(previously in Program Eleven/I: Novas 0.5) (also in story time if this is a dream sequence)
(previously in story time: Novas 3.9) (the end point of the main story)
(previously in story time: Novas 6 Act 2) (a possible coda)
Hexaptych.
More of an end credits, really. 0.5 leads straight into ‘Tomorrow’, but 0.6 follows up quite a long time afterwards. After the Simulation, after the Revolution, after the Satellite, after… everything.
In terms of actual vs fictional 1980s theming: while 0.5 was sort of inspired by Walt Disney World’s Tomorrowland and EPCOT Center, this one is the 1988 Global Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders on Human Survival.
Novas 0.6: The Day After Tomorrow
01 John Denver – Take Me To Tomorrow JACK
Hey everybody
Tell me how do you feel
Are you satisfied with your life?
Do you think it's real?
Tell me how is your head?
What are your dreams?
Do you have any plans?
Do you have any schemes?
Do you care about, about anybody?
I'd like to know
Is the answer no?
Take me to tomorrow
Take me there today
I've had my fill of sorrow
And living this way
Take me to tomorrow
That's where I'd like to be
The day after tomorrow is waiting for me
Hey everybody
What's on your mind?
Do you think there's nowhere else to go?
There's nothing left to find?
Are you happy where you are?
Do you have anything to share?
Do you think you're gonna waste your life
spending it there?
Would you like to find a way out?
Do you think it's worth a try?
I'd like to know
Is the answer no?
Well maybe so, uh huh
Take me to tomorrow
Take me there today
I've had my fill of sorrow
And living this way
Take me to tomorrow
That's where I'd like to be
The day after tomorrow is waiting for me
Take me to tomorrow
Take me there today
I've had my fill of sorrow
And living your way
Take me to tomorrow
That's where I'd like to be
The day after tomorrow is waiting
The day after tomorrow is waiting
The day after tomorrow is waiting for me
John Denver has been just sort of sitting there on the table since ‘Concrete Road’ in 0.3, so don’t blame me, you knew this was happening. But it’s not Country Roads.
02 Edie Brickell and New Bohemians – Tell Me SUSAN
Heard you the first time
But it sounded so good
That it's worth repeating
If you only would
I'm still in shock
I don't know what to say
Waited for so long
For this happy day
Tell me
Tell me again
Walk across hot coals
To approach the shrine
Some people never make it
But we keep on trying
When you woke me up
To tell me we were here
Oh, it was music
Music to my ears
Tell me
Tell me again
Let it fly
When I'm falling backwards
Into a dream
Do me a favor
Don't let me sleep
Tell me
Tell me again
Tell me
Tell me again
Edie Brickell has always been on her own frequency since ‘What I Am’ in 1988, which I guess must have been sufficiently hippie to attract the attention of Paul Simon, and vice versa, since she married him in 1992. I was wondering what she’d done since (I do not count the video of ‘Good Times’ that shipped with Windows 95), and… this. This is what she’s done since. In 2018.
03 Gary Garrett – Flying Dream SUSAN’S FATHER
Milk and honey on the stove
A big band on the radio
Open up the curtains to the sky
Fill my cup and hit the light
And stare out at the starry night
I wonder if I'll ever learn to fly
It feels so easy, feels so right
To rise above the city lights
I hope I have my flying dream tonight
I hope I have my flying dream tonight
I know I'm doing something right
I'm gliding down the street
I feel my body rise above the ground
Dodging all the power lines
And mountains that I meet
I'm free until the morning comes around
Coming down
Bacon cooking on the stove
The Beatles on the radio
The sky is blue, the clouds are drifting by
I wonder how I got to be
A prisoner of gravity
I know there's more to me than meets the eye
I know that I could fly right now
If I could just remember how
I know I'll make it through the day all right
If I can have my flying dream tonight
Cause it feels so easy, feels so right
To rise above the city lights
I hope I have my flying dream tonight
I hope I have my flying dream tonight
Ooh flying dream
A song I found randomly when I was looking for demonstrations of hexagonal harmonic grid systems in the style of Euler’s Tonnetz (in this case, in Just Intonation) and it fell into my list of ‘I need to do something with this’, and this is the something.
