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A new edition of Rush’s famous album, Moving Pictures, was released recently. I received a vinyl edition from the Rush website with a bonus: a lyric sheet of one song from the album, a facsimile of Neil Peart’s handwritten sheet. The sheet was chosen randomly. I did not know which song I would receive. Check the inner sleeve. What do I find? “Witch Hunt,” appropriately enough.
The opening track from 1975’s The Warrior on the Edge of Time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UIYMxZRLf0
It’s been a while since I posted any decoding of lyrics. I was thinking about what use classical literature, myth, and history have, and this song popped into my head. They provide a storehouse of examples that can prompt the mind to remember its block universe origin.
As far as poetry goes, the lyrics are a little awkward at times, but Hawkwind are not known for their eloquence (e.g. rhyming ‘sat’ and ‘at’, ‘battery’ and ‘anatomy’, and ‘soul’ and ‘knoll’ are of questionable taste). Nonetheless, the imagery is well done. I especially like the stone circle of sitting wizard sages (which prompted me to remember the meaning of ‘inner circle’ : the inner circle of eternalism initiates) and the line ‘the wind blows through your watering eyes’ (with double-meaning on eye/I; ‘watering eye/I’ is a particularly neat combining of loose cognition perception with instability of local control source; the line yields a good, full image of the divine wind blowing through the perceptual distortion and instability of self; note the 1987 Pink Floyd song “Learning to Fly” from A Momentary Lapse of Reason: “Across the clouds I see my shadow fly | Out of the corner of my watering eye” [via Cybermonk; compare).
Below are the lyrics, with my comments in [italics].
[First four lines lines quoted from Longfellow poem "Psalm of Life"] Lives of great men all remind us [a role for myth and history, to make the mind remember its block universe origin] We may make our lives sublime [potential for transcendent knowledge] And departing leave behind us [vanishing of accustomed ego solidity] Footprints in the sands of time [ego disappears, leaving trace path of worldine in granular string of timelices] Of hewn stones the sacred circle [stone of block universe] Where the wizard sages sat [to sit in the stone circle is to be an initiate into psychedelic dependent control in the fixed future; to be in the inner circle, as opposed to the uninitiated outside the circle] Let us try to remember All the times where they were at So your thoughts, they were expecting Assault and battery on the human anatomy [fear of future threat; fear that you will be harmed by the higher controller though inserter] The Golden Void speaks to me [hidden separate thought source] Denying my reality [the higher controller forcefully denies one's initial sense of self and perception] I lose my body, lose my mind [loss of accustomed sense of self and control] I blow like wind, flow like wine [blowing and flowing characteristic of loose cognition; wind = power from higher controller, holy spirit; wine = psychedelic cognitive loosener] Down a corridor of flame [corridor is analogous to snake-shaped worldline; flames refer to purifying of mind, burning away impure model of autonomous control] Will I fly so high again [fear at out of control high] Is there something wrong with me [doubt about autonomy of self] I cannot hear, I cannot see [perceptions overwhelmed] Down a corridor of flame So you think the time is past The life you lead will always last [double-meaning: new initiate fears end of life as autonomous control agent; experienced initiate knows eternity of life always fixed in worldline in block universe] Chaotic fusion's of your soul Down below that rocky knoll Through the clouds an open sky The wind flows through your watering eyes [double meaning: read "I" for "eyes"; multiple selves, spread across timeslices. The power from the higher controller (holy spirit wind) flows through your watering I (blurry controller in loose cognition)]. The sounds are pitched to draw you On your never ending journey [the higher controller moves you along; your worldline is frozen eternally into the spacetime block; your journey never ends, your trip never ends] On the edge of time [perspective raised up seems to perceive time itself, and oneself embedded in it]
In the 2010 documentary Beyond the Lighted Stage, Neil Peart says:
Words can carry different freight for different people, of course, but those who do have the sensitivity to pay the kind of attention to lyrics that I put into them, it’s wonderful to connect that way and to feel that you’re not playing down to anyone. We’ve always had the impression that people are just as smart as we are, so if we can figure this stuff out, that they can, too, you know, and we’re not being that, that terrible, damning word, “pretentious”. We’re not pretending anything. This is really what turned us on this year, you know. Lyrically, it’s always been a reflection of my times and the times I observe, but everyone is a reflection of me.
here: https://youtu.be/ge0NXaidkmM?t=4173
Peart writes for an audience sensitive to the coded allusions to intense, drug-based altered state experiencing, including self-control seizure and reconfiguration in the light of experiential shift from possiblism to eternalism.
