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Title: Silent Running
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Published: Jun 20, 2014
Author: Mike & the Mechanics
Post Date: 2014-06-20 19:12:46 by Lod
Keywords: None
Views: 119
Comments: 5
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#1. To: Lod (#0)
that's got some good lyrics...i don't get the video though.
Thanks for posting this, Lod. Most of the scenes in the video was pulled from an ecology-based science fiction film called Choke Canyon in the US market, in which an energy scientist loses his lab and land to a corporate nuclear waste dump. That should go a long way to explaining why the story in the video does not always follow one's understanding of the lyrics evenly. The song writers were British. Go back to this period in the 1980s, a mere four decades after VE day. After WWII and during the Cold War, during which this was produced, the British have lived with the terror of having their land occupied by foreign invaders. British territory in the Channel was actually occupied during the war, and the Germans faced continuous resistance from citizens of these small islands. The video may be interpreted in many ways but I see it as a young boy having a premonition of the future as he imagines being reunited with his dead father, who may have been a casualty while serving in their country's military, possibly in a special forces/advanced technology capacity far away from the docile setting in the video. Songwriters and video producers seldom have to work out all the details of meaning and interpretation in order to stage lucrative production, so I don't read too much into the drama surrounding the visitor at the door handing the key on behalf of the father to the son, the holographic image of the father, and the son shimmering as the video ends. To me, it doesn't matter as I'm seeing this as the son's imaginary reunion with his father. The father is warning the son of things that could happen or may be about to happen, so the audience is free to take them the same way. Wiki notes that the BBC banned this song from the airwaves during the first gulf war (1991?). I know Lod and christine have fertile imaginations so the song's lyrics are theirs to interpret. Digging more deeply into the Wiki page, one finds that the whole record appears to have a dark, futuristic, "occupation" theme. A remaining set of questions: were the songwriters in any way opposed to the New World Order as they saw it? Did they find it wrong that British firearms laws disarmed the populace when it faced such fears as an invader, or a hostile government? The Wikipedia page for this song is helpful in getting a basic perspective: "Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)" is a song performed by Mike + The Mechanics. Written by Mike Rutherford and B. A. Robertson, it was the first track from their 1985 self-titled debut album. It was also released as the band's first single, reaching number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and number 1 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, where it stayed for five weeks.[1] It reached number 21 in the band's native United Kingdom.[2] Paul Carrack provided lead vocals on the song.[3] The song's original title was simply "Silent Running"; the name extension was given when the song was chosen to appear in the 1986 movie On Dangerous Ground, which was titled Choke Canyon in the US.[4] The longer title for the song has proved confusing, not only because of the film's different title in the US, but because the song's lyrics have nothing to do with the film. Possibly because of this, the song is listed as "Silent Running" on many later releases, such as the Hits album. The song was banned by the BBC during the Gulf War due to its address of war, nationalism and religion, as well as a direct reference to weaponry in the line, "There's a gun and ammunition just inside the doorway."[5] The Protomen released a Cover version of the song as a mash-up with their own song, Breaking Out in 2012 as a B-Side. The fear of German occupation was especially intense for communists, labor unionists, and left-leaning socialists in the UK. Fascists like Oswald Mosley were placed under house arrest for the duration of the war because of these fears. In V is for Vendetta, the underground resistance and its imperial foe are based on the left in the UK and an imaginary government controlled by the fascists. We can gather that the authors of this song were leftists who were opposed to the "conservative" government of Margaret Thatcher and took her "iron lady" image as a threat to freedom. In some ways they were correct, if so. Government continuity programs developed against communism are what have blossomed into anti-domestic "resistance" apparatuses since America's 9/11 and the 7/7 train bombing in London.
Good stuff - thanks for the history!
1. Neer, Dan (1985). Mike on Mike [interview LP], Atlantic Recording Corporation. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choke_Canyon Answers your question with a citation from the song author himself.
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#3. To: Lod, christine, *antifa* (#1)
that's got some good lyrics...i don't get the video though.
The song and the video are thought-provoking, although the lyrics are mild and the music modest by today's standards. Genesis, the band from which Mike and the Mechanics were formed, had a leftist bent. "Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)" _s.jpg)
Single by Mike + The Mechanics from the album Mike + The Mechanics Released 4 November 1985 Format 7" Recorded 1985 Genre Soft rock Length 6:14
4:09 (7")Label Atlantic Writer(s) Mike Rutherford, B. A. Robertson Producer(s) Christopher Neil Mike + The Mechanics singles chronology "Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)"
1985"All I Need Is a Miracle"
1986
#4. To: Deasy (#3)
#5. To: Lod, christine (#4)
The promotional video for the song features a few clips from the film, but primarily follows the story of the lyrics, which are about an astronaut trying to send a message to the past in order to warn his family of an imminent societal breakdown.[1]
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