“Democracy is an empty lie
Dead like our yesterdays tonight…”
Different, more jangly than the album version on Generation Terrorists (one of my “desert island” CDs in the ’90s, and ironically not available on Youtube due to label restrictions), this track appears on the NME compilation A Taste Of Heavenly, released in 2002. You can hear the album version HERE, or listen to the whole album from start to finish HERE.
The twins do a Bruce Springsteen cover live on FM 94/9 in 2006.
“Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring. Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvellous, intoxicating.”
— Simone Weil
“In particular those who are condemned to stagnation are often pronounced happy on the pretext that happiness consists in being at rest. This notion we reject, for our perspective is that of existentialist ethics. Every subject plays his part as such specifically through exploits or projects that serve as a mode of transcendence; he achieves liberty only through a continual reaching out towards other liberties. There is no justification for present existence other than its expansion into an indefinitely open future. Every time transcendence falls back into immanence, stagnation, there is a degradation of existence into the ‘en-sois’ – the brutish life of subjection to given conditions – and of liberty into constraint and contingence. This downfall represents a moral fault if the subject consents to it; if it is inflicted upon him, it spells frustration and oppression. In both cases it is an absolute evil. Every individual concerned to justify his existence feels that his existence involves an undefined need to transcend himself, to engage in freely chosen projects.”
— Simone de Beauvoir
(not chicken)
From Thirteen Tales of Love and Revenge (Lizard King Records, 2007). The Pierces are two sisters, Allison and Catherine Pierce, based in New York.
Album: Jeanne Moreau chante 12 chansons de Cyrus Bassiak (1963). With footage from Tony Richardson’s Mademoiselle (1966).
Je suis indolente, mes yeux sont vagues, vagues, vagues
Et je balance mes hanches vaguement
Mes lèvres remuent, fardées de mots si vagues, vagues
Les passants hésitent en me croisant
Le temps maudit toujours les presse
Le vent si lent pour celle qui attend
Le temps me berce de paresse
Alors je chante sans fin ce vague chant
{Refrain:}
Les jeux de l’amour sont comme les jeux du hasard
Qui rêve de cœur souvent est servi de pique noir
Qui cherche un regard reçoit des rires moqueurs
Les hommes nonchalants me font des signes vagues, vagues
Et me frôlent de l’épaule vaguement
Une étreinte vague entre deux êtres vagues, vagues
C’est un peu renier le néant
Le temps maudit toujours nous presse
Le temps pourtant qui va si lentement
Le temps efface mes caresses
Alors je chante sans fin ce vague chant
{au Refrain}
Et je suis si triste quand les hommes vagues, vagues, vagues
Se reposent dans mes bras vaguement
Vaguement divaguent dans leur sommeil si vague, vague
Quand ils dorment, ils ressemblent aux enfants
Le temps maudit toujours m’oppresse
Le temps qui va son lent balancement
Le temps emporte ma tendresse
Alors je chante sans fin ce vague chant
After the jump, here’s a vaguely crappy semi-automatic translation of the lyrics. It’s a hard song to translate because of the pun on the French word “vague” – wave (the motion), wave (the gesture), vague (indeterminate)…
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