“We’re not pretending anything” : lyrics are metaphorical reports of *experiencing*, not mere imagination about Greek gods, Xanadu, futuristic societies, robots, clockwork angels.
“people are just as smart as we are…they can [figure it out]” : Peart relies on audience to decipher. Rush as mystery band, requires metaphorical interpretation.
“reflection of my times and the times I observe…everyone is a reflection of me” : extreme solipsism typical of altered state, doubts about reality of external world, including other people. Mind in altered state interprets all things as leading to revelation about self, time and world
Quotation plays in part over video for song Subdivisions. Sample lyrics referring to eternalism and self-control cybernetics [see also egodeath.com on Subdivisions]:
In geometric order
growing up it all seemed so one-sided / opinions all provided / the future pre-decided
nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone
conform or be cast out
any escape might help to smooth / the unattractive truth / but the suburbs have no charms to soothe / the restless dreams of youth
the timeless old attraction [sung ‘timeless soul detraction’]
Get caught in ticking traps
Did John Lennon learn the lyrical technique of alluding to altered state experiencing from Bob Dylan? Dylan heard the Beatles sing ‘I get high’ in the song ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’.
I have not studied Dylan much, but the broad outlines suggest he was working on the lyrical technique of alluding to altered state experiencing in early 1964. This verse from ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ comes to mind, with my annotations:
Take me on a trip upon your magic swirlin’ ship [passive rider on loose cognition ship]
My senses have been stripped, my hands can’t feel to grip [loose cognition; inability to control and steer]
My toes too numb to step
Wait only for my boot heels to be wanderin’ [toe in front (ego] not in control, but heel behind (hidden controller) is; wander = not in direct control of direction]
I’m ready to go anywhere, I’m ready for to fade [acceptance of secondary level of control, of givenness of motion; ego power fades]
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way [illusory cross time ego power fades into time slice ‘parade’ of individual moments; local control spellbound and enthralled by nonlocal control]
I promise to go under it [pledge to higher controller, submission]
Dylan’s drug timeline is unclear, but some place his first LSD trip in early 1964, with cannabis use before that. His lyrics take on a more symbolic, introspective quality beginning with the songs written in early 1964, including ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ [although not recorded and released until 1965].
It’s accepted that Dylan turned the Beatles on to cannabis in late 1964. Lennon is usually said to have gone through a ‘Dylan’ phase during the recording of the Help! album in early 1965. Before the Beatles took the reins in late 1965, Dylan was the accepted leader of rock as art form. The classic psychedelic band The Byrds began their success in early 1965 by covering ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’, including only the verse I quoted above, the most obviously psychedelic of the verses.
Michael writes:
The Rock radio DJ again played the audio clip of John Lennon vehemently denying that the song title and lyric line “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” stands for LSD. My retort: Was this before, or after the “Beatles are more popular than Jesus” fiasco? The Beatles had PR problems even before the pot and acid revolution.
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was released in June 1967 on Sgt. Pepper’s. Lennon said the Beatles were more popular than Jesus in March 1966, originally appearing in a British publication. The fiasco erupted when the statement was republished in the USA in August 1966. There were extensive protests throughout the US, especially the south. Radio stations stopped playing their records. Records were burned publicly. The KKK picketed their concerts. Death threats were made. A number of other countries banned the Beatles’ music. Lennon’s killer in 1980 was still angry about the remark.
By June 1967 and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, the covert war was well underway. The Byrds had already seen their commercial success harmed by the accusation that their songs ‘Eight Miles High’ and ‘Fifth Dimension’ were drug songs, released in March and June of 1966. Fifth Dimension album released in July 1966, featuring cover with band members riding magic carpet and first appearance of their psychedelic band name logo.
