DESERT ISLAND DISCS


'Heaven’s Holding a Half Moon’


‘Jung the Foreman Prayed at Work...’


‘Make Me a Deal, and Make it Straight!’


‘At the Back of the Holy Temple’


‘Angry Tears Are Too Dear, You Won’t Let Them Go’


‘Watch Out! You Might Get What You’re After'


‘There’s a Killer on the Road’


'Words are Flowing Out Like Endless Rain into a Paper Cup'



1 - Midnight At The Oasis
'Heaven’s Holding a Half Moon’

 

I was a teenager when this came out in 1974 and I remember being seduced by its jazzy rhythms and dreamy lyrics from the start. 'Seduced' is an appropriate word, because a look at the lyrics now confirms that it is about a woman seducing her man.

 

          ‘Let’s slip off to a sand dune, real soon,
          and kick up a little dust’

 

The combination of its laid back rhythm and floaty, jazzy chords somehow conveys a dreamy (I wanted to say ‘steamy’ here but as deserts are lacking in moisture I’ll have to settle for...) hot atmosphere in which the love scene takes place.

 

The lyrics feature playful mid-sentence rhymes (sand dune, real soon; I’ll be your belly dancer, prancer) and a poetic turn of phrase.There are even corny puns thrown in for good measure:

 

          ‘Cactus is our friend, he’ll point out the way’

 

and at times they get quite surprisingly explicit:

 

          ‘You won’t need a camel honey, when I take you for a ride.’

 

(How did they get away with that in a top ten hit back in 1974?). Watching Maria ( full name Maria Grazia Rosa Domenica D'Amato) seductively shaking her bare midriff as she bounces and slaps her tambourine against her hip, I find she and her fantastic song can still cast their hypnotic spell over me.

 

 

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