(previously: Mixtape of the Found Decade)
(previously in Program Eleven/I: Novas 0.1)
(previously in story time: Novas 4.1)
In the fiction of Novas, this is Susan’s dream sequence. She’s been having space dreams since her chronologically earlier appearance in 5.3.
Novas 0.1 was an experiment (as all of the Novas project is, an experiment in cyberpunk-aesthetic nostalgia trawling and radically remixed hypermedia on the ragged edge of online rights permission), but it was more experimental than most of these modules because I built it structurally, deliberately layered track by track as a palindrome.
I intended for it to have exactly ten tracks because that’s the parameters I set myself at the start of the project: units of ten or sixteen songs, no repeats.
But Novas 0.1 just didn’t work with ten. It completed a loop, of a kind, with Dance Dance Dance matching and feeding back to Squares And Triangles, but there was no thematic conclusion. No spark plug to it.
Then I found Baba Yaga’s Secret Combination (because they did a cover of Back in the USSR) and that was the missing piece. So after four years, I had to break a ground rule: it had to be eleven songs.
That’s when I suddenly noticed that it was the day of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch. (And also was set number 11 in my internal numbering).
And so: an Apollo 11 themed mix.
Novas 0.2: The Earth Forever Turning
01 Donovan – Cosmic Wheels (1973, Scotland) JACK
God is playing marbles
With his planets and his stars
Creating havoc through my life
With his influence on Mars
That's why I'm stumbling down the highway on my boots of steel
I should be rolling down the skyway on my cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
In the present position of the planets
It's impossible for me to say
Just when I'll find my course again
With these boulders in my way
I should be rolling down the skyway on my cosmic wheels
Instead of stumbling down this highway on my boots of steel
Cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
Cosmic wheels
Celestial wheels
Jack is not satisfied with the situation.
Donovan appears quite a few times in my musical landscape. This one, I think I first heard back in 1993.
02 Tasmin Archer – Sleeping Satellite (1992, England) SKYWATCH
I blame you for the moonlit sky
And the dream that died with the Eagle's flight
I blame you for the moonlit nights
When I wonder why are the seas still dry
Don't blame this sleeping satellite
Did we fly to the moon too soon?
Did we squander the chance?
In the rush of the race
The reason we chase
Is lost in romance
And still we try
To justify the waste for a taste
Of man's greatest adventure, whoa
I blame you for the moonlit sky
And the dream that died with the Eagle's flight
I blame you for the moonlit nights
When I wonder why are the seas still dry
Don't blame this sleeping satellite
Have we lost what it takes to advance
Have we peaked too soon?
If the world is so green
Then why does it scream
Under a blue moon?
We wonder why
Is the Earth sacrificed for the price
Of its greatest treasure, whoa
I blame you for the moonlit sky
And the dream that died with the Eagle's flight
I blame you for the moonlit nights
When I wonder why are the seas still dry
Don't blame this sleeping satellite
And when we shoot for the stars
What a giant step
Have we got what it takes
To carry the weight
Of this concept?
Or pass it by
Like a shot in the dark miss the mark
With a sense of adventure, whoa
I blame you for the moonlit sky
And the dream that died with the Eagle's flight
I blame you for the moonlit nights
When I wonder why are the seas still dry
Don't blame this sleeping satellite
SKYWATCH remembers many things which have been lost. The decisions of humans are alien to her but still she tries to fathom their reasons.
Whatever happened to Tasmin Archer? This was an amazing song, from that early 90s period when it briefly seemed like everything was opening up, politically and musically.
