CHRISTMAS STORIES
CHRISTMAS STORIES
ANTHOLOGY
NOVEMBER 1998
LINDHARDT OG RINGHOF (ISBN 87-595-1110-9)
Christmas Stories (“Julehistorier“) is an anthology featuring new works of a line of Lindhardt and Ringhof writers. Its extent is 104 pages.
The contributors are Nis Boesdal, Ole Frøslev, Kirstine Heide, Tønnes Hilden, Peder Hove, Bente Kastberg, Dida Kaas Knuth, Lis Vibeke Kristensen, Hans Lyngby Jepsen, Tomas Møllehave, Ole Strandgaard, Mark Ørsten and Martin Hall.
Hall’s contribution to the book is called “Nine Cigarettes” and is a monologue performed by a young man lying on a bed in a room on Christmas Eve.
UNTITLED
UNTITLED
MARTIN HALL
PROSE POETRY
SEPTEMBER 1998
LINDHARDT OG RINGHOF (ISBN 87-595-1053-6)
With the release of his fifth book, Untitled (“Uden titel”), Martin Hall marked a change in his career as a writer, not just by changing publishers – leaving Borgens Forlag to sign up with Lindhardt og Ringhof – but more importantly by writing his most coherent piece of literature so far.
The book was received very well by the press and is regarded as Hall’s literary breakthrough by most critics.
In comparison to his prior works Untitled shares some similarity with the form and style in Continuum from 1989, but diverts in content by its more decadent and temperamental nature. The style of writing is witty, pompous, yet very self-aware and vulnerable.
Genre: Prose poetry
Pages: 61
Design: Jens Kruse
"Beauty is a fragile thing. A shadow you can break a piece off to keep, inscribe in your own dream and then leave at a later date."
”Martin Hall is a phenomenon. He is unique.”
Weekendavisen [the Danish equivalent to The Observer)
“Pompous like hell, but also fiercely ironical and very funny.”
Jyllands-Posten (Denmark’s biggest daily newspaper)
”It’s relieving to read texts that aren’t afraid of being politically uncorrect … great linguistic energy and authority.”
Standart (Denmark’s most respected literary magazine)
”A therapeutic tour de force into the sickest corners of the human mind.”
Aktuelt (major Danish newspaper)
”In his honour: Martin Hall’s monstrous staging of himself is exercised with a great sense of humour.”
Information (the Danish equivalent to The Independent)
”Visionary, vehement and fascinating.”
Aarhus Stiftstidende (major regional newspaper)
The following description is taken from the publishing agency Lindhardt og Ringhof’s autumn catalogue at the time of the book’s release:
”In 1989 Martin Hall released Continuum which was his personal farewell to the eighties. With his new book, Untitled, he once again reflects upon a decade, this time through a series of very personal writings aimed at the spirit of the nineties. His criticism is formulated from a both aggressive and intellectually aristocratic point of view, all the time carried by a search for harmony and completeness.”
HOPE
HOPE
VARIOUS ARTISTS
CD
SEPTEMBER 1998
AUDIO RESEARCH EDITIONS (ARECD101)
Hope is a limited edition cd consisting of pieces made by international sound artists and experimental composers such as Martin Hall, Robert Kennedy, Scanner and Keith Rowe among many others. Each artist has produced an original recording with the duration of approximately one minute for the project.
Hope was released in relation to the ninth International Symposium of Electronic Art at John Moores University in Liverpool taking place during September and October 1998.
1. September Song (Martin Hall) (0:45)
Martin Hall, Robert Kennedy, Scanner and Keith Rowe among many others. You can find a list featuring all participants on the release here.
Design: Colin Fallows
Hope was produced and released in relation to the 9th International Symposium of Electronic Art at John Moores University in Liverpool taking place during September and October 1998. The artists on the release range from well-known figures in the art and music world to individuals and groups making their debut on this occasion.
Martin Hall contributes with the track “September Song”. Other artists on the cd feature names such as Robert Kennedy, Scanner and Keith Rowe. You can find a list featuring all participants on the release here.
Audio Research Editions’ description of the project goes like this:
“Hope is a limited edition cd collection of one-minute soundworks by international sound artists, experimental composers, noise makers and other audio creators. Contributors were invited to create an original recording of one-minute duration for the CD on the theme of hope – whether personal or universal; directly, obliquely, humorously, ironically, romantically, musically, noisily, lyrically or in their title.”
Founded by Colin Fallows in 1998, Audio Research Editions is a limited edition imprint for artists’ soundworks. The label has published over 150 works by artists from over 20 countries. Publications include Trace which was released in relation to the Liverpool Biennial of Contemporary Art 1999, a double-cd to which Martin Hall also contributes.
PHASE III
PHASE III
TRAUMA
CD
APRIL 1998
SPV (SPV085-62142CD)
Phase III is German techno act Trauma’s third album. Formed by members of Girls Under Glass, the group reached quite a large audience during the nineties, both in Germany and in the United States.
On Phase III Martin Hall appears as guest singer and co-writer on the two songs “Love in Vein” and “Visibility”.
1. The Labyrinth (4:43)
2. Give Me a Reason (5:37)
3. Love in Vein (feat. Martin Hall) (4:18)
4. The Everlast Control (6:30)
5. The Virtual Door (Version ’98) (5:20)
6. Visibility (feat. Martin Hall) (4:12)
7. A Better Tomorrow (5:31)
8. Once In a Lifetime (5:24)
9. Your Fall (7:05)
10. The Virtual Door (feat. Özlem Çetin) (5:17)
LOVE IN VEIN
Heavy as lead in a medicine secret
Turning the sights on a narrow-go-round
Limited mind never looking for answers
Vanishing light never hitting the ground
And the beauty blinds you
And it cools the strain
And it hides inside you
Like a love in vein
Silhouette tear on a pillow of sorrow
Look-a-like pain as a ticket to go
Cities of light for a memory season
Dressing your mind for millennium low
‘Cause the beauty blinds you
And it cools the strain
And it hides inside you
Like a love in vein
VISIBILITY
The sharp light that’s been running out of these days
My heart’s beating like it’s been poisoned by your embrace
Don’t know what I want
Don’t know what I’ll need tomorrow
Don’t know any stranger in your face
‘Cause I’m breathing the light
And I’m hiding the cries
I’m turning the world again
Like a broken song playing on and on
In my mind
That runs down the sky
Running down the wall like a lover’s call
In my mind
Visibility burns me
My soul sister of another disguise
Of another tonight
My soul sister of a second disguise
Let me drown in your light
Visibility burns me
Visibility turns me
And I’m breathing the light
And I’m hiding the cries
I’m turning the world again
Like a broken song playing on and on
In my mind
That runs down the sky
Running down the wall like a lover’s call
In my mind
Visibility burns me
Visibility turns me
The sharp needle of a hand mirror light
Of a whisper that cries
My heart’s beating like it’s run out of light
Like it’s breaking the sky
Axel Ermes: Keyboards, samplers
Hauke Harms: Synthesizer
Lacasa Del Cid: Percussion, sitar, e-bow guitar
Martin Hall: Vocals (3, 6)
Miriam Schell: Vocals (1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9)
Özlem Çetin: Vocals (10)
Volker Zacharias: Keyboards, bass, vocals
Design: Klaus-Peter Staudinger
“Love in Vein” is also available on the Martin Hall box set Catalogue (2007).
On Trauma’s previous album, Construct from 1994, the group recorded a cover version of Martin Hall’s “Synthesis”.
BODYSTYLER INTERVIEW
BODYSTYLER INTERVIEW
Bodystyler interview made by Tobias Matkowitz on December the 18th 1997 in relation to the German release of ‘Random Hold’
You’ve studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. What did you study, and when did you finish?
– I studied at the line of the pictorial arts, not painting as such, but the exploration of graphic images, collage-like pictures involving reproductions and photos as well as original material – drawings and writings etc. I quit during the second year due to personal problems at the time, as well as problems with the way things were conducted at the academy.
You do much more than creating music. You write books, you produce theatre performances. How important is music to you?
