Album of the Day

Pawn Hearts, by Van der Graff Generator (1971): Given today's date, I hit quite a vein of dark/menacing music today: Univers Zero, the first Van Halen album ("Runnin' With the Devil" anyone?), and, of course, VdGG. Given the whole Mark of the Beast mythology, it's appropriate that this album, with "Man-Erg," is the Album of the Day, given that Hammill gets it right about beasts and such:

The killer lives inside me; yes, I can feel him move.
Sometimes he's lightly sleeping in the quiet of his room;
but then his eyes will rise and stare through mine,
he'll speak my words and slice my mind inside.
Yes, the killer lives.

The angels live inside me, I can feel them smile;
their presence strokes and soothes the tempest in my mind
and their love can heal the wounds that I have wrought.
They watch me as I go to fall;
well, I know I shall be caught
while the angels live.

* * *

And I, too, live inside me and very often don't know who I am;
I know I'm not a hero;well, I hope that I'm not damned.
I'm just a man, and killers, angels, all are these,
dictators, saviours, refugees in war and peace
as long as Man lives...

I'm just a man, and killers, angels, all are these:
dictators, saviours, refugees.

To paraphrase Walt Kelly - we have seen the Beast and the Beast is us.