March – June 1966 also saw the Beatles land in controversy with the ‘Butcher Cover‘ to the US album Yesterday and Today, depicting dead baby dolls. It was a rough year for the Beatles – early in the year they were forcefully run out of the Philippines for perceived insults against the Queen of that country. They were well trained at minimizing the effects of bad publicity by the release of Sgt. Pepper’s and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.
–
Beatles timeline (assembled via):
28 August 1964 – Dylan fully turns on the Beatles and manager Brian Epstein to cannabis. They had encountered it as early as 1960, but stuck to amphetamines. Dylan had heard the lyric “I can’t hide” in the Beatles song ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ as ‘I get high’ and assumed that the Beatles were already regular users.
8 October 1964 – Beatles record song ‘She’s A Woman’. Lennon later says that the lyrics ‘turn me on when I get lonely’ refers to cannabis. This is likely the first dru allusion in a Beatles song, here simply referring to the drug. The technique would later blossom into competent allusions to control dynamics as revealed in the intense altered state.
23 / 27 November 1964 – ‘I Feel Fine / She’s A Woman’ single released.
February – June 1965 – Beatles record album and film Help!. The filming of the movie (and therefore also the recording of album, recorded concurrently) is usually described as happening amid a cloud of cannabis smoke.
Between March and July 1965 – Lennons, Harrison and Boyd dosed with LSD.
13 April 1965 – song ‘Help!’ recorded, reflecting altered state loss of youthful conception of independent ego power and need for rescue by higher controller. Lyrical encoding suggests that the date of LSD dosing above must be before the recording of the song, unless Lennon had strong control loss experiences on cannabis, such as through ingesting.
6 August 1965 – Help! album released.
24 August 1965 – Purported ‘second trip’ of Lennon and Harrison and Starr’s first, at party in Los Angeles. Joined by Roger McGuinn and David Crosby of The Byrds. Actor Peter Fonda tells Lennon ‘I know what it’s like to be dead’, later used in the song ‘She Said She Said’ from Revolver.
October – November 1965 – Beatles record Rubber Soul album and ‘Day Tripper / We Can Work It Out’ single
3 December 1965 – Rubber Soul album and ‘Day Tripper / We Can Work It Out’ single released
March 1966 – ‘Butcher’ photo taken for US compilation album, cover produced but hastily covered over at most packaging plants in time for June 1966 release. ‘Bigger than Jesus’ interview conducted and published in UK
1 April 1966 – Lennon purchases copy of Leary, Alpert, and Metzner’s The Psychedelic Experience: A Manual Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Influences song ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ from Revolver album, the recording of which song began on 6 April 1966.
April – June 1966 – Recording of Revolver album and ‘Paperback Writer / Rain’ single
30 May / 10 June 1966 – ‘Paperback Writer / Rain’ single released
5 August 1966 – Revolver album released.
August 1966 – ‘Bigger than Jesus’ controversy in US; final Beatles tour.
6 October 1966 – LSD prohibition begins, first in California
November 1966 – April 1967 – Beatles record Sgt. Pepper’s album and ‘Strawberry Fields Forever / Penny Lane’ single
February 1967 – ‘Strawberry Fields Forever / Penny Lane’ single released
April – November 1967 – Beatles record songs collected on Magical Mystery Tour album
29 April 1967 – Lennon attends 14 Hour Technicolour Dream [=duration of an LSD trip] happening while tripping on LSD.
1 June 1967 – Sgt. Pepper’s album released. Song ‘A Day in the Life’ banned by BBC for drug references; other countries ban other songs for the same. Beatles initially deny, but later McCartney says ‘Sgt. Pepper was a drug album’.
17 June 1967 – McCartney is first Beatle to discuss LSD use publicly.
24 July 1967 – Beatles and Epstein add names to public add calling for legalization of cannabis.
7 August 1967 – Harrisons trip on LSD while in Haight-Ashbury.
26 August 1967 – Beatles publicly renounce use of drugs, pledge themselves to Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Beatles play the game, publicly embrace meditation as phony substitute for drugs, popularized after illegalization of LSD.
