Just in time for National Book Lovers Day, here are six songs based on books that you might not know about. Everyone knows "Ramble On," "Wuthering Heights," and "Hallelujah," but what about those you might have missed? Songs about Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire, or George Orwell's 1984, or the Irish novel The Third Policeman. There are those songs, and then there are these.
"Ramble On" is more well-known in Led Zeppelin's discography for being about The Lord of the Rings, with the lines, T' was in the darkest depths of Mordor / I met a girl so fair / But Gollum