PAWN HEARTS

Imagine you are the only child of a disintegrating marriage. In total loneliness you have become hyper-sensitive to the earliest signs of an impending altercation that will once again tear apart the foundations of the love and security that should comprise your infant world. In the imagery of the children's game of paper-stone-scissors, you only have blank paper, you live in a stone tower prophesying disaster, you only have blunt scissors. In bed, in the presence of the night, you hear them rowing again and again, and internally your world is disintegrating. Only when you reach maturity do you realise that you can escape and see your childhood unhappiness in perspective; all things are apart/a part. But deep inside the damage persists - all the grief you have seen leaves you chasing solitary peace. The maelstrom of your memory is a vampire and it feeds on you. And so you only think on how it might have been, locked in silent monologue, in silent scream.

Fans of 'Pawn Hearts' will realise that I am hypothesizing one possible real-life scenario to explicate the tortured psychodrama of the major track on this album. A plagued psyche that is like a lighthouse keeper who will be destroyed by a disaster that is merely observed. And of course the child in this putative ill-fated family is a pawn whose heart is being broken.

'A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers' is structured as a suite that, in my opinion, bears the hallmarks of a contemporaneous piece by another band who, in 1971, were much bigger than VdGG. In that year I saw VdGG perform on the stage of the Manchester Free Trade Hall, where six months previously I had had the great privilege to attend Emerson Lake & Palmer's 'Pictures at an Exhibition' concert tour (three days prior to its recording in Newcastle). Although the ELP live album was only released in November 1971, and 'Pawn Hearts' in October 1971, ELP had been performing PaaE since the famous Isle of Wight Festival in August 1970.

Consider the analogies between these two progressive rock suites. The similarity of the titles, not only in phrasing but also in the shared concept of an observer; in one case as an observer of an art exhibition, and in the other a lighthouse keeper. Both open with sedate and haunting keyboard melodies that recur later in their suite, and are titled with, again, observer themes: 'Promenade' and 'Eyewitness'. In both the opening is followed by a ponderous and dissonant section, which in the case of PoLK is actually entitled 'Pictures/Lighthouse' - literally spelling out the connection, with what I suspect was Peter Hammill's working title. As each suite unfolds, dramatic and dissonant sections are interspersed with a calm melody (PaaE: 'The Sage'; PoLK: 'Presence of the Night'), and both culminate in anthemic sections with the theme of departure (PaaE: 'The Great Gates of Kiev'; PoLK: 'We Go Now'). Most intriguing for me is the PoLK section called 'S.H.M.'; why give a piece such a meaningless title unless it is a band in-joke? I speculate that it stands for 'Second Hand Mussorgsky' - for those who don't know, PaaE is based on a classical suite by that composer. Two thoughts in case I am guessing correctly: (1) the VdGG track is ultimately inspired by a 19th century Russian Romantic composer (I mention this as occasionally it is questioned whether VdGG are truly a Prog Rock band); and (2) the ELP piece has much greater significance in Prog history than generally acknowledged.

There are of course two further tracks on the album, and they can be interpreted within the same psycho-theme: 'Lemmings' rushing over a cliff could represent a family heading towards internal destruction; and 'Man-Erg' may represent a self-analysis of the psychological consequences of past experience of such trauma.

And I mustn't forget the music - truly incredible!

Verdict: A serious artistic masterpiece.

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