September 1967 – Beatles film Magical Mystery Tour
November 1967 – Magical Mystery Tour album released
26 December 1967 – Magical Mystery Tour film released
February – April 1968 – Beatles attend Transcendental Meditation retreat in India at ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
18 October 1968 – Lennon and Ono arrested for cannabis possession
12 March 1969 – Harrisons arrested for cannabis possession
All four Beatles would defend LSD later in life.
Other drugs factor into the Beatles story, including cocaine and heroin, but they are of relatively less interest than cannabis and especially LSD. Due to Prohibition and the pre-Prohibition drug backlash, we can never take them exactly at their word about their drug use. They were forced to conceal and distort in their statements to the ‘straight’ media.
I sense that the period 1965-1967 is the most profound period of the Beatles career, the most influenced by cannabis and LSD.
Unity consciousness is not the end goal of enlightenment. You must test your mental model of control in the intense altered state: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/egodeath/conversations/messages/7377
From “Watcher of the Skies” by Genesis (1972)
“From life alone
To life as one [unity consciousness, oneness]
Think not now your journey’s done [a warning to ‘oneness’ advocates: you’re not finished!]
For though your ship be sturdy
No mercy has the sea
Will you survive on the ocean of being?” [A challenge to test control agency in the loosened state of cognition. You think your ship is sturdy? Set sail and steer your ship. See how your mental model of control fares on the sea. The ship is the control system, you are the pilot, the sea is the loosened state of cognition]
Just tuned into this:
Spent my days with a woman unkind, [woman unkind = egoic delusion]
Smoked my stuff and drank all my wine. [ingestion of entheogen]
Made up my mind to make a new start, [transformation of mental worldmodel]
Going To California with an aching in my heart. [wounded local source of thoughts]
Someone told me there’s a girl out there [rumors of new relationship]
with love in her eyes and flowers in her hair. [Love = benevolent relationship between parts of self; eyes/*I*s = splitting of self; flowers in hair = entheogens in head; also, flower = secret of growth, revealing of control systems in head]
Took my chances on a big jet plane, [flying sensation, piloting, steering; risky chance]
never let them tell you that we’re all the same.
The sea was red and the sky was grey; [Inversion of normal colors]
I wondered how tomorrow could ever follow today. [stopped time, eternalism]
The mountains and the canyons started to tremble and shake [world model changes, both high and low; perceptual distortion]
as the children of the sun began to awake. [new child = new fresh control system after initiation; parent-child relationship with ultimate controller = sun]
Seems that the wrath of the Gods [wrath against ego delusion; higher controller kills ego delusion]
Got a punch on the nose and it started to flow; [watery perceptual distortion]
I think I might be sinking. [loss of ego control power as self sinks into watery flowing surroundings]
Throw me a line if I reach it in time [prayer for rescue, to be pulled out]
I’ll meet you up there where the path [union with higher controller; on the single, eternal path]
Runs straight and high. [single eternal path of determinism]
To find a queen without a king, [queen/king = controllers, union of controllers. queen without king is local receptive passive ego without active filling controller]
They say she plays guitar and cries and sings… la la la la
Ride a white mare in the footsteps of dawn [horse and rider, follow the path of the sun/ higher controller]
Tryin’ to find a woman who’s never, never, never been born. [never been born = never mistook local pseudo autonomy for literal autonomy; cf. Beatles, “She Said She Said” – and you’re making me feel like I’ve never been born]
Standing on a hill in my mountain of dreams,
Telling myself it’s not as hard, hard, hard as it seems.
Singer leaves ego delusion, travels in search of new control system.
One of the more shocking songs in the Beatles catalogue.
Well I’d rather see you dead, little girl
Than to be with another man
You better keep your head, little girl
Or I won’t know where I am
You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That’s the end ah little girl
Well I know that I’m a wicked guy
And I was born with a jealous mind
And I can’t spend my whole life
Trying just to make you toe the line
You better run for your life if you can…
Let this be a sermon
I mean everything I’ve said
Baby, I’m determined
And I’d rather see you dead
You better run for your life if you can…
I’d rather see you dead…
You better run for your life if you can…
The lyrics are deliberately shocking and disturbing in order to point to the altered state themes, similar to the controversial album cover that featured pieces of meat and plastic limbs from baby dolls of the same time period (The song was recorded in Dec of 1965 and the picture taken in early 1966). Lennon sings with a paranoid, manic quality, as someone in the grips of egodeath madness, willing to destroy his own ego (the little girl). His little girl has betrayed him, gone off to another man. This means that his local control system has failed him, betrayed him, left him for another control source (‘the other man’). Lennon is not in control of his ego, but another controller is. Lennon is driven out of his mind and will kill his own ego in order to demonstrate his control. He hints at the religious nature of the song in the line “Let this be a sermon” and at fatedness in the line “Baby, I’m determined.”