04 Donna Lewis – Blue Planet SUSAN’S MOTHER
Soft lights
Moving in darkness
Moving in patterns
Outlining life
Distant
Image of crystal
Like fingers extending
Into the sea
East of the sun
The blue web of tangled ribbons grow
Out of the ancient river they flow
Into the red light dangers that rise
Higher as time goes by
Blue planet
Save yourself
Blue planet
Save yourself
Changes
Unwelcome changes
From oceans to badlands
To forests of stone
Short lived
Profusions of flowers
Dry in the warm winds
Of this vanished life
Out on the edge
The edge of the southern plain, up high
A mosaic of rainbow colours glow
Where the remains of lost worlds lay
Untouched by the forces of time
Blue planet
Save yourself
Blue planet
Save yourself
Blue planet
Save yourself
Blue planet
Save yourself
Save yourself now
Because I heard Donna Lewitz’s more well known 90s hit, ‘I Love You Always Forever’ and, well, this was from her follow-up album, and unimaginably, it’s been forgotten.
05 Paul Winter – Mystery THE ALIENS
It lives in the seed of a tree as it grows
You hear it if you listen to the wind as it blows
It's there in a river as it flows into the sea
It's a song in the soul of a man becoming free
And it lives in the laughter of children at play
And in the blazing sun that gives light to the day
It moves the planets and the stars in the sky
It's been the mover of mountains since the beginning of time
Oh Mystery you are alive
I feel you all around
You are the fire in my heart
You are the Holy Sound
You are all of life
It is to You that I sing
Grant that I may feel You
Always in everything
And it lives in the waves as they crash upon the beach
I've seen it in the gods that man has tried to reach
I feel it in the love that I know we need so much
I know it in your smile my love when our hearts do touch
But when I listen deep inside I feel best of all
Like a moon that's glowing white and I listen to Your call
And I know You will guide me I feel like the tide
Rushing through the ocean of my heart that's open wide
Oh Mystery you are alive
I feel you all around
You are the fire in my heart
You are the Holy Sound
You are all of life
It is to You that I sing
Grant that I may feel You
Always in everything
Oh grant that I may feel You
Always in everything
Oh grant that I may feel You
Always in everything
Oh Mystery
The Missa Gaia, and the rest of the Cathedral of St John the Divine gang, keeps haunting me.
06 Enigma – Return To Innocence SKYWATCH
(Amis chant)
Love, devotion
Feeling, emotion
Don't be afraid to be weak
Don't be too proud to be strong
Just look into your heart my friend
That will be the return to yourself
The return to innocence
(Amis chant)
The return to innocence
And if you want then start to laugh
If you must just start to cry
Be yourself don't hide
Just believe in destiny
Don't care what people say
Just follow your own way
Don't give up and use the chance
Your return to innocence
(Amis chant)
That's not the beginning of the end
That's the return to yourself
The return to innocence
(Amis chant)
It's the return to innocence
So this is Michael Cretu producing circa 1994, who you may remember was married to Sandra (‘Hiroshima’) at the time (she sings the bit at the end), and then a couple years later there was a whole big thing about who did the actual lyrics of the chant and there was a court case about it. And the answer was: Difang and Igay Duana, of the Amis people in Taiwan, in France, in 1988.
Here’s the Duanas singing the full version of ‘Elders Drinking Chant’ , and here’s them singing it in their garage in 2001.
07 Jennifer Rush – Credo SYSTEM
Credo
Credo
Credo
I believe in the life within
Credo
Now some people live in darkness
And some people live in hell
It's hard when you live in daylight
To love the night as well
Why can't they live like brothers?
And hwy won't they live in peace?
Why do the same old prisoners
Sing 'I shall be released'?
Oh, why?
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
He will save us all
Outside the gates of Heaven we wait
Will he really come at all?
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
He will save us all
Will he come today?
Will he come today?
Will he really come at all?
Credo
It's hard to believe in saviours
After what my eyes have seen
More and more day to day life
Is like some crazy dream
But I still believe in kindness
And I still believe in love
Maybe a little blindness
Is all we're guilty of
Oh, why?
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
He will save us all
Outside the gates of Heaven we wait
Will he really come at all?
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
He will save us all
Will he come today?
Will he come today?
Will he really come at all?
He will save us all
Credo
I believe in the life within
Credo
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
Credo
I believe in the life within
Credo
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
Salve Deum Kyrie Eleison
Jennifer Rush! Probably most famous for ‘The Power of Love’ (no not THAT ONE from 1985, this one from 1984). But in 1997 she was doing something really interesting.
