21st Century Gothic

This song is where the gothic angle to my writing began. I'd had the title (I think it may have been inspired by the TV programme Urban Gothic) and a tiny part of the chorus for ages, but I couldn't write the rest. Then I started listening to the sheer gothic awesomeness that is The Sisters Of Mercy, and everything fell into place reasonably quickly from there. This song is hugely influenced by them, and especially their most famous song This Corrosion. This is where my idea for a musical genre came together: gothic production and atmosphere (lots of keyboards, sound effects, choirs, minor keys etc.), combined with the power of grunge or alternative music, and the sheer abandon of hard rock or metal.

What I decided to do was take a song about what life is like in the 21st Century, and shroud it in gothic and mythological imagery. So you get references to Roman Gods, vampires, architecture, monsters, demon spawn, the Garden of Eden, and spiritualism (the idea of a spiritual stream may have been somwhat, erm, borrowed, from the computer game Final Fantasy VII). Although it seems to be quite a grim world view, I also wanted to put some hope into it, which explains a reference to the maxim "Love and music will save us all"; although in this context, it's more "love and music are all we have".

I also felt like putting some Latin in it, to keep with the theme of the collision of two different time periods. However, I don't speak any Latin, so I got my translations from an online translator, which means I don't know how accurate they are. I'll put the translations at the end, in red.

This is probably the song that defines my current writing style, so obviously I'm pretty damn pleased with it. Any comments are welcome.

21st Century Gothic - July - August 2006

Never before
Has it seemed more
Like the human heart is just
A fist covered in blood
To speak from the heart
Means to open your veins
And die for attention
In a crimson tinged flood
There is a house
That is painted white
To disguise its blackened core
We've created a monster
And we watch
As it sends its spawn to war
We don't care if the savages die
We give the vampires of today
A mandate to suck our lifeblood dry

We are your children
Stranded in Eden after the fall
Won't you save us, can't you hear us
When we call?

Chorus:
(Hey)
Shadow shroud across the sky
(Hey)
Greed growing like a disease
(Hey)
Love looks into my eyes
And laughs at what it sees
(Hey)
Mars marauding, Aries annihilating
And i'm too selfish
To think of anyone but me
(Hey)
I have to sing my pain
To keep from going insane
(Hey)
Welcome to the 21st century!

I wither away
As my body decays
It's just my mind
That still retains control
And it reaches out
To flow through the stream
That connect the world's
Few remaining believing souls
We are paralysed
Victims of the night
Corpses animated by
Just two energies
Love
And music run through our veins
and unite us against
A common enemy

We are your children
Stranded in Eden after the fall
Won't you save us, can't you hear us
When we call?

Chorus:
(Hey)
Shadow shroud across the sky
(Hey)
Greed growing like a disease
(Hey)
Love looks into my eyes
And laughs at what it sees
(Hey)
Mars marauding, Aries annihilating
And i'm too selfish
To think of anyone but me
(Hey)
I have to sing my pain
To keep from going insane
(Hey)
Welcome to the 21st century!

Tantum is lacuna servo nos iam
(These words)
Tantum is lacuna servo nos iam

We dance through our music
We are just our music
We scream through our music
We bleed through our music
We call through our music
We're bound through our music
We live through our music
We're one through our music

(Shouted/screamed) Nos es unus!

Chorus:
(Hey)
Shadow shroud across the sky
(Hey)
Greed growing like a disease
(Hey)
Love looks into my eyes
And laughs at what it sees
(Hey)
Mars marauding, Aries annihilating
And i'm too selfish
To think of anyone but me
(Hey)
I have to sing my pain
To keep from going insane
(Hey)
Welcome to the 21st century!
Welcome to the 21st century!
Welcome ....

(Whispered) Nos es unus, Nos es unus, Nos es unus...(Repeat to fade)




Latin translations:

Tantum is lacuna servo nos iam = Only these words can save us now

Nos es unus = We are one