– Music is the most important field of my work. I’ve reduced – or rather focused – my activities into music and writing, these two areas being the foundations of my work. Music without a superior idea or meaning doesn’t interest me. I’ve always been very concerned with the contents of music so to speak, that the performing artist had something more to offer than just the music, that there was a point in what they were doing. In that way words and lyrics became a very natural part of music to me, not a foreign element.
What were your books about?
– The first books I wrote were very incomprehensible pieces of stream-of-consciousness writings, prose and poetry mixed in a very ”uncensored” fashion. They were extremely aggressive books about cultural alienation, and have been called the most imperceptible works ever written in Danish. Quite an accomplishment in itself, I would say. Anyway, the last book I wrote was more a kind of grotesque comedy, a farce, something that obviously surprised a lot of people. What I’m writing on at the moment is much more personal.
What kinds of theatre did you produce?
– Multimedia performances. In the show Parade it got quite extreme, bodily self-mutilation and group sex on stage etc. Very violent. A very interesting phase, but not something I would do again. I think.
You also wrote some soundtracks for movies. What musical style did you work with? Was it like the one we hear on ‘Random Hold’?
– Well, yes and no. Obviously there are some recurring elements in the music I make, but the music for a film called Angel Of The Night was much more ambient-orientated, where the music for another film called Totem was more industrial-like. When I make music for films, I work to support the images I see, not to invent some surplus emotion.
How would you describe the musical style on ‘Random Hold’? I think it’s a kind of electronic, spherical ballad style, also sometimes a little dark, isn’t it?
– When something gets a bit introvert or more reflective in its expression, it tends to be described as “dark”, so I understand what you’re saying, but I wouldn’t call it that. I find it very light, very open ended so to speak. I think the keyword in describing the music on Random Hold would be organic. But your description is equally fitting. I’m probably the worst person to describe my own music.
The tracks on the new record are all very quiet. What moods do you want to create for your listeners?
– A non-invasive soundscape. An uplifted state of mind. A mental and emotional asylum from modern culture cancer life.
What do you want to express with your music?
– What it expresses. That’s why I make music. It expresses something that words can’t.
I’ve read that you’ve released something like 31 pieces of music. When did you start making music, and how did you come to this point?
– I started making music at a very early age and have continued to do so ever since. I think that’s the simplest way to answer the question.
We don’t really know anything about your former releases. Please tell something about them. What were the differences to ‘Random Hold’, what were the biggest successes, and what else should be mentioned?
– I’ve worked with a lot of different styles and genres, people and projects, so it’s a bit difficult making one single comparison to Random Hold. I think the most significant aspect of this album to everything that’s gone before, is the clarity of it, the focus. In many ways I feel like it’s taken me all these years to make that album. My debut album The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation with Ballet Mécanique was a very hysteric manifesto of diverging emotional states, where Random Hold is the calm of the journey, a much more singular state of mind. The Ballet Mécanique album did very well, although it was considered a very extreme release at the time. It was released in the Netherlands was well. Later solo albums like Relief and Cutting Through had a more commercial and grandiose sense to them. Both titles were also released in Germany. Then in Denmark I’ve had some radio hits as well, ”Beat Of The Drum” from the Presence album and some during the nineties, “Strange Delight” and “Pleasurama”.
How known are you in Denmark and its music scene?
– I’m a known name, but very “elitish” so to speak – more of a ”cult figure” as the papers would describe it. Denmark is a small country, and if you’ve said something in an interview in 1981, it’s going to follow you for the rest of your life; since I have said a lot of things during the years, the myths and fantasies surrounding my person are amazing. It’s very interesting to watch things grow like that.
What kinds of music or bands do you listen to at home?
– I have been listening to the music from the film Ulysses’ Gaze by Theo Angelopoulos, written by Eleni Karaindrou, for the last couple of months. It is absolutely incredible. It has moved me deeply. All in all I’ve been listening a lot to film music lately, everything from Zbigniew Presiner’s soundtracks to the Kieslowski trilogy Blue, White and Red to Brassed Off. In between that selected arias by Maria Callas. And then David Holmes’ Let’s Get Killed.
Are there other acts that were inspiring you to make this record or to make music generally?
– Random Hold was made very much without any external influences, very much in an inspirational vacuum so to speak, more out of inner necessity than any outer stimuli. But during the years, yes, obviously there have been a lot inspirational sources. The Pop Group’s album Y changed my idea of sound. And I still remember getting hold of a 7″-single called “Hearts In Exile” with the Homosexuals back in 1979; a true masterpiece. I could go on and on, but I’m always a bit hesitant with gushing out references. Periodically Lee “Scratch” Perry has been a very inspiring influence, although this is no way has been reflected in my music; the cutting edge of the drum’n’bass scene has its names to offer etc.
Tell us something about yourself. Where do you live, what do you do when you’re not making music, what TV-series do you like, who is your favourite film star … you know, something that other “serious” magazines don’t ask and you would never tell anybody else but us?
– I live on the top floor of an old chocolate factory. I read, I write, I record cassettes with great music to people I know. Occasionally I lecture on colleges, schools and libraries. I have no favourite TV-series or filmstars. I prefer to rent films, watching them in my own time. Quite a boring answer, but still an answer.
What is your favourite track on ‘Random Hold’? Mine are “Cradlemoon” and “Skinline”, but I really like all the tracks.
– “Performance” and “Skinline”. And “Cradlemoon” as well, particularly due to the lyrics; in a way it manages to tell the story of my life in about 16 lines.
I think it’s sad, that there’s only 43 minutes on the album. Why didn’t you include some more tracks to make it last longer.
– We recorded some other tracks as well which have been released separately in Denmark on an EP called Extended Play. I didn’t include them on the album, first and foremost because it broke the natural state and connection between the tracks included. To me the overall importance is the integrity of the album; the quality, not the quantity. I get very pissed off by people judging a CD by its playing time. Like people complaining about a concert, “that it was too short”. Who are they to dictate? Buy a dog instead. This is absurd. The great thing about vinyl releases is, that you don’t have a display of seconds and minutes in front of you, but that you simply react to the wholeness of the release. A lot of great records only last for about half an hour, but nowadays even the contracts with the record companies demand this and that amount of playing minutes on the CD. It’s ridiculous. It’s like only wanting to have sex with someone that weighs over 80 kilo. Now, I understand what you’re saying, that if you like something, you’d like to have more of it, but in this case the magic of Random Hold lasts exactly 42 minutes and 47 seconds, no more, no less. Putting on an additional track to satisfy any consumer greed would simply destroy the wholeness of the record. Quote: “The artist speaks” etc. Anyway, this gave me an opportunity to state my irritation towards the product mania of the music business. Thank you.
What’s up in the future? Are you working on new material now? Do you have other projects? Will there be a tour?
– Yes, I’m working with new material. And Public Propaganda is trying to arrange a tour in Germany during the spring of 98. In Denmark the Indie-label Lidocaine has just released a concert I did in 95 with a string quartet, which has been very well received. It includes some Random Hold songs as well. I’ve made a lot of new material, but I’m looking for something entirely different at the moment, giving myself the time to be able to take a next step, not just making a “Random Hold 2”, if you know what I mean. I think it’s incredibly important, that you drive yourself towards new challenges all the time, that you resist the temptation of just repeating a formula, no matter how good it is. I despise artists who just “play it safe”; you need to sacrifice something every time you start on a new project, otherwise you die as an artist. It’s a ceremony, a ritual, where you need to confront yourself, challenge yourself. It’s not that you can’t work in the same field at all, it’s simply that your own attitude towards the present task should be new, different, that you remain willing to develop and transform. Ultimately your expression is a consequence of the personal development you’ve been through, whether we’re talking about your art or your life. Not that there should be any difference. My life has made my career, it’s not the other way around.
Your music is a fusion of classical and electronic elements. When I read the CD-booklet, I see that you do the vocals and play guitar, drums and bass. What does “tape material” mean? And don’t you also work with electronic elements when you create the tracks? Don’t you like using electronic stuff as a musician?
