Tuesday 10 January 2017

Rah Band - Clouds Across the Moon (1985)



Rah Band is fantastic. Every song of theirs has a quality to the rhythms that stays and stays and stays with you. This song in particular really shines for not just the memorable melodies and hooks, but also the lyrics and the vocal performance.

This is possibly one of the saddest songs I know of. Every time I sit down and analyze the lyrics and the lyrical themes I really do get a lump in my throat. And this music video makes it so much worse.

This poor woman in the story of the song. She is separated by her husband and father of her children by a space war. Her husband being some sort of military spaceship captain. Due to whatever circumstances of the war itself, she is only able to communicate with her husband once a year, and even then, the call can be disconnected for no reason at all.

So she uses her one communication to essentially tell her husband that she can't stand to be alone anymore. However, the moment when she calls he happens to be with another woman, and it's a little grey whether or not he even responds to her on the phone. She suspects someone else there with him, but still takes the time to innocently express her sadness, while never losing faith in her husband. At which point the call gets connected, and she says she'll try again next year.

Now, far be it from me to condemn a man on the front lines of a space war, where any moment could be his last. But in the context of her perspective, she assumes the worst, but never expresses it. The video is most likely a representation of her mind running wild, but still, when you put yourself in her shoes, and listen to her voice, you can't help but feel pretty bad.

When you put it all in to context, this performance just crushes me every time, haha. But hey, there is some synth bass in there to cheer me up.

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