First of all Happy New Year my dear friends of Hive :) I wish you a prosperous and healthy 2024. This is my first post of the year.
Dream of Sheep" is a song by Kate Bush from her fifth studio album, "Hounds of Love," released in 1985. The song is part of the album's conceptual suite called "The Ninth Wave," which tells the story of a person drifting in the sea after a wreck and floats alone in the cold waters clinging to her life at night, utterly alone in the dark, longing for rescue while dealing with the struggle of not giving up as tiredness sets in.
Watch the video here: CAPTIONS IN ENGLISH. SUBTÍTULOS TAMBIÉN EN ESPAÑOL
"The Ninth wave" comprises several songs that are somehow interconnected telling a big story which was conceptualized as an imaginary soundtrack to a film, and two of them are "Dream of Sheep" and "Hello Earth" which are combined in this version I've made along with little snippets and clues to several other songs. The songs belonging to this suite are:
And Dream Of Sheep
Under Ice
Waking The Witch
Watching You Without Me
Jig Of Life
Hello Earth
The Morning Fog
While in Dream of Sheep it's a person who is lost at sea after a storm, Hello Earth is an astronaut drifting in Space watching Earth, and the storms forming unable to warn those under it but the whole set is about a person lost at sea, so it's more an imagining and awakening to feel connected to Earth and grateful to live. Maybe a glimpse of a happy ending... a "Little light shining" or maybe not. It is followed by a series of dreams, hallucinations and sometimes nightmares, in then there is an urge to "wake up" What it is clear is that Hello Earth is the moment of transcendence, In the final song of the suite it's hinted she she's either rescued or passed to a peaceful afterlife, but but it's uplifting and peaceful. Kate herself hinted she was rescued. There are many hints in the lyrics throughout the songs that suggests so, but it's vague and open.
"The Ninth Wave" is a reference to an old Irish saying about the ninth wave being the strongest, fastest approaching and most dangerous one. It is said that waves come in rounds of three, and the third of the third round might be the one who will tumble you down. Famous Aivazovsky's painting 'The ninth wave' (1850) shows a group of people shipwrecked at sea, as a metaphor for the final wave before drowning, a moment which becomes the anchor of the album and provides its framing narrative.
Kate was also inspired by "The Coming of Arthur" by XIX English poet Lord Tennyson
‘Wave after wave, each mightier than the last,
Till last, a ninth one, gathering half the deep
And full of voices, slowly rose and plunged
Roaring, and all the wave was in a flame’ – ‘The Coming of Arthur’
In Irish Mythology the Ninth is a barrier between Death and the Afterlife but in the context of the suite it maybe translates as the struggle for survival and the emotional depths human experience when that happens, a test of soul's strength
Which one in this case, I'll leave it to your interpretation. It is all somehow vague and allegorical but intricately linked to our will to live. The whole suite became the B side of Hounds of love album telling the story of this shipwrecked woman floating alone in the sea through a series of songs, and as her demise is imminent she starts to experience near death experiences and the line between her conscious and unconscious mind blur causing dream-states and surreal astral lucid dreams (some nightmarish) that reflect her inner struggles and her longing to survive, in a battle between the pull of death and the will to live
In "And Dream of Sheep," the protagonist is struggling to stay awake and alive in the cold water after falling off a ship. We really don't know much how she got there, only that she's all alone in the dark freezing cold waters. The lyrics convey a sense of loneliness, and somehow fear, and desperation as the character struggles longing to be found and rescue, a "little SOS light" her only beacon, a desire for escape imagining voices on the radio, and longing for a more peaceful state for mind "I can't be left alone with my imagination". Finally it could be interpreted as the need to rest and though the final interpretation may vary, I feel it's somehow an acceptance and the need to rest but as this song belongs to a longer arch that might be not the end of her story. Still there are lines of resilience and fight against it "I can't be left to my imagination"
Poppies are mentioned, another reference to sleep a flower related to the mythology of the Dream God Hypnos. Remember our post about poppies and their mythological relationship with dreams and sleeping imagery.
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The repeated lines in the chorus "Let me be weak, let me sleep and dream of sheep" suggests a desire for rest and comfort and detaching from the reality of the dire situation of drowning. There is a sense of loss and almost of acceptance, yet it fights back "I'll wake up to the sound of engines"
This song is so emotional and it has made me cry so many times in my low times that I felt compelled to make this version. It's introspective and haunting, and somehow captures our vulnerability in the face of adversity.
Kate re-recorded this song when she was older, with a lower pitched voice. The second version of the song is very emotional with just her floating on water with a life vest and a beacon light. She recorded it in one take, live, unedited and raw floating in a very cold water tank. You can hear the gasping of air and shivering breath while singing, and somehow I wanted to capture the same feeling, so I set it up to be in cold water while recording this myself, so mine is not a perfect polished take but one that made me cry while singing.
After Dream of Sheep the suite goes on in different dreams and hallucinations... using metaphors but all are linked with repeated sentences "little light" "get out of the waves, get out of the water".