– On the Random Hold recording, myself and the co-producer Thomas Li lived on an – for the summer – abandoned art school, periodically joined by our keyboard player Ole Hansen. On quite a few of my earlier records I’ve played all instruments myself, very often based on keyboards and electronic equipment, so it was important to me to make a distinction on this one. The most significant difference was bringing in Thomas Li as a producer, which meant a lot to the recordings – we recorded everything mobile, on location, and he would as an example use the buildings to generate the ambience and the sound. Although I obviously had a lot to do with the sampling and the programming phases, Thomas would be responsible for the main areas of the electronic processes, like Ole Hansen would be defined as the keyboard player.
– The concept “tape material” was used to indicate that a lot of the sounds used on the record – like the breathing and heartbeat sounds on “Performance” – was collected by me, to make a distinction to the keyboard samples Thomas and Ole would contribute with. Like the noises at the start of “Another Heart Laid Bare”; there was this girl from a closed wing of a psychiatric hospital who kept phoning me all the time, so I took a sample of her messages from my phone answering machine, and although you can’t hear a word of what she’s saying, it gives a very clear indication of the state of mind, I’m referring to in the song. It might sound a bit academic, but this was simply a way of trying to shed a light on the recording process, emphasizing that the sound as a whole was made from collaboration between the involved parties, not as a Martin Hall solo feature like the earlier records. In my general work I use electronic equipment 90% of the time, and it’s a vital aspect of all my recordings, but as I said earlier, the prime importance of the Random Hold sound texture is the organic aspects of it – the strings, the ambience, the treatments, the way it’s been recorded.
Please tell me your three favourite records ever.
– Well, actually Ulysses’ Gaze must be one of them. Otherwise, I don’t know. I’m very fond of Gavin Bryars’ Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet as well as Virgina Astley’s Gardens Were We Feel Secure, but then that leaves out Richard Jobson’s The Right Man. Not to speak of Arvo Pärt’s Tabula Rasa. I give up.
Where have you been in Germany, and how did you like it? What was good, what was bad?
– I’ve been in Berlin and Hamburg some times. On my last interview tour I visited Hannover and Dortmund as well, but these stays were very short, mostly experienced through a conference room in the daytime and some nameless restaurant at night. I like the German mentality a lot, the order and the effectiveness. I still haven’t figured out the German sense of humour.
How come the girls in Denmark are so pretty? Being in Copenhagen a few times, I saw masses of blond, well-dressed, pretty girls everywhere … do you have one of them as a wife? In Germany we have many pretty girls too, but not that many …
– I don’t know. Are they? Anyway, “let the veils be drawn here” as they say. Talking about brute sexuality, I’d rather discuss Nietzsche’s Anti-Christ or something.
I love Denmark (not only because of the pretty girls I mentioned and the great “poelser”!!!) because of its quietness, its peace, its snugness. Do you think that these elements affect your music? I think it matches very well the moods I experienced being in Denmark.
– That might be. I like the stillness of the country, the cleanliness of it, but I certainly dislike the over-cosy mentality it produces. The last place on Earth a civil war is ever going to break out is in Denmark. Wasn’t it Henry Miller talking about the Danes being the most boring people on Earth? Anyway, some of the inherent qualities of being Danish I embrace, some I don’t.
Do you have a favourite joke, you could tell our insane readers?
– No.
ORKUS INTERVIEW
ORKUS INTERVIEW
Martin Hall interviewed by Torsten Pape for Orkus Magazine in relation to the German release of ‘Random Hold’ (October 1997)
Your discography and bibliography are very impressive and in your fatherland Denmark you seem to be a real star. What do you think is the secret of your success and why do you think that you are totally unknown here in Germany?
– Well, I think the right way to state my “stardom” in Denmark is that I’m properly as much infamous as famous in my home country. If the amount of publicity I’ve gathered during the years – reviews, articles, interviews etc. – was equivalent to sales, I would definitely be a millionaire. This, however, is not the case. I’ve gathered a very dedicated following and obviously sold a fair amount of records, but Denmark is a very little country, both in terms of possibilities and mentality. I’ve always been very bold about my views on basically everything which has made me a fairly controversial character in the press and on the music scene in general … “loved by many, but hated by more” so to speak. The success of my career is on the other hand very clearly that I’ve always done exactly what I’ve wanted to. I had a few albums released in Germany in the mid-eighties, Relief and Cutting Through, which as far as I’ve been informed did fairly well, but then again, that was another decade.
I’ve read that you have experimented with the mixture of electronic and classical instruments for a very long time. How did you come to this kind of musical expression? Please explain what fascinates you about these apparent opposites, and how do you see your own musical development in comparison to other artists?
– I started playing classical guitar at the age of ten, not so much for the love of this kind of music, more as a matter of basic learning. I’ve always loved music, but not in an isolated way, more in relation to what the composer or singer was trying to pass on to his or her audience – music being a means to an end, a translation of feelings, a media. I think, it’s been a very natural process for me to explore the grey zones between different genres. I’ve always loved the symphonic element of the orchestra, the cinematic aspects they could offer an otherwise fairly fragile song, but then the electronic set-up has the intimacy and independency that’s the core of all my music making. Early on with Ballet Mécanique, my first group, the violins and cello added a more timeless touch to the music, but I think it all comes down to a personal taste and preference, mine being string-sections and ambience. “Performance” on Random Hold is a good example of this inclination; all the sounds on the track are samples of an organic or environmental nature – breathing, heartbeats, outdoor recordings of industrial machinery etc. – which put together with a very discrete string arrangement at the end of the song very successfully portrays my general state of mind. It has a certain beautiful solitude about it. Like a lot of the images in Tarkovsky’s Stalker. The Random Hold album was an attempt to create this kind of audio-image, where all the sounds were generated by the producer team, not just sitting down with a pre-programmed keyboard to record a song. We recorded it mobile, at an isolated art school in the summertime, using the empty halls, silos, rooms to create the ambience on the recordings. In this kind of work-situation samplers and digital recording facilities embrace the music, maximize the organic sound material – it becomes intellectual to consider the differences between the electronic and the acoustic influences. It all works together, if the material allows it to do so.
You have also written books and dealt with video art and making films. How would you describe your actions in these directions, and what kind of artistic expression do you like the most?
– I’ve always worked with whatever possibilities, I’ve had access to. Obviously pen and paper being an important one. As I stated before, I’ve always been more interested in what kind of essence, meaning, urge, intelligence moved through the music, as opposed to what kind of ego did. I didn’t really want to be a “pop star” or whatever you’d like to call it, I wanted to change the world. I didn’t set out to be a singer, I became so because there wasn’t anyone else around at the time. I started writing lyrics, poems, pieces for magazines at a very early age simply because I couldn’t not do so. It was a natural expression. I think that’s what art is all about, not being able to not do so. To give a certain state of mind a focus, a form, a theatre in which to portray itself. In this relation I used whatever came my way, two-track recorders, old amplifiers, photocopy machines at schools… everything developing very naturally across borders. Poems in books are lyrics for songs, songs with good lyrics offer new images to the mind of the listener, images in the mind create paintings, photos, illustrations, drawings etc. It’s all about development, reaching new perceptions, getting on with your life. In the words of the Dalai Lama, “the quality of art is, that it makes people who are otherwise always looking outward, turn inward”. That’s one way of putting it. But to return to your question, I’ve simply journeyed as many fields as possible to narrow it down to the basics, which in my case is words and music. I don’t think a person should be too selective too early. This seems applicable to all areas of life.
What kind of music, films or books do you prefer in your private life?
– I always tend to avoid to be too specific on this issue. When people ask me, what I’ve been most influenced by, it’s very difficult for me to answer, if it’s the Sex Pistols or Arvo Pärt. I mean, at the time of the release of “God Save the Queen”, that single changed my life, but then a lot of other records continued to do so in the years after that. Gavin Bryars, Scott Walker, Wim Mertens, Richard Jobson, Gabriel Fauré. This goes for literature as well. I was deeply engrossed in writers such as Baudelaire and Rimbaud, Nietzsche, but then in other periods it would English poetry, T. S. Eliot and Christopher Isherwood. Evelyn Waugh’s Decline And Fall is a wonderful book. I still enjoy the writings of Rainer Maria Rilke a lot. But then that leaves out the metaphysical catalogue. Cutting a long story short, I’d put Leonardo Da Vinci at the top of the list. Considering my ramble about art before, you should be able to see why.
