Andy Thornton

the things you never say

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home

was originally called 'Hope' and amounts to the same thing, except a little less abstract I guess, unless you never had a home. But that's the thing eh?.. no one has ever had the home they need. Keep looking for the one that something tells you should exist and trust the thing that's telling you that, it could just be the thing that sees you to it.

heat of your love

I'm a rider in a desert of truth. My fave line. The intro was inspired by Haydn Parsey who was a composer guy who used my studio when I was at work. He's into orchestration & I enjoyed setting a solo on top of the orchestration. Apart from that it's just a groovy vibe kind of God thing. Man.

she won't talk to me

petulant boy gets upset in dead end rejection situation. Boo hoo. Then has a laugh by taking the piss out of his own situation. Universal thing about not telling the person you fancy what you feel cos then they run away from you. Boo hoo. That is, if they're not too grown up. Patronising, moi?

one less holy

written in 1989 I think. It's just nonsense really. I liked the tune and then years later the lyrics became meaningful despite not being at the time. Spooky. Only meaningful if you write it into my life from another's perspective. Aha.. guess on. All this grass and stones stuff though - comes back years later on 'Home'. Am I short on metaphors, rhymes or Jungian substance? Or just stuck in a pattern worth escaping? Who are you, my therapist?

the things you never say

a kind of "me and my big mouth..." song. Written out of frustration over looking for more personal intimacy when it wasn't forthcoming from someone. I keep believing it's worth extending yourself in the hope that putting yourself on the edge for a relationship is worth it. The evidence isn't always forthcoming though. Sometimes it hurts and you lick your wounds before trying it again. Maybe it's a licking your wounds song. Does that turn anyone's stomach?

the final key

keeping schtum here. Love the groovy playout with mad wierd shit from brother Paul Wilkinson - enormously talented & original young Irish bloke who is a fella to watch in the coming years. Written in a messy time looking for a route ahead.

overtime, overground

this is a strange one because I wrote the tune and was singing it around in my head with the 'wait another minute' stuff. Then one night I had this very emotive dream & I woke up and wrote the abstract lyric at 6.30 then went back to sleep. The lyric tries to relate sense of the dream but not the action. I can't remember the dream at all now, but the first time I then sang the song I couldn't get to the end because I was so moved by it. It dug deep into me. I know what it's about now but didn't at the time. Face your darkness, brothers and sisters.

hands of time

One of my best lyrics I think - just for the simplicity. Wish I could love someone that well. Wish someone could love me that well. Still, try to. Sang it at my friend Fiona & Brian's wedding & I love them greatly, & Fiona has been my buddy. She has shown me the best of what this is about I reckon. It's worth taking the risk of visiting your emotional story to get rid of as much of the fear as you can & get reconciled to your makeup. I think.

heartbeat in everything

a new physics psalm. Written on the balcony in a cottage by the sea at the west coast of Scotland. 'Within the atoms the meanings fly' says I - a thesis that the meaning and the physics are one. Every generation learns of the ignorance of the previous one in our scientific age but needs their wisdom equally. So I'm saying it's all one in the great Maker. See. If King David had been a nuclear physicist he would have said all this. Honest. But would he have Mikey Randon to play the groove stuff? All I played on this was the funny tweaky noises. Class act eh?

world gone madness

this lyric scares the hell out of me. I don't think I'll play it live very much. But I think did the right thing in writing it. It kept nagging me and insisted on coming out. It had to go somewhere. Wish it hadn't had to be born. The other love songs that belong here were aborted. Do you think we got enough going on in the middle bit? More voices you scream!.. The lap steel players on this album are Iain Archer and Paul Wilkinson. During the making of the album they formed a techno lap steel duo which now does weddings and functions under the name of "Lap Dance". See how much the lyric scares me, I had to make a joke.

god is black

living in Hackney in a white minority area for 2 years has been good. Made me realise how much whites crap up the world and then try pass God on to others. Anyway let's face it this is just some kind of creed and I don't quite know why I wrote it except to say "yes, I know". Keep struggling to know what to do about it, but maybe knowing is part of the struggle and the answer for the time being. Support Jubilee 2000 everyone!

confessing [the sight of beauty]

mikey said this one should just be called "fwor". I suppose I might get an Ibiza hit if it were. Anyway it's pretty transparent song I guess. I wrote it all in my head then found a guitar and played it straight off. It was a great fun moment as it was like it had been storing up waiting to come out in a big OTT burst of energy. Makes me sound like a Catholic boy but it wasn't guilt. Just frustration I guess! I love it any way and did we hold back on the arrangement? Is anyone not over playing here?? Yaheaaaeeey!

i'm not the man

i can't say any more about this really. My brother told me about this speech at the end of a Chekov play called Uncle Vanya. In the play one of the central characters talks about meeting her saviour in heaven. She has had a terribly hard life and her great defining moment in meeting God is when God looks at her and pities her, because she has known no pity in a hard world. She's not looking for anything more than knowing herself as understood and welcomed. The compassion of others, when we need it, is transforming.

Compassion is a better way of putting it than forgiveness I reckon, because forgiveness in our language has some kind of indebtedness implicit within it - there's a relationship of unequals. But compassion is tenderness and restoration and a path to equality which involves forgiveness and enriches the soul. It seems to me that when you love someone and make your self massively vulnerable to them you get back a lot of the state of their heart into your life. This can chill you if don't get compassion - even rejection needs vulnerability and compassion from the rejecter. So this song has something to do with learning to find love and compassion for myself and wishing to find it in the acceptance of an other. I still hope for that.