03 The Sundays – Monochrome (1997, England) SUSAN
It's four in the morning
July in '69
Me and my sister
We crept down like shadows
They're bringing the Moon
right down to our sitting room
Static and silence
In a monochrome vision
They're dancing around
Slow puppets, silver ground
And the world
Is watching with joy
We hear a voice from above
And it's history
And we stayed awake all night
There's something said
and the whole world laughs aloud
And me and my sister
Looking on like shadows
The end of an age
as we watch them walk in a glow
Lost in space
But I don't know where it is
They're dancing around
Slow puppets, silver ground
And the stars
And stripes in the sand
We hear a voice from above
And it's history
And we stayed awake all night
They're dancing around
It sends a shiver down my spine
And I run
To look at the sky and
I half expect to hear them
asking to come down
Oh will they fly
or will they fall?
To be excited
By a long late night
Susan remembers.
Harriet Wheeler’s voice is just luminous and as with Tasmin Archer, it’s really interesting to hear women singing about space hardware. I think the only really big hit The Sundays had was Summertime, off the same 1997 album (Static and Silence), at the pre-millennial height of Britpop.
04 Neil Armstrong – One Small Step (1969, USA) NEIL ARMSTRONG
"Ok we can see you coming down the ladder now"
"Ok I just checked, getting back up to that first step,
it's uh, hasn't collapsed too far, but it's adequate"
"That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind"
05 Julia Ecklar – Hope Eyrie (1982/2001, USA) SKYWATCH
Worlds grow old and suns grow cold
And death we never can doubt
Time's cold wind wailing the past
Reminds us that all flesh is grass
And history's lamps blow out
But the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again
Cycles turn while the far stars burn
And people and planets age
Life's crown passes to younger lands
Time sweeps the dust of hope from its hands
And turns another page
For the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again
But we who feel the weight of the wheel
When winter falls over the world
Can hope for tomorrow and raise our eyes
To a silver moon in the open skies
And a single flag unfurled
For the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again
We know well what life can tell
If you will not perish then grow
And today our fragile flesh and steel
Have laid our hands on a vaster wheel
With all of the stars to know
That the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again
From all who tried out of history's tide
A salute to the team that won
And the old Earth smiles at her children's reach
The wave that carried us up the beach
To reach for the shining sun
For the Eagle has landed
Tell your children when
Time won't drive us down to dust again
SKYWATCH was not programmed to forget.
A classic space anthem written by Leslie Fish, who I think recorded it in 1982 on her album Skybound, but the 2001 recording by Julia Ecklar from the compilation album To Touch The Stars (if it is in fact a different recording) seems to be the only one currently findable.
06 Disney – There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (1964, USA) SYSTEM
There's a great big beautiful tomorrow
Shining at the end of every day
There's a great big beautiful tomorrow
And tomorrow's just a dream away
Man has a dream and that's the start
He follows his dream with mind and heart
When it becomes a reality
It's a dream come true
For you and me
So there's a great big beautiful tomorrow
Shining at the end of every day
There's a great big beautiful tomorrow
Just a dream away
SYSTEM sings a comforting song.
The (in)famous theme song of Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress, originally the General Electric Pavilion at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, then at Disneyland, then at Walt Disney World Floria from 1975.
My Dad visited the USA on a business trip sometime in the late 1960s, I think, and fitted in a trip to Disneyland carrying a then-state-of-the-art Phillips cassette recorder, resulting in a much-treasured audio tape of the Carousel of Progress. So it’s sort of ground into my brain.
Compare with Tomorrow from the musical Annie (and Novas 0), written in 1977.
07 Aimee Mann – Fifty Years After The Fair (1993, USA) SUSAN
Fifty years after the Fair
The picture I have is so clear
Underneath the clouds in the ear
There's the Trylon and the Perisphere
And the that for me is the finest of scenes
The perfect world 'cross the river in Queens
Fifty years after the Fair
I drink from another cup
But it does no good to compare
Cause nothing ever measures up
I guess for a second we thought
That all good things would rise to the top
And how beautiful it was, Tomorrow
We'll never have a day of sorrow
We got through the Thirties but our belts were tight
We conceived of a future with no hope in sight
We've got decades ahead of us to get it right
Fifty years after the Fair
Fifty years after the Fair
I live in tomorrow town
Even on a wing and a prayer
The future never came around
It hurts just to even think of those days
The damage we do by the hopes that we raise
But how beautiful it was, Tomorrow
We'll never have a day of sorrow
We got through the '30s but our belts were tight
We conceived of a future with no hope in sight
We've got decades ahead of us to get it right
Fifty years after the Fair
(living in tomorrow town)
(future never came around)
(picture that we had was clear)
(Trlon and the Perisphere)
Susan dreams about a future already lost.