In later interviews, Lennon distanced himself from the song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-90rrjR6Wvk
Written during an all night acid trip by Mike Heron in 1967. Aside from the various references to death and timeless scattered among the lyrics, the ending of the song reflects the perceptual white light feedback that often accompanies the climax of an acid trip and the sensation of allowing a hidden controller to guide you:
May the long time sun shine upon you
All love surround you
And the pure light within you
Guide you all the way on.
I bring up these lyrics because they are often misattributed as a traditional blessing. You can find people claiming that they are an Irish blessing, a Sikh blessing, a Sufi blessing, and a Kundalini mantra and that Heron adopted them. The lyrics have become especially widespread in a variety of yogic practices, though again without proper attribution.
It is important to reassert the original context of these lyrics. They reflect drug-based experiencing. When meditation-only advocates and other drug-disparaging, ‘spiritual’ new agers use the lyrics, they are co-opting lyrics that actually reflect drug-based spirituality, which is the only authentic form of spirituality because only with drugs does the spirit actually come in any reliable sense. It’s not clear how the misattribution has spread so much. It seems that at some point in the late 60s or early 70s, practitioners of Kundalini yoga began singing the lyrics to conclude their daily practice. Likely, Heron’s name simply fell out as practitioners spread the chant. How the chant became attributed to so many different traditions is beyond me.
This is only a minor part of the conflict against entheogen-diminishing, meditation advocates, but it nonetheless reflects larger patterns in that conflict. Meditation-only advocates co-opt authentic drug-based spirituality and act as if their co-option reflects traditional practice.
Dreamt I was dead sleeping in your bed
Floated up from the ground and looked down
Then finally I could see completely
Heard the angels’ song
I know what you are
I could never tell
They sang what you are
This far away, you’re a miniature to me
Are you sorry you almost disappeared
Now I know what you are
I could never tell
They sang what you are
Now the notes are fading
and everything is turned around
And I can’t help but think it
Its a long way down
And everything is changing
and everything is turned around
And I can’t help but thinking
its a long way down
Now I know what you are
I could never tell
They sang what you are
–––
The song is about an altered state experience in which the speaker’s awareness splits away from his sense of self or ego, rises up, and comes to see how small his ego really is. The song refers to an “I” and a “You” as if to two different people, but it’s really about self knowledge. In the altered state one’s awareness seems to split from one’s sense of self or ego. One recognizes that one’s ego, which one had previously identified with completely, is but a limited and largely illusory construct. That’s why the speaker can address that construct as “You”. “Miniature” and “almost disappeared” refer to the limited and largely illusory nature of the ego.
“Everything is turned around” refers to the complete change of viewpoint brought about by the altered state and the revolutionary self-knowledge gained in it. Where once the speaker had identified himself completely with his ego, he now has a wider understanding of himself, one that includes the experiences typical of the altered state.
“It’s a long way down” refers to the period after the knowledge about the limited and illusory nature of the ego has been gained. The altered state experience will come to an end, and the speaker will return to his normal state of perception and egoic functioning.
This is a common experience in the altered state. Look up references to these sensations in the altered state: dreaming that one is dead, flying up to a height or being lifted up, looking down, hearing the angels, self-discovery and self-knowledge, ego death, meta-perception, perceiving the working of one’s own mind, the illusory ego, pure awareness.
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Many other Guster songs from the albums Parachute (1995), Goldfly (1997), Lost and Gone Forever (1999), and Keep it Together (2003) refer to altered state experiencing. I have not investigated their other albums. It is noteworthy because the band would not normally be characterized as Psychedelic, Classic, Acid, Prog, or Metal. We expect to find masterful allusions to the altered state in those genres.
cyberdisciple 
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