram class being postponed indefinitely because the root of Jesse’s just turned up in glorious majesty.
22 July 2012
ACIDIC REGULATOR
As they plunged, the couple from Paintball’s Coming Home might have realised that it wasn’t a really good idea.
1 August 2012
ACIDIC REGULATOR
Piers Plowman for the 21st century, anyone? I’m not suggesting any deliberate reference, just the shared concept of a dream vision.
Any ideas on “seven score and nine”? It’s needed for the rhyme and could easily be a random number, but you never know. Is there a 149 bus route in the Wirral or something?
25 August 2012
MrSpecialPants
I love this song, haven’t got a bloody clue what much of it means though. I was walking in Birstall, West Yorks a few weeks ago and a car passed me with this blaring out of the window, wonder if the driver ever comes here?
9 December 2012
Peter Aglingtons
Has anyone else spotted the PG Wodehouse reference? In Code of the Woosters, Gussie Fink-Nottle writes in his notebook of Roderick Spode “the way he eats asparagus makes one question one’s whole conception of man as nature’s last word”.
8 June 2013
vendor of quack nostrums
Spotter’s badge for Mr. Aglingtons please. And the fact that it is asparagus he is inappropriately consuming somehow adds to the delight I am currently experiencing.
8 June 2013
CHARLES EXFORD
Brilliant find, Peter, and looking at Ricardo’s comment #13 above, I find it somehow reassuring that the prolific Wodehouse obviously recycled his quips… like most humorists, I suppose.
NB57 has mentioned that he’s a Wodehouse fan.
10 June 2013