Your lyrics seem very introspective, because there are many descriptions of your own feelings. What kind of person is Martin Hall, what characters are inside you – which of them are shown in your lyrics, and what are reasons for you to express your feelings?
– I don’t have a particular wish to express my feelings anymore, but it seems, it’s all I’m really able to do. I think, I’m writing a lot from one particular state of mind, from the standpoint of the observer. I find myself monitoring and describing what’s going on in me, the states I’m moving through, not necessarily because I find them attractive to write about, more simply because they’re what’s happening to me. Some people find my lyrics very depressing, view me as a very depressed person, which I’m not. Spending a lot of years being depressed might explain the flavour of the material, I don’t know. Other people find me very intellectual, which I can’t relate to either. I think the best way to describe myself is as a vacant mind, established with a lot of filters downwards to prevent any unnecessary pollution. If you have a tendency towards the suicidal, it’s very important to make up your mind about living, to make a choice, live or die. Everything else is a waste of time. I’ve made mine.
There are some words and metaphors that appear very often in your lyrics (the night, the moon, wounds, to bleed etc.). Please tell me something about them, their importance to you, their relation to your life.
– Well, isolated like that, it sounds very melodramatic. I think the fact that I’m using a lot of what you could call dark imagery, is a matter of taking the focus away from the action and turbulence of the surrounding world, directing it more towards oneself as a life, the more fragile aspects of it, the more vulnerable sides of living. Vulnerability is very often considered to be a weak state, which to me is a quite ridiculous concept. Vulnerability is sensitivity, the ability to reach beyond the Neanderthal state. The lyrics on the Random Hold are very “placeless” – they could be happening anywhere, because they’re a state of mind, a state of reflective consciousness if you want to put it like that. They’re written to seal off an inner territory, a kind of mental and emotional hinterland, where you can go, when you want to, a safe haven. I mean, I can’t imagine the record being played at a disco … It all sounds a bit over the top, but my point is that the music should make you pause a little while, act as a kind of stillness, become a room in which you can spend some time on your own. It’s more a state of mind than music. Anyway …
From 1986 to 1992 you had an intense interest in metaphysics. Please say something about that. How does this kind of science fascinate you?
– Where to begin …? In general terms “how” is an accepted question, “why” is not. “How” deals with the mechanical aspects of life, “why” with the unexplainable aspects of it. I’ve always had a very strong desire to try to understand things, to be able to deal with life. Without going into the depth of the matter, I think it was a necessity for me to leave behind the music business for a while, to deepen my understanding of things, of anything that could offer a way out of the trap I found myself in at that point in time. I mean, I had become a kind of figurehead for a lot of people at that time, almost like a spokesman for a generation, which was a role I in no way could identify myself with. So I went into an isolated period of two years, practicing Kundalini yoga, meditation, going to lectures, visiting esoteric societies, spiritual fraternities etc., basically anything that could offer me a broader understanding of the world I’d been born into. To me it wasn’t like a hobby or an interest anymore, it was a necessity, a change of direction. Drugs might offer you some degree of new perception, but only for a while – ultimately the idea is to make it a permanent state of mind, not just an occasional kick. Most people find the concept “the meaning of life” a joke, but then again, if you’ve been pushed far enough, it becomes more than an intellectual question. I don’t think you’re able to understand very much, if you haven’t had some degree of loss in your life, some degree of pain and suffering – it does mature people. Resistance is a great teacher. Need is the mother of all wisdom. If you don’t hunger for something, your understanding of it is going to very shallow. If you’re satisfied with the world and the answers it offers, fine, go no further; if you’re not, don’t expect anyone else to bring you what you need. There is no “secret knowledge”, it’s only secret to those too lazy to try to attain it. The metaphysical question, the science of it, everything from Eastern mysticism to the Tarot, it’s a mirror of the human mind, a way of understanding yourself and the world in a better way. It’s a shame that a lot of people consider it to be a religious thing. As a first principle it’s a development issue for the individual. That it stretches far beyond the individual is another thing.
In your song “Cradlemoon” you describe an escape from this world. What are the reasons for this wish of being far away?
– I think it’s a very natural response to most human company. After years of chaos, my aim is peace of mind … that’s my addiction, I suppose. The calm after the storm. I need a fair amount of stillness around me. Not always, but at least on a continuous basis. “Cradlemoon” is a kind of post-modern lullaby, a serenade, a nocturnal longing. Again, it’s this kind of reflective state, looking at the images that pass through your mind before sleep. It’s a song marking the threshold between one world and another, reality as we see it and sleep, the world of dreams. The image of a cradle moon, this thin curve on the night sky, it’s almost like you could climb it and go to sleep in it. I don’t know, maybe I’m just another hopeless romantic, the last renaissance artist of the century. These images a very dear to me. They carry a wonderful weightless sense to them. Like the poetry of Shelley and Blake. Always out of your hand, whenever you try to grab them.
Especially “She’s Eternal” touched my heart. Sometimes it seems that she is a person, but most of the time that it’s your inner world. What explanation is right? Why do you “never wanted her to see”, and why does the world die if she dies?
– Well, first of all, I’m very pleased about your focus towards the lyrics on the album. It’s been a recurring phenomena in Germany, that there’s a lot of interest directed towards the lyrics. “She’s Eternal” is a kind of a hymn to the female gender, to the essence of it, but in that respect as abstract as it’s specific. I do think a third element can occur between two people, a third state beyond the two, something bigger than both of the individuals so to speak. One of my considerations in the song is to not mess this up. The line you’re referring to is “I never wanted her to see the godless world inside of me”, which in a way summons up this longing after keeping something pure, although you yourself might be quite battered. I think people are going to find their own storyline in this song because of the imagery used in it. The term “with her the world dies” refers to the lack of focus towards anything else than the moment, the present state of mind, the peace you’re able to find in another person’s shadow. But again, it’s one of these songs that needs to be heard rather than analysed. I find it difficult to say much more about it. It’s like a picture. It’s easier to make someone look at it instead of describing it to them.
Are there plans for the future and especially gigs planned here in Germany?
– Public Propaganda is trying to arrange a tour in the new year. I’m playing very few concerts in general, but after the warm welcome the record seems to have received, I’m obviously looking forwards to visit at some point. However, I haven’t got any idea of the line-up. We shall see. Things happen in the strangest ways at the moment. I’ve just released a live recording in Denmark from the National Danish Radio where I recently performed with a string quartet. This might find its way to Germany as well, I don’t know. Concerning plans for the future, yes. Always. A lot of plans. But so much about that for now. I think I’ve said enough. Thank you very much for the attention.
PERFORMANCE
PERFORMANCE
MARTIN HALL
CD
OCTOBER 1997
LIDOCAINE (LIDOCD10)
Performance is a live recording featuring Martin Hall’s concert with the Danish string quartet Den Danske Kvartet (The Danish Quartet) in the old concert hall of the National Danish Radio on the 8th of April 1995.
The album was the first live recording ever released with Hall.