08 Mr Mister – Kyrie THE PROBE
Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie Eleison
Kyrie
The wind blows hard against this mountainside
Across the sea into my soul
Reaches in to where I cannot hide
Setting my feet upon the rock
My heart is old, it holds my memories
My body burns, a gemlike flame
Somewhere between the soul and soft machine
Is where I find myself again
Kyrie Eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie Eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie Eleison where I'm going will you follow?
Kyrie Eleison on a highway in the light
When I was young I thought of growing old
Of what my life would mean to me
Would I have followed down my chosen road
Or only wished what I could be?
Kyrie Eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie Eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie Eleison where I'm going will you follow?
Kyrie Eleison on a highway in the light
Mr Mister have previously featured in the Eclipse Suite, which is not strictly part of Novas, though if it were, it would be somewhere out in space in alt-1986.
09 John Denver – The One World (Theme For The Global Forum) PETER
Take a moment and stop to think
A moment is all it will take
Take a moment, we're on the brink
What a difference we all can make
It's up to us, to all of us
We simply have to try
It's up to us, to all of us
Time is passing by
This is the one world for all of us
The one world we ever may know
This is the one world for all of us
The blue skies, the green earth below
This is the one world we're living in
The one world we ever may share
This is the one world we're living
The rivers, the oceans, the air
This is the one world for all of us
The one world that's yours and that's mine
This is the one world for all of us
A world only God could design
This is the one star of all the stars
The star that we wish on each night
This is the one star of all the stars
A star with its own special light
This is the one world for all of us
A world that we owe to the brave
This is the one world for all of us
The one world we have to save
This is a very unusual song to find, it seems. Released only as a promotion for the 1988 Global Forum. Why do I know it? I’m not sure. Perhaps only by name.
10 Belinda Carlisle – Heaven Is A Place On Earth GABRIELLE
Ooh baby do you know what that's worth?
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
They say in Heaven love comes first
We'll make Heaven a place on Earth
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
When the night falls down
I wait for you and you come around
And the world's alive
With the sound of kids on the street outside
When you walk into the room
You pull me close and we start to move
And we're spinning with the stars above
And you lift me up in a web of love
Ooh baby do you know what that's worth?
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
They say in Heaven love comes first
We'll make Heaven a place on Earth
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
When I feel alone
I reach for you and you bring me home
When I'm lost at sea
I hear your voice and it carries me
In this world we're just beginning
To understand the miracle of living
Baby I was afraid before
I'm not afraid anymore
Ooh baby do you know what that's worth?
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
They say in Heaven love comes first
We'll make Heaven a place on Earth
Ooh Heaven is a place on Earth
Belinda Carlisle was lead singer of all-girl New Wave band The Go-Gos before pivoting hard to power ballad pop in the late 80s. And yet, here she is in 1987 (that interesting year of the Harmonic Convergence) with the hit of her career. ‘Circle In The Sand’ was also pretty good, but I don’t think this one will ever be surpassed.
11 Limahl – Never Ending Story JACK, SUSAN and THE ENTIRE CAST
Turn around
Look at what you see
In her face
The mirror of your dreams
Make believe I'm everywhere
Given in the light
Written on the pages
Is the answer to a never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
Reach the stars
Fly a fantasy
Dream a dream
And what you see will be
Rhymes that keep their secrets
Will unfold behind the clouds
And there upon the rainbow
Is the answer to a never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
Show no fear
For she may fade away
In your hand
The birth of a new day
Rhymes that keep their secrets
Will unfold behind the clouds
And there upon the rainbow
Is the answer to a never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
never ending story
(ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh-ahh)
Okay so the whole Novas 0.x sequence was really kicked off by watching Stranger Things Season 3 and the US/Russian thing, which kind of annoyed me with how… Sylvester Stallone it was. So to wrap it up here’s Georgio Moroder – of course it would be him, wouldn’t it – and Beth ‘Dance Dance Dance’ Andersen and Christopher ‘Limhl’ Hamill, who apparently reached the peak of his post Kajagoogoo solo career (which had only just launched) with this song.
Because really, how could you top that?
THIS ENDS PROGRAM ELEVEN/I.
(end of story time)
(next in release time: Novas 2.7, first module of Program Eleven/II)