Joanna Newsom @ RFH 11th/12th May

[titch juicy]

I seem to remember that there's some fans on here. Tickets on sale on the RFH website right now.

Joanna Newsom Tickets

[Sue]

Hey! Joanna Newsom!

I actually agree with the critic who said she sounded like a duck, but I'm up for seeing Roy Harper, there's a blast from the past :))

And I'm sure FlapJackDavey will be keen to see JN again.

Thanks for the heads up titch.

Edited to add: Erm, no, won't be going, just seen the prices - she's upped her game a bit then :-S

Edited again to add: We should have got her down to the Goose before, looks like it's too late now, God knows what her fee is if they're charging that much for tix :-S

[titch juicy]

She's worth every penny and more.

[Sue]

I'm sure you're right, but depends how many pennies you have.

Sometimes they have to be spent on, er, things like food :)

[flapjackdavey]

she's brilliant , not sure I'd pay that money to see her though , mind you , you are getting Roy Harper for that too so I suppose its ok . still a bit steep .

[titch juicy]

i'm sure many would disagree, but i think she's as close to a musical genius (not a word i like) that the 21st century's given us thus far

a prodigious talent

the new album is stunning

[flapjackdavey]

sawdust and diamonds

genius is a word thats used too often ,but anyone that can come up with a line such as " I wasnt born of a whistle or milked from a thistle at twighlight " has got to come pretty close . :-)

even if she does sound like a duck .... :))

spooky and brilliant

[titch juicy]

one of the comments underneath that video sums her up better than i ever could

"untamed emotional force, unique songwriting, sophisticated lyrics, breathtaking singing and virtuous harp-playing all combined in one delicate woman..."

[titch juicy]

i think it's worth posting all the lyrics to sawdust and diamonds, so i shall

From the top of the flight

Of the wide white stairs

Through the rest of my life

Do you wait for me there?

There's a bell in my ears

There's a wide white row

Drop a bell down the stairs

Hear it fall forever more

Hear it fall forever more

Drop a bell off of the dock

Blot it out in the sea

Drowning mute as a rock

Sounding mutiny

There's a light in the wings

Hits this system of strings

From the side while they swing;

See the wires, the wires, the wires

And the articulation

In our elbows and knees

[makes them jerk in the breeze]

Makes us buckle and we couple in endless increase

As the audience admires milkymoon

And the little white dove

Made with love, made with love

Made with glue and a glove and some pliers

Swings a low sickle arc

From its perch in the dark

Settle down

Settle down

Settle down my desire

And the moment i slept

I was swept up in a terrible tremor

Though no longer bereft, how i shook

And i couldn't remember

And then the furthermost shake

Drove a murdering stake in

And cleft me right down through my center

And i shouldn't say so

But i know that it was then or never

Push me back into a tree

Bind my buttons with salt

Fill my long ears with bees

Braying 'please, please, please,

Oh you ought not!

No you ought not!'

And then this system of strings

Tugs on the tip of my wings

Cut from cardboard and old magazines

Makes me warble and rise like a sparrow

And in the place where i stood

Is a circle of wood

A quarter to which you chop and you stack in your barrow

And it is terribly good

To carry water and chop wood

Streaked with soot, heavy booted and wild-eyed

As i crash through the rafters

And the ropes and the pulleys trail after

And the holiest, holiest belfry burns sky high

And then a slow lip of fire

Moves across the prairie with precision

While somewhere with your pliers and glue

You make your first incision

And in a moment of almost unbearable vision

Doubled over with the hunger of lions

'Hold me close', cooed the dove

Who was stuffed now with sawdust and diamonds

I wanted to say 'why the long face?'

[slowly slip away with your long face]

Sparrow perch and play songs of long face

Burro buck and bray songs of long face

Sings 'i will swallow your sadness and eat your cold clay

Just to lift your long face

And though it may be madness, i will take to the grave

Your precious long face

& though our bones they may break & our souls separate

Why the long face? Milkymoon

And though our bodies recoil from the grip of the soil

Why the long face?'

[it was not my mistake,

It was not your miskate;

There is a bell beneath the lake

And verily the spell begins to break

And verily the spell begins to break]

In the trough of the waves

Which are pawing like dogs

Between pale-faced and grave

As i write in my log

And then i hear a noise from the hull

Seven days out to sea

And it is the damnable bell

And it tolls, i believe, that it tolls

It tolls for me!

And it tolls for me!

And though my wrists and my waist

Seem so easy to break

Still my dear i would have walked you to the edge of the water

And they will recognise

All the lines of your face

In the face of the daughter, of the daughter, of my daughter

And darling we will be fine

But what was yours and mine

Appears to be a sandcastle that the gibbering wave takes

But if it's all just the same

Then say my name, say my name,

Say my name in the morning so that i know when the wave breaks

I wasn't born of a whistle

Or milked from a thistle at twilight

No, i was all horns and thorns

Sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright

So enough of this terror we deserve to know light

And grow evermore lighter and lighter

You would have seen me through

But i could not undo that desire

Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh desire

Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh desire

Oh-oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh desire milkymoon

From the top of the flight

Of the wide white stairs

Through the rest of my life

Do you wait for me there?