1. Like the Touch of Rain (Performance) (5:11)
2. An Attempt of Interruption (7:45)
3. Cradlemoon (4:47)
4. Worlds Apart (7:38)
5. Pleasantly Surprised (Another Heart Laid Bare) (5:07)
6. Another Chapter (8:07)
7. Curtain Fall (8:43)
8. Synthesis (6:59)
LIKE THE TOUCH OF RAIN (PERFORMANCE)
Fields of living fire
You’ll see me reaching into the air
The shadow of a survivor
I turn around but there’s no one there
I’ve been looking for reason
Some poisons taste like the sweetest wine
But all I ever believed in
Was all the things that I couldn’t find
But I believe the silence holds the answers
And I believe that nothing ever stays the same
I’m gonna keep on taking any chances
‘Cause I believe that love is like the touch of rain
Hear the cries and the whispers
The touch-and-go of another night
The afterglow of desire
Shines with the flame of a lesser light
A line of nameless faces
Fading away in a sea of time
A heart of empty spaces
Is far too often what’s left behind
Still I believe that silence holds the answers
And I believe that nothing ever stays the same
I never wanted any second chances
‘Cause I believe that love is like the touch of rain
Like a circle never ends
There’s a fire in my blood
And no matter what I do
Seems like it’s never going to stop
AN ATTEMPT OF INTERRUPTION
The nurseling and the tendon
The naked responsibility
Unexisting possibilities
Like long-gone friends
Infectious ideas
I kept your sins
Sincere to the end
And I concentrate on remembering your face, your eyes
But the noise from the second day’s party wipes it out
Sentimental warfare
Days of life, seconds of love
Hours of sin, this could be as heart-known
Lust-dead in deed, vulgar to feed
Holding me down, you could be forgiven
‘Cause I’ll lie for you
I’ll die for you
I’ll do anything
You could be forgiven
‘Cause I’ll lie for you
I’ll die for you
I’ll do anything
To be forgiven
CRADLEMOON
The fire and the water keep mixing in my blood
The sons and the daughters seemed to give it all up
They got too tired of believing
Too tired to believe
In the promises that nobody keeps
I’ve seen a generation coming
I’ve seen a generation go
And the more I see, the less I know
I want to go to sleep
I want to drown in the deep of the cradlemoon
I want to touch the sky
I want to lie down and die in the cradlemoon of the night
So I followed the shadows by the trail of the waste
And it led me into the heart to the heart of these days
I never wanted to remember
I never wanted to believe
But you don’t ask why when the thunderheart beats
All I wanted was a reason
What I got was so much more
Felt my heart would burst by the things that I saw
I want to go to sleep
I want to drown in the deep of the cradlemoon
I want to touch the sky
I want to lie down and die in the cradlemoon of the night
In a world full of stories, they will never explain
Why the cry of my heart and my soul stays the same
WORLDS APART
Somebody told me that love never dies
It grows silent
But once every often
It takes on the form of indifference
Child of northern light
You’re lost at winter stations
You always cried for change
Now you keep the same locations
Year after year
In a world of cards you kept looking for a future
But all you ever found was your isolated nature
Reflected in dreams
The fire and the gold
All the stories that you told
Never seem to set you free
The innocence is gone but the shadow hunt goes on
In a night without end
In a heart that pretends to believe
In worlds apart
In worlds divided
You breathe the air
I breathe the silence
The moon is turning gold as the stars are shining silver
I can’t recall this room but it feels like I have been here
So long ago
A season without end
It cuts the sky wide open
Another line of thoughts run into the distant ocean
Of sheltering blue
We used to never part
Guard the secrets of our hearts
Underneath a nightless dream
But stories always end
And they don’t begin again
When the eyes go to sleep
Disappear in a world out of reach
In worlds apart
In worlds divided
You breathe the air
I breathe the silence
The darkness drowns the light
Spitting shadows in our faces
It’s making you forget
It’s erasing all the traces
Except in my heart
The night is turning red
As it’s running through your fingers
You’re bleeding heart and soul as you give up
As you surrender
The last breath of life
Breathe the light
Breathe the light
PLEASANTLY SURPRISED (ANOTHER HEART LAID BARE)
Another heart laid bare on the doorstep to my exile
The salt and pantomime of any world
I see the bended heads
Always humble in the daylight
Playing the servant’s role to never see
Of all the souvenirs that you left for my keeping
The one I like the most is the world outside
I never thought I would but the distance seems so perfect
I can’t deny the fact that I’m pleasantly surprised
Another victim cries
Points his finger at the heavens
But when the sun goes down he counts his coins
The traces on my skin
They keep shining in the nighttime
A fingerprint on every memory
ANOTHER CHAPTER
Ashes to ashes
And dust to dust
A fantasy world of omni-science
Heavens and ambitions in showrooms of the mind
In another chapter of forgotten time
Faces disappearing in memory and mind
But you, you know it all in your identity-design
So 20th century
Things are what they are, no matter what we feel
Endeavour is the key, not the mastermind ideal
And if you don’t agree
Well then you don’t agree
So come on little playtime Hitler
Forget your intellectual parades
There are no final solutions, only final denials
No need for vain display
I’ve seen your religion and I’ve seen your inner borders
And my spit is more sacred than all your holy water
‘Cause it’s of flesh and blood
It’s of flesh and blood
My flesh and blood
CURTAIN FALL
The moon upon the sky
It’s bleeding light on gardens made of stone
Under the jealous clouds
The shadows break and leave the world alone
All on its own
The strangest of beliefs
Is to be found within the empty eye
All beauty looks so weak
You move your hand towards it and it hides
It hides and dies
Oh my love
Your flesh and your blood is all I need
Everything I know
And I’ll count every tear
Every tear that you’ve cried
And I’ll melt every wave on the oceans of ice
From the stars in the night there’ll be shining a light
Dirt and dust is the earth that we try to hide
Oh my love
You shine like a summer dream
The sky high above
It fades like a dying scream
Oh my love
Will you think of me?
My love
Will you set me free?
Immaculate as need
Immaculate perfection on your skin
It slowly blows away
A scent within the air is all that stays
Upon the stage
The play is at its end
Your face, it seems so pale within the light
A secret most supreme
We’ll meet again in someone else’s dream
In time you’ll see
And I’ll count every tear
Every tear that you’ve cried
And I’ll melt every wave on the oceans of ice
From the stars in the night there’ll be shining a light
Dirt and dust is the earth that we try to hide
Oh my love
You shine like a summer dream
The sky high above
It fades like a dying scream
Oh my love
Will you think of me
My love
Will you set me free?
My love
You will live deep inside me
At the curtain fall
SYNTHESIS
To my love
Wherever you may be
I’m with you
United in spirit
My life lies in your hands
All power ever been
All power yet to come
Is here now
This instant
Around us
Inside us
Arne Balk-Møller: Second violin
Gert-Inge Andersson: Viola
Henrik Brendstrup: Cello
Leif Lind: Horns
Martin Hall: Vocals
Michal Stadnicki: Double bass
Per Jacobsen: Horns
Tim Frederiksen: First violin
Design: Jens Kruse
Photo: Robin Skjoldborg
All songs were arranged by Hans-Erik Philip. Martin Hall and Den Danske Kvartet also appeared at the Roskilde Festival 1995.
The material on the record stretches from the early Ballet Mecanique period (“An Attempt of Interruption”) to several sketches for the later Random Hold album.
TESTCARDS 1989–1995
TESTCARDS 1989–1995
MARTIN HALL
DB-CD
APRIL 1997
TEST (TEST1)
Testcards 1989-1995 is a double-cd released in a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies. The material consists of 29 private Martin Hall demo recordings made in the period 1989–1995, all in all almost two and a half hours of otherwise unreleased songs.
The title also includes radically different demo versions of four Random Hold tracks.
1. Curtain Fall (7:55)
2. Calling My Name (6:45)
3. Shining Through (5:14)
4. The Crystal Sky (5:46)
5. Killing Fields (6:07)
6. Chain of Events (5:46)
7. No Questions Asked (4:55)
8. House of Cards (6:24)
9. Cradlemoon (5:17)
10. Like the Touch of Rain (Performance) (4:40)
11. Journal of Another Heart Laid Bare (5:29)
12. Behind Closed Eyes (Cue) (3:30)
13. The Tempest (4:52)
14. Untouchable (5:02)
15. Rota (2:30)
16. Urban Heat (2:13)
17. Coming Your Way (3:58)
18. Afterglow (4:05)
19. Harder (5:29)
20. Pure (5:00)
21. Transfer (2:50)
22. Stigma (4:52)
23. 20th Century Love Theme (7:12)
24. Melt Away (4:36)
25. Second Nature (6:16)
26. Elysium (6:14)
27. Erasing the Traces (4:08)
28. A Temporary Display (5:18)
29. Palladium (3:50)
CURTAIN FALL
The moon upon the sky
It’s bleeding light on gardens made of stone
Under the jealous clouds
The shadows break and leave the world alone
All on its own
The strangest of beliefs
Is to be found within the empty eye
All beauty looks so weak
You move your hand towards it and it hides
It hides and dies
Oh my love
Your flesh and your blood is all I need
Everything I know
And I’ll count every tear
Every tear that you’ve cried
And I’ll melt every wave on the oceans of ice
From the stars in the night there’ll be shining a light
Dirt and dust is the earth that we try to hide
Oh my love
You shine like a summer dream
The sky high above
It fades like a dying scream
Oh my love
Will you think of me?