Aimee Mann was the singer of New Wave band Til Tuesday (‘Voices Carry’) until she reinvented herself in the early 1990s as a grunge/indie/folk-rock solo act, as was the style at the time.
She’s singing about the 1939 New York World’s Fair (so the year 1989), not the 1964 one. But 50 years after 1969 also works for me right now.
08 Tandy Morgan – Spaceship Earth (1986, England) A DREAM VERSION OF JACK
And when I look out onto everything blue
As far as the eye can see
If I could hold onto one precious thing it's you
The way it used to be
Communication blackout
Just rumours coming in
Like electronic shadows
Writhing on the wind
Until the hands of time get back to 1992
On spaceship Earth I once knew
Valleys wide oceans blue
I walked beside them with you
In '92
I reach to touch you but nobody's here
Only a hologram dancing on the air
The clock is spinning like there's no tomorrow
(maybe there isn't)
Faster faster
Going out of all control
The devil take the winner
And drown him in his pride
And let go the beginner
Waiting here inside
And let the hands of time go back to 1992
On spaceship Earth I once knew
Valleys wide, oceans blue
I walked beside them with you
In '92
Oh
I'll never go back home
Never go back
Never go back
Never go back home
To spaceship Earth I once knew
Valleys wide oceans blue
I walked beside them with you
In '92
Spaceship Earth, '92
Ages old, futures new
I see them and I see you
Forever blue
Was it Jack dreaming of Susan, or Susan dreaming of Jack?
Mostly I find it’s just individual songs that resonate with me, sometimes I’ll find a thread of several songs by one or related artists, but very very occasionally there are entire albums that are just tuned to my wavelength. Dave Scott-Morgan’s Earthrise is one. (Some others: Klaatu’s Hope, Mainframe’s Tenants of the Latticework, Tim Blake’s Blake’s New Jerusalem.)
09 Mary Hopkin – Voyage Of The Moon (1969, Wales) SUSAN
The moon is like a boat my love
Of lemon peel afloat my love
And with a sail of gauze my love
She seems to slightly pause
Upon her silent way
All on her starry way
I see her pearly decks my love
Set in with diamond specks my love
I see her pearly mast my love
Far from her seashell past
And softly does she sway
All on her starry way
Of silk they have been spun my love
The ropes that limply run my love
Down to her carvéd prow my love
Down to her mermaid prow
And gently does she sway
All on her starry way
She seems to linger long my love
As if spell'd by her song my love
But know she tarries not my love
Her journey unforgot
She makes her starry way
She makes her starry way
All in the sea of sky my love
The moonships sail and fly my love
And many are their kind my love
Though all need but one wind
To make their starry ways
To make their starry ways
And there will come a time my love
Oh may it be in mine my love
When men will proudly rise my love
And board to sail the skies
Moonships from all the spheres
Moonships from all the spheres
The men be bathed in light my love
The women clothed in white my love
All in that wondrous fleet my love
As each the other meets
Will smile and softly sing
Will smile and softly sing
And on some distant sand my love
The ships will gently land my love
Fair folk will meet them there my love
With flowing golden hair
And great will be their joy
And great will be their joy
The moon is like a boat my love
Of lemon peel afloat my love
And with a sail of gauze my love
She seems to slightly pause
There was more to the dreams than she could remember, and they were coming faster now.
