Forgotten throes of
anothers life
The heart of love is their only light
Faithless greeds, consolidating
Holding down sweet charity
With western eyes and serpents breath
We lay our own conscience to rest
But I'm aching at the view
Yes I'm breaking at the scenes just like you
They have values of a certain taste
The innocent they can hardly wait
To crucify, invalidating
Turning to dishonesty
With western eyes and serpents breath
They lay their own conscience to rest
But then they lie and then they dare to be
Hidden heros candidly
So I'm aching at the view
Yes I'm breaking at the scenes just like you
I feel so cold on hookers and gin
This mess we're in!
CREDITS:
Written by
G Barrow/B Gibbons/A Utley
Musicians
A Utley : Piano
C Deamer : Drums
S Atkins : Additional vocals
Samples
Hookers & Gin from the
"Sean Atkins Experience" 1957
courtesy of Starfish Records Inc.
COMMENTS:
Written in a classic
way. Dave
I love the idea of two vocals on one tune. Geoff
Sean on one of our records at last. Adrian
On the album we've actually got it down as
some old record. It's just our sick little
joke at the end. Geoff
INFORMATION:
The Architecture of a
Track: "Western Eyes"
Geoff Barrow creates the music of Portishead
like the ultimate studio reanimator, using
the chop-and-block capabilities of the
sampler and vinyl platter as his primary
tools. Even the very organic-sounding
"Western Eyes" was assembled from
many sessions, cut to vinyl, then scratched
back to the mix.
With a rare, untreated vocal from Gibbons,
the song recalls a dream with its spartan
orchestral arrangement, toy piano and dusky
jazz guitar. The track closes with '40s-style
crooning (from Shawn Atkins of London group
Whores of Babylon) answering Gibbons' bleak
lyrics with a few words on "hookers and
gin."
Barrow elaborates: "It began with one
piano chord that Adrian and I just repeated.
I had a drum set beat from a session I did
six months before at another studio with
Clive Beamer. I sampled that beat and added
it to the tape. Then I listened back over
some strings I had recorded from Dummy and
found this two-note bit, so I looped that and
added it over the top as a demo with the
beat. Then I played another part on the piano
as a drop-in, and we sent it off to Beth. She
had already written her vocal melody and the
lyrics for another track; she sang her song
over our backing track.
"For the actual recording, Adrian played
the piano part on a proper grand piano. We
did a string session about three months
later, got the orchestra to actually play
that initial bit, then took that as a sample.
Then we added the real piano back as a
sample, added the bass and a hi-hat and
arranged it. Finally, Beth came in and put
down the main vocal at the studio in Ridge
Farm near Brighten.
"For the closing male vocal, Shawn came
up from Bristol. We had a laugh and couple of
drinks and came up with some ideas. I really
wanted to do something with a vocal in it,
but I didn't want it to be stupid, 'cause it
could sound that way. We wanted to capture a
certain vibe. Shawn sang over a piano line
and then I put it on vinyl, without the
piano. Adrian worked out some jazz guitar
chords and the tinkling piano around Shawn's
vocal. By that time, a full drum-set beat had
been cut to vinyl, so I sampled it back off
vinyl and replaced the original samples.
"We mixed it as a whole thing, put it
down to quarter-inch tape, then cut that
end-part back to vinyl. Then I scratched the
vinyl in with the piano, strings, guitar and
the vocal." (From Pulse!, October 1997)