My love
Will you set me free?
Immaculate as need
Immaculate perfection on your skin
It slowly blows away
A scent within the air is all that stays
Upon the stage
The play is at its end
Your face, it seems so pale within the light
A secret most supreme
We’ll meet again in someone else’s dream
In time you’ll see
And I’ll count every tear
Every tear that you’ve cried
And I’ll melt every wave on the oceans of ice
From the stars in the night there’ll be shining a light
Dirt and dust is the earth that we try to hide
Oh my love
You shine like a summer dream
The sky high above
It fades like a dying scream
Oh my love
Will you think of me
My love
Will you set me free?
My love
You will live deep inside me
At the curtain fall
CALLING MY NAME
She’s a silent voice inside me
She’s a voice that calls my name
She’s a quiet dream inside me
She’s a dream that stays the same
She’s a distant world inside me
She’s a face within the rain
She’s a moment and a memory
And she’s calling me again
She keeps on calling my name
She keeps on calling inside me
I see her face in the rain
She keeps on calling
Through all the days of my life
I’ve searched for some higher meaning
I’ve paid whatever the price
Only to find out that I need her
She’s a world inside a moment
She’s forever and a day
She’s a portrait of a longing
Of an age that’s far away
She’s a tear that shines like diamond
She’s a face within the rain
She’s a golden world of silence
And it’s calling me again
SHINING THROUGH
Shining
Shining through the darkness
A face made of fire
A face made of dreams
Shining
Shining through the silence
I feel her beside me
I feel her inside
And I see her
Shining through the night
And I need her
Just to feel her
Lying close by my side
Shining
Shining through the empty
She touches like reason
She touches like light
Shining
Shining through the sadness
She’s all that I’ve asked for
She’s all that I need
And the silence
The silence is hers
She’s my reason
She’s my religion
She’s everything that I know
In the heartland of the night
Every feeling melts into mind
She gives me meaning
She gives me feeling
She’s the silence I’m feeling inside
THE CRYSTAL SKY
The crystal sky, it shines no shelter
The crystal sky, it shines so hard
A crystal heart, it never disappears
‘Cause crystal hearts, they never die
And their faces keep on shining through the night
And their silhouettes, they flicker in the light
They shine so hard
The tired skin, it needs a shelter
The tired skin, it needs the night
The ticking clock, it doesn’t know the time
The ticking clock, it doesn’t care
And the traces on my skin, they shine at night
Underneath the prison of the crystal sky
It shines so hard
Voices seem to whisper underneath the floors
And the eyes, they keep on burning through the walls
They shine so hard
And the crystal sky is shining through the night
Shining painfully on all that never dies
It shines so hard
KILLING FIELDS
Hear the voices on the airwaves
See the faces on the screens
There’s a world of best intentions
Turning into killing fields
I used to think that we were different
I used to put my trust in you
And in the days of never-ending time
I guess that you believed it too
Now I’m looking at your face
As you sit on turning tables
As you’re trying not to think of the irony
You always wanted everything
But you lost the guarding feeling
You wanted more than you could steal
Became the son of killing fields
Like the sweetest contradiction
Like the strangest of beliefs
In a world that changes overnight
Flesh and blood, it seems so weak
No one seemed to understand you
No one even seemed to try
Not an unsolved piece of mystery
When you start to wonder why
Through the windows of the world
You could see a thousand faces
But you never took the time to try to understand
And when the rain began to fall
There was nowhere to seek shelter
There was nowhere left to hide
Except the killing fields inside
The stars were burning in your blood
As you reached out for the angels
It only seemed a breath away
But then it seemed to fade
And when you fell down from the sky
Seems you got your all-tomorrow
A never-ending set of trials
The killing fields of your own mind
CHAIN OF EVENTS
Can’t remember how it started, guess it’s always been this way
I was waiting for the moment that kept slipping into days
In a room without a view you’ve got all the time you need
To remember who you are, to recall the things you’ve seen
Just like a perfect puzzle, like a story without end
I was caught between the lines in this chain of events
I watched the teardrops burn out, watched the world change its skin
Thought I’d leave it behind but then I went further in
At first it all seemed like nothing new
The same old disease without a cure
The only thing changed was the measure of sand in the glass
I saw the stars fall from the sky
I saw the days getting shorter
I saw the hearts bleed in the night
I saw the ice turn to water
I saw the wastelands of dead eyes
I heard the whispering silence
Within the corners of my mind
The faces kept on returning
So perfect paranoia is perfect awareness
At least that’s what I thought but no one seemed to want to share it
A ghost on every corner and a world too out of hand
Seemed they just ignored the values that they didn’t understand
With so-called nothing to hide they all shined their empty hearts
While they told me that the lies were in the story from the start
Never thought I’d be returning to the place it all began
To the tainted heart of longing where feeling travels hand to hand
I followed the pathways of the scars
I followed the guidelines of my heart
Wherever I went, all I saw was the face of the past
I saw the stars fall from the sky
I saw the days getting shorter
I saw the hearts bleed in the night
I saw the ice turn to water
I saw the wastelands of dead eyes
I heard the whispering silence
Within the corners of my mind
The faces kept on returning
Don’t forget the past
If we forget it, we’ll repeat it
All the poison that we’ve had, I never thought that we would need it
Oh God, I hate their narrow minds and all their new world master plans
All they’ve ever seemed to do’s to turn tomorrow secondhand
The words are said, the same old lines
A world that’s falling to pieces
In the innocent blue eyes you’ll see the spreading diseases
In the kingdom of the blind conquistadors are returning
And their target is your mind
They’re just waiting for their season
Seems like the story never ends in this chain of events
Could we make the circle end?