After Dream of Sheep ends and we assume she has fallen sleep, she has a nightmare that she is trapped "Under Ice", at the end of the song we go back to the same scene of this woman in the sea while she moans "It's me" like praying someone sees her
There's something moving under
Moving under ice through water
Trying to (it's me) get out of the cold water (it's me)
Something (it's me), someone help them
In the somehow scary "Wake the Witch" the song starts with a very soothing piano, and our protagonist is still sleeping, which is dangerous for her survival. We listen the voice of her family and loved ones telling her to wake up, and some references to Dream of Sheep and her "little light"
Wake up, love
We should make the night
But see your little lights alive
Stop that lying (ma needs a shower, get out of bed)
And sleeping in bed, get up
Little light
Can you not see that little light up there?
Where?
There
Where?
Over here
Then she is in a nightmare and the bad dream takes over. At the end we listen to an helicopter broadcasting a distress signal "Get out of the waves, Get out of the water" . This motif is also something that will repeat several times. I myself sing it at the end of my "mash-up"
The suite goes on with "Watching you without me" which feels like an attempt of awakening as she is stranded at the sea. In it her spirit of ghost visit her beloved ones that might not know what became of her. In Kate's own words "Suddenly, they're kind of at home, in spirit, seeing their loved one sitting there waiting for them to come home. And, you know, watching the clock, and obviously very worried about where they are, maybe making phone calls and things. But there's no way that you can actually communicate, because they can't see you"
In "Jig of Life" she's visited by her future self in her imagination that tells to not give up and stay alive because of the life that is waiting for her after, the life she will live, the family she'll have. It's not a choice for her present self to give up and deny her future. The song breaks in all the ominous tone with a Celtic Jig.
At the end of the song she ways I put this moment here "over here". That's where she is, her location. Still, we dive again deeper and deeper into "Hello Earth"
Then we move on to Hello Earth which makes the second half of my version, but there are also minor glimpses to other songs out from the suite (including Running up that Hill and "The Big Sky" (both in Hounds of Love)) which I had previously covered. In "Hello Earth" the protagonist is already submerged underwater and experiences a dreamlike lucid dreaming vision and connection with the Earth. She imagines she sees the Earth from space and the storm from above, the same storm that put her in that situation. "Get out of the waves" but the warning is helpless. But at the end It's as if the character is coming back to life and awareness. In the original recording there is a sampled NASA communication with Houston control expressing gratitude for being alive. In the end both of the songs deal with the theme of survival and the human connection with the Earth.
It is like an out of body experience and the song turns spacious and poignant, as if she has detached from her own body and from out of it all she knows she's but a little speck with a dim flickering light floating in the ocean, invisible from that vantage. Still, alive and part of this beating planet, and we really don't know if she was rescued or not, but in 2014 Kate Bush Herself hinted she actually survived her trials in the water and survived the night. At least we'd like to think that way.
This is hinted in the follow up song and final song of the arch in "The Morning Fog" in which dawn is portrayed and she makes the promise to tell her loved ones that she loves them "better". It is an uplifting tune after the dark cold night. And it doesn't matter really, it's her appreciation of what she has/had what's important. LIVE and LOVE, every day counts.
I also added a SOS distress call at the end... for Earth, and for this little woman floating in the dark ocean... We hope someone heard
And maybe someone saw your beacon
GO TO SLEEP LITTLE EARTH
"Little light guide them to me"
So this is a little tale of survival.
Giving up when you are exhausted is inviting, but you mustn't give up
You must LIVE
LYRICS OF MY "MASH-UP" VERSION
I have only posted the audio only for my patrons at https://patreon.com/yidneth but you can watch/listen through the video above (from youtube)
Audio only only on my patreon.com/yidneth (thanks to the who support me here, some of you hivers by the way)
Little light shining
Little light will guide them to me
My face is all lit up
My face is all lit up
If they find me racing white horses
They'll not take me for a buoy
Let me be weak, let me sleep and dream of sheep
Where did I go? Why did I go?
Oh I'll wake up to any sound of engines
Every gull a seeking craft
I can't keep my eyes open
Wish I had my radio
I'd tune into some friendly voices
Talking 'bout stupid things
I can't be left to my imagination
Let me be weak, let me sleep and dream of sheep
Ooh, their breath is warm
And they smell like sleep
And they say they take me home
Like poppies, heavy with seed
They take me deeper and deeper
With just one hand held up high
I can blot you out
Out of sight
In the head of the tempest
(look at the big sky)
(Get out of the waves, get out of the water)
And If I only could, I'd make a deal with God
Hello Earth (SOS distress signal)
In Kate Bush Words
“The Ninth Wave was a film, that's how I thought of it. It's the idea of this person being in the water, how they've got there, we don't know. But the idea is that they've been on a ship and they've been washed over the side so they're alone in this water. And they're absolutely terrified, and they're completely alone at the mercy of their imagination, which again I personally find such a terrifying thing, the power of ones own imagination being let loose on something like that. And the idea that they've got it in their head that they mustn't fall asleep, because if you fall asleep when you're in the water, I've heard that you roll over and so you drown, so they're trying to keep themselves awake. (Richard Skinner, 'Classic Albums interview of Kate Bush: Hounds Of Love'. BBC Radio 1, 26th January 1992)”.
So I hope you found this exercise and exploration interesting. It was done out of respect to an artist I truly admire because I think the meaning runs "deeper and deeper" as it is sung
I've added captions also to the video so you can read the words along
𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐊 𝐘𝐎𝐔
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Until next, thanks for your support and I will upload all significant replies (proof of reading/watching)
Ps. You know I write my own original songs but from time to time I like to make covers or tributes of songs that mean something to me. I think
singer-songwriter & illustrator
http://yidneth.com