A Donovan song, but Mary recorded it first and I’m pretty sure she’s got the better voice too. And in 1969! Since Discogs says it was released in February, it is entirely possible that this one could have been played on Apollo 11. Probably didn’t, but could have. (Hopkins did feature on the British ITV TV broadcast, and her ‘Those Were The Days’ from the same album was played on Apollo 12.).
I have a memory of hearing this one in 1993, too.
10 Paul Winter – Blue Green Hills Of Earth (1982, USA) SKYWATCH
For the Earth forever turning
For the skies, for every sea
To our Lord we sing returning
Home to our blue green hills of Earth
For the Earth forever turning
For the skies, for every sea
To our Lord we sing returning
Home to our blue green hills of Earth
For the mountains, hills and pastures
In their silent majesty
For all life, for all our nature
Sing we our joyful praise to Thee
For the sun, for rain and thunder
For the land that makes us free
For the stars, for all the heavens
Sing we our joyful praise to Thee
For the Earth forever turning
For the skies, for every sea
To our Lord we sing returning
Home to our blue green hills of Earth
SYSTEM did not understand many things about SKYWATCH. It did not need to. The obsolete AI would be gone soon.
From the 1982 album ‘Missa Gaia’, itself an album version of the first ‘Earth Mass’ performed in 1981 at the New York Episcopal Cathedral of St John the Divine by Paul Winter, a jazz bandleader who had moved by then into the emerging New Age music genre. Lyrics by Kim Oler seem to have been inspired by a 1947 Robert Heinlein science fiction story.
11 Jamee Mae Kyson – Children Of The Dawning Reimagined (1978/2018, USA) SUSAN
I'll travel in the morning with the wind upon my back
For that is when the Earth is being born
And the morning star is shining with the cool and crystal light
Calling to the children of the morn
Come with me, children of the dawning
Come with me, to a new world that morning eyes can se
Let the past find its way
This is no time to mourn
The crystal path is calling to the children of the morn
I'll travel in the darkness of a history-shadowed night
To everyone I find I'll sing a warning
That the night is but a seedling of the dawn that is to come
Are you ready for the children of the morning?
Can you rise, and travel with the morning?
Can you walk, to a new world beyond the world you know?
If you can, come with me
That morning star has shown
And we must learn to travel with the children of the morn
We'll travel all together when the dew is on the land
And all the world is fresh from being born
And the morning star is shining with the promise of our lives
And we know that we're the children of the morning
Come with me, children of the dawning
Come with me, to a new world that morning eyes can see
For the morning star is shining
A world is being born
From the light of all the children of the morning
She woke that morning feeling strangely refreshed.
The Cathedral of St John the Divine was a nexus point in the early 1980s for the emerging environmental and New Age movements, both of which interlaced and drew inspiration from the 1960s and 1970s space programs and the view of Earth as a planet that Apollo produced. Paul Winter was a StJtD artist-in-residence, as was the multifaceted writer (of many genres, occasionally including science fiction) Madeleine L’Engle. Other networks linking to the Cathedral were William Irwin Thompson’s Lindisfarne Association (drawing together artists, mystics and scientists, including Green pioneer E F Schumacher, Apollo astronaut Russell Schweickart, and Whole Earth Catalog and Internet pioneer Stewart Brand, among many others)… and the Findhorn and Lorian Foundations.
David Spangler, the lyricist for ‘Children of the Dawning’, was one of the people who crossed between several of those networks, appearing at Findhorn and Lindisfarne, before setting up Lorian as his own foundation. In the 1960s and 1970s he was in a folk band, The New Troubadours, with spiritual and ecological themes.
‘Children of the Dawning’ appears at least in 1978, on a cassette release. In 2018 it’s been remade, and here it is.
There’s something about the deeply geeky and earnest sensitivity of the 1970s that I find very endearing. It’s very much the Novas DNA that I’m looking for: music that’s just a little askew from the mainstream timeline, but is heading somewhere with it.