NO QUESTIONS ASKED
If all the stars within the night
Could burn a hole upon the sky
The heavens high would fall like rain
Tell the story once again
When I see her
When I breathe her
On cool, white sheets
She defines me
She reminds me
Of the sleep I need
Of all I need
No questions asked, it’s all the same
She holds her hand over the flame
If walls could talk I’d listen in
Hear the story once again
HOUSE OF CARDS
Turning around to catch the feeling
Watching it fade into the air
All of the reasons you believed in
Never seemed to be there
Time after time you heard their stories
Time after time you missed the point
All of the time you looked for answers
Never saw the questions you found
You tried to hold on to broken pieces
You tried to believe what wasn’t there
I know the way it’s falling inside you
I know the way it feels when it falls apart
I know the way it keeps falling
When it’s falling like a house of cards
Trying to count a thousand reasons
Trying to keep a single thought
All of the world to disbelieve in
For a heart
Torn apart
I know the way it’s falling inside you
I know the way it feels when it falls apart
I know the way it keeps falling
When it’s falling like a house of cards
The water keeps running through your fingers
The silence keeps hanging in the air
You’re watching the stranger in the mirror
There’s nobody there
Nobody there
CRADLEMOON
The fire and the water keep mixing in my blood
The sons and the daughters seemed to give it all up
They got too tired of the waiting, too tired to believe
In the promises that nobody keeps
I’ve seen a generation coming, I’ve seen a generation go
And the more I see, the less I know
I want to go to sleep
I want to drown in the deep of the cradlemoon
I want to touch the sky
I want to lie down and die in the cradlemoon of the night
So I followed the shadows by the trail of the waste
And it led me into the heart, to the heart of these days
Never wanted to remember, never wanted to believe
But you don’t ask why when the thunderheart beats
All I wanted was a reason, what I got was so much more
Felt my heart would burst by the things that I saw
I want to go to sleep
I want to drown in the deep of the cradlemoon
I want to touch the sky
I want to lie down and die in the cradlemoon of the night
In a world full of stories, they will never explain
Why the cry of my heart and my soul stays the same
LIKE THE TOUCH OF RAIN (PERFORMANCE)
Fields of living fire
You’ll see me reaching into the air
The shadow of a survivor
I turn around but there’s no one there
I’ve been looking for reason
Some poisons taste like the sweetest wine
But all I ever believed in
Was all the things that I couldn’t find
Now I believe the silence holds the answers
And I believe that nothing ever stays the same
I’m gonna keep on taking any chances
‘Cause I believe that love is like the touch of rain
Hear the cries and the whispers
The touch-and-go of another night
The afterglow of desire
Shines with the flame of a lesser light
A line of nameless faces
Fading away in a sea of time
A heart of empty spaces
Is far too often what’s left behind
But I believe the silence holds the answers
And I believe that nothing ever stays the same
I’m gonna keep on taking any chances
‘Cause I believe that love is like the touch of rain
Like a circle never ends
There’s a fire in my blood
And no matter what I do
Seems like it’s never going to stop
JOURNAL OF ANOTHER HEART LAID BARE
Another heart laid bare on the doorstep to my exile
The salt and pantomime of any world
I see the bended heads, always humble in the daylight
Playing the servant’s role to never see
Of all the souvenirs that you left for my keeping
The one I like the most is the world outside
I never thought I would but the distance seems so perfect
I can’t deny the fact that I’m pleasantly surprised
Another victim cries, points his finger at the heavens
But when the sun goes down he counts his coins
The traces on my skin, they keep shining in the nighttime
A fingerprint on every memory
BEHIND CLOSED EYES (CUE)
The cities of light, the mirrors beneath the stars
In all of my life I’ve followed my untamed heart
It keeps raging like a fever in the sleepless nights
In a somewhere behind closed doors and behind closed eyes
The sea of the sky keeps shining a world of gold
The sweeter the song, the sadder the tale that’s told
There’s a story, there’s a secret that I’ll never know
There’s a feeling that will follow me anywhere I’ll go
I’ll walk on the waters
I’ll quiet the storms
With you as my reason
With you as my calm
THE TEMPEST
I’ve been wanting
I’ve been needing
I’ve been longing for you
Like a hunger
Deep down under
I’ve been starving just for you
‘Cause I want you so
And I need to know
If you need me like I need you
Please answer my prayers
I need to know
I need you so
I need to breathe you
To be near you
To feel you
I need your love
Your finger touch
I need to feel you
Burning on me
Inside me
I’ve been hurting
I’ve been searching
I’ve been thirsting for you
From the gentle
To a tempest
I keep yearning just for you
‘Cause I want you so
And I need to know
If you want me like I want you
Please answer my prayers
UNTOUCHABLE
From blood into ashes
A word in the night
I heard someone whisper that I’d passed the line
The scream of my heartbeat
It’s burning in cold anger by the things I hear
Blood into ashes
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
In the untouchable of each moment
In the untouchable of the silence
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
I’ve heard enough statements like “everything’s relative”
Go jump from a rooftop, there goes your philosophy
‘Cause the map they’ve made isn’t the landscape
Although nicely drawn
Over and over
Falling all over again
In the untouchable of each moment
In the untouchable of the silence
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
Tears of dust
Colours of the night
Words of chains
Memories of lies
Gonna break on through
Fantasies
Poisons taste like wine
In a dream
In a dream of time
The untouchable
Gonna reach the untouchable
ROTA
I watch them come, I watch them go
I watch them go to pieces
Where they’re going nobody knows
But it’s the way that seems easy
Easy come, easy go
Where they go no one knows
The rhythm of the rota never stops
We’re such stuff as dreams are made of
I watch them run, I watch them fall
Within their own wall-to-wall smiles
The story goes, it goes ’round and ’round
The way up and down is the same
URBAN HEAT
Urban heat and urban child
I remember running wild
Urban heat and urban blood
I just couldn’t get enough
Cutting wires, running hot
Urban heat and urban baby
Sweet thing going bitter maybe
I don’t doubt your intuition
But it seems you need resistance
Hear the thunderdrum, it beats
In this drome of city heat
Knock on wood and knock on head
Better check if something’s dead
In your life or in your head
Urban heat and urban baby
Maybe I’m just going crazy
But I wonder where you’re going
‘Cause it’s never really showing
Urban heat and city fire
Going higher to get higher
Touch-and-go, the line is knife sharp
Pity those who struggle too hard
So get it on and get it right
You’re gonna miss me when I die
Are we to be or to be not?
We’re here to go
COMING YOUR WAY
I’m a storm rider, mind rewriter
Last survivor of emotional backlash
Born to why it, born to die it
Levitate it in this “memento mori”
Heavy pathos, shining razors
All-erasure on the edge of this nowhere
Tantalizing, fantasizing
Going nowhere if you don’t think about it
Think about it now
‘Cause it’s coming your way
I’m a soul diva, dancing Shiva
Burning fever in my brain and my body
Heavy thinker, heavy feeler
Heavy going with a delicate outline
City children hate religion
Going deeper, underworlds of survival
Stimulation, entertainment
By exhaustion, slowly-slowly it gets them
Gonna get you now
The invisible warfare
And it’s coming your way
Coming-coming your way
It’s all coming your way under Scorpio rising
I’m a loud-talker, city walker
Western prophet, gonna tell you about it
Transformation coming your way
Recognize it, not just know-all-about-it
Mind dispersion, soul perverting
Hell parading, 20th century brainwash
In the mirror, one to zero
Coming your way under Scorpio rising
AFTERGLOW
Deeper
Rain falling in the night
Burning
White is the flame
Afterglow burns
Glitters within the rain
Cuts like a knife
Cuts like the fire of eyes
Never enough
I can’t get enough
Never enough
I can’t get enough of your love
Like rings
Spreading in the water
Circles
Circles of you
HARDER
Rising on the horizon
Shapes of things still to come
Turning point getting closer
Shadows fall harder now
Here comes the rain
Here comes the fire
Rising sense overloading
Hunger lives in the blood
Reason comes from a longing
Nightless dark deepening
Here comes the rain
Here comes the fire
It’s coming down harder
PURE
Pure
I need you
Pure
I feel you inside me
Pure
I know you’re there
Pure
I need you
Pure
Cast like a shadow
Pure
I feel you near
TRANSFER
All you know is my name
Just a face in the dark
Would it change anything?
If you came to know
On the edge of the knife that divides
Turning point
Turning day into night
Pressure burns
I need love under will
STIGMA
Child
You live with no tomorrow
Where time is just a memory
Where’s the fire in your eyes?
Is it fear by your side?
Why don’t you cast any shadow?
What’s that mark on your skin?
Is that a rock’n’roll stigma?
Another rock’n’roll stigma
Is that your rock’n’roll stigma?
