Flaming June
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Music & Lyrics by Pigni A pretty weird song; it was originally conceived as more of a ballad a la Robbie Williams ( purist proggers would have fainted in the meantime while reading this…); indeed my intent was to write also a song for my beloved redhead Anna ( for the record….. I fell in love again!) and since the topic of the album was also pictures, I began browsing the web for a portrait of a redhead and I found this marvellous canvass by Lord Frederic Leighton; I loved it at once and I found it had something dreamlike, magical, summer like and I loved the sparkling light and the peacefulness oozing from the image, again a juxtaposition that attracted me. Lyrically I tried to keep the surreal feeling of the picture but obviously there are hints to my girlfriend and me and that's why I came up with the line about the girl who took a lamplight for the moon since that really happened on our first date when we were sitting by the lake one night ! It seemed almost finished musically and sounding not like a Robbie Williams' hit but a poor man's Beatles song, but one day, while sitting at the piano, I began playing these percussive jazzy chords a la Steely Dan; at first I thought they were utterly out of context with what I had previously written but this reinvigorated my genuine "prog soul" and I remember I played them to Anna on the phone and she told me to keep going since she felt this swift change of mood was portraying precisely her character (rather temperamental like every redhead woman since Queen Elisabeth I, I daresay!) and therefore I kept going till the whole coda of the song developed ( I could've called the album "coda" given many songs feature that…but of course Led Zeppelin came first !); I liked the continuous swings of atmosphere (there are also sweeter sections because Anna is very tender as well !) and I think I could've gone forever developing themes…but luckily enough at some point I decided it was time to get back to the introductory arpeggio and end it up ! This said, once we laid down the backing tracks we were pretty much stuck and the song rested in limbo, until I thought about the talent of Billy Sherwood…he could be the man…definitely a progger but also acquainted with pop, so I got in touch and he answered saying the track was quite cool and he would have liked to contribute…so he was on board as well coming up with a terrific arrangement that brought the song to another level (great guitars here man, thank you so much ! )…and…well to have two "Yes alumni" on the same album it's just wonderful for a die hard fan like me ! Now the song sounds to me as if Keane had met Pink Floyd which is bizarre and fine given I like them both ! |
