Wednesday 12 January 2011

I Am Beset By Angels

This is in a sense the definitive The Club of Queer Trades song: plangent, almost maudlin; full of bad puns and self-conscious cleverness. I stand by the first verse though. It's a true story too: as i was walking back from a pub in Finsbury Park (probably the Old Dairy) with a girlfriend, an older feller, in the days when there still were older fellers, was staggering all over the road ahead of us.One of the bollards had been knocked over in the road ahead of him, the huge lightbulb beneath it exposed and beaming up into the night. He went over to investigate, bent over to look at it and fell flat on his face. We went to assist, looping arms under his and dragging him to his feet, and causing him to complain "I am beset by angels!"

I thought it was one of the oddest and most beautiful expressions I'd ever heard and wrote a song about it 7 years later.


I am beset by Angels

I walk home slowly, by the scenic route
The shortest points between each letter of the alphabet
My snail’s pace leaves a shiny trail
As I leave the pavement black and wet
There’s silver in my water
There are subterranean lights
In the distance booming voices
Filter through the ochre night

I am beset by angels
As I rise above the lights
Strong hands will try and stop me
From dying here tonight

Three times they came to visit me
To save me from the glare
Icarus in factor 50
On a wing and a prayer
The first one took me by the cock
The second by the hand
The third one took a soft boy
And made a gentle man

I am beset by angels
As I rise above the lights
Strong hands will try and stop me
From dying here tonight

These angelic kick-starts
Bring water to the eye
Like the peeling of an onion
I’m a pretty layered guy
Sedimentary, my dear Watson
Tearing at the seams
Three angels at my table
Making me eat my greens








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