Another rock’n’roll stigma
Child
You’re playing with a fire
That burns
Burns your heart and soul
20TH CENTURY LOVE THEME
Love is unknown
Love is silent
It’s a whisper and a cry
Love is safety
In a moment
Love is still
As the night falls like a shadow
It still rains
All the questions don’t need any answers
For a while
And love
Is like rings in the water
Rings around you
And love
Love is like you
Oh it’s soft like a shadow
It’s warmer than blood
Love is unknown
Love is silent
It’s a question that doesn’t want any answer
MELT AWAY
Time
In the still of a moment
Of a glimpse
Still
In the ages gone by
Still to come
Melt away like the day
Melt away like the night
Melt away in a dreamless sleep
Melt away in the light
Melt away all the flesh
Melt away every bone
Melt away all the nightless darkness
Melt away in the unknown
If just for a moment
Melt away this chain of evil
SECOND NATURE
Give me shelter
Give me time
Touch my longing
With your mind
See the faces
On the sky
Burning teardrops
Breaking ice
The images keep on changing
Within the light of the day
One side is shown in the mirror
Another’s hidden away
My second nature performance
A journal written in grey
The neitherworld never changes
The winterlands stay the same
Time ran out on empty questions
Time ran out on empty answers long ago
Now I’m living in this exile
Hiding all the things I ever came to know
Like the faces seem to hide within the rain
Turn away your eyes, the world remains the same
Try to count the times you’ve felt like this before
Feel the teardrops burning out forever more
ELYSIUM
She’s my Elysium
The only empty room inside me
She turns the world away
She cools the light of day
She covers me
Whenever she’s near me
Her beauty’s a calm where danger lies
A whispering silence
It’s cool like the darkness in her eyes
A centreless feeling
That spreads like a word within the wind
She’s forming the open
And catches the stars on the heavens
The traces on my skin
The frozen fingerprints inside me
A crowded field of dreams
Enacts its memories outside of me
Whenever she’s near me
Her beauty’s a calm where danger lies
A whispering silence
It’s cool like the darkness in her eyes
A centreless feeling
That spreads like a word within the wind
She’s forming the open
And catches the stars on the heavens
I need her Elysium
I need her skin to cover me
I need her mind to set me free
I need her touch to burn on me
I need her feel inside of me
I never thought I’d be returning to the place it all began
To the tainted heart of longing
To the writing in the sand
No matter where I seemed to turn
Dreams were drowning in the rain
Like imaginary worlds made of all-escaping days
Voices calling in the night from the corners of my mind
From the desolated worlds I was trying to leave behind
I was lost within a circle, in a season without end
But with a breath she seemed to break the chain of events
ERASING THE TRACES
Salt and sand thickening my blood
In the heritage of never quite enough
I tell the story once, tell the story twice
Insincerity dies
Heart and soul and the riddle of the mind
You get to know yourself at the dividing line
The feeling in the air comes as no surprise
Signing off with a sigh
Time has come to turn another card
Read aloud the secrets of my heart
Burn another handful of the past to erase the traces
Spread the ashes high above the clouds
Hide it underneath the hardest ice
Take it to the corners of the world and then erase the traces
Counting stars in the middle of the night
Losing sleep again under burning skies
I used to call a name, used to call in vain
Best friend of man is his pain
Feelings come and then suddenly they go
There always comes a time when you just don’t know
Another thousand years under second views
Superiority cured
Time has come to turn another card
Read aloud the secrets of my heart
Burn another handful of the past to erase the traces
Spread the ashes high above the clouds
Hide it underneath the hardest ice
Take it to the corners of the world and then erase the traces
Touching the world with a feeling of disbelief
Fall apart like the play of my memory
Hold the hand of the feeling inside of me
Never easy
Easy coming, easy going
But things never change, they stay the same
There’s a writing in blood out in the rain
Seems like perfect paranoia is perfect awareness
My mind is full of the traces
A TEMPORARY DISPLAY
It’s all the wrong reasons with the right ideal
Written like need all over your face
Contemporary nothing medaling itself
Losing grace under pressure
The animal heart speaks again
And it falls like night
And it reaches everywhere
Makes me want it all
With a feel that burns so blind
Can’t remember how
Guess it’s always been this way
Like a house of cards
Just a temporary display
The comfort of strangers is all that I need
The palm of my hand keeps the shadows away
Enjoying the sweetness, the taste of the salt
Always watching the backgrounds
The character cast stays the same
And it falls like night
And it reaches everywhere
Makes me want it all
With a feel that burns so blind
Can’t remember how
Guess it’s always been this way
Like a house of cards
Just a temporary display
In a room without a view
Under skies of silk and water
I’ll be watching how the kindest fire burns
PALLADIUM
Never thought I’d ever be myself
Thought I was within my prison cell
‘Cause the windows gave the view
That all to know was what I knew
Sharing weaknesses with so-called friends
In a game that’s called “it never ends”
Had to leave it all behind
And face the prison of my mind
In this Palladium
In this Palladium
And I know you know it all
Behind mirrors, behind walls
Henrik Marstal: Bass, cello
Iben Teilmann: Viola
Martin Hall: Vocals, instruments
Tina Schæfer: Backing vocals
Design: Signe Toft Jacobsen
The background for the release of the double-cd and the limited stock is explained in the label Test’s press announcement:
”The idea with this release is to give the more dedicated Hall listeners the opportunity to get acquainted with material that otherwise would be lost. The reason behind the limited edition is due to a demand from the owners of the recordings who don’t want to see the double-cd launched in a major fashion.“
HALLMARK 1–4
HALLMARK 1-4
MARTIN HALL
7″ EP
APRIL 1997
THE PLANET (MOON03)
Hallmark 1–4 is an independent release that has nothing to do with Testcards 1989-1995 although the records were released simultaneously.
This 7″ single was issued by the underground label The Planet in a limited edition of 100 copies and contains a rare Dialogue recording (Martin Hall’s electronic 1980 duo with Per Hendrichsen) featuring Morten Versner from Ballet Mécanique on violin.
1. Untouchable (5:02)
2. Give Me a Reason (4:31)
3. Tears and Morphine (4:08)
4. The Missing War (6:04)
UNTOUCHABLE
From blood into ashes
A word in the night
I heard someone whisper that I’d passed the line
The scream of my heartbeat
It’s burning in cold anger by the things I hear
Blood into ashes
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
In the untouchable of each moment
In the untouchable of the silence
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
I’ve heard enough statements like “everything’s relative”
Go jump from a rooftop, there goes your philosophy
‘Cause the map they’ve made isn’t the landscape
Although nicely drawn
Over and over
Falling all over again
In the untouchable of each moment
In the untouchable of the silence
And in the night the rain keeps on falling
And in the streets the silence keeps calling
Tears of dust
Colours of the night
Words of chains
Memories of lies
Gonna break on through
Fantasies
Poisons taste like wine
In a dream
In a dream of time
The untouchable
Gonna reach the untouchable
GIVE ME A REASON
So give me, give me a reason
And give me, give me a dream
Now here’s a song for the broken hearts
It’s dedicated to pain
Another time and another place
But the story’s the same
I always read every bottom line
‘Cause everything’s got a price
A pretty face doesn’t last that long
I want to know what’s behind
So give me, give me a reason
And give me, give me a dream
The hallelujah of broken souls
Another promise to keep
I’ve had enough of the heart of blues
Time goes and rust never sleeps
TEARS AND MORPHINE
Like tears in the rain
They are fading away
No eye shall absorb the tear it cries
Each tear is a stream that purifies
Irma Victoria: Vocals
Martin Hall: Vocals, instruments
Morten Versner: Violin
Ole Hansen: Trumpet
Per Hendrichsen: Synthesizers
Tina Schæfer: Vocals
Design: Lars Julsgård Thomsen
The record presents four different aspects of Hall’s musical workings: The solo track “Untouchable” from 1989 followed by a NTT outtake from their 1993 sessions (“Give Me a Reason” featuring Tina Schæfer), then a re-recording from 1994 of Irma Victoria and the Hatebox Experience’s “Tears in The Rain” and finally “The Missing War” with Dialogue.
THE WORLD DAYS
THE WORLD DAYS
MARTIN HALL
NOVEL
MARCH 1996
BORGENS FORLAG (ISBN 87-21-00406-4)
The World Days is Martin Hall’s debut novel. Where his earlier works were characterized by a more obscure and essay-like style of writing, this time the author charged head-on into a burlesque and almost slapstick’ish style and plot. The book is a tongue-in-cheek tale about religious rapture and love, a comedy drama driven by romantic pathos and poetic exuberance.
In general the book was well received by the press. On the cover of the book the following info was given:
”The World Days is a wild and adventurous tale, an absurd farce about friendship and love. The story is enacted in a timeless Europe where myth and reality no longer seems to be separable, neither for the reader nor the involved parties. The title refers to the prophecy of a hundred days where the angels are said to descend from heaven.
The World Days is an epic tale from the great wide open.“
Genre: Novel
Pages: 171
Design: Martin Hall
Photo: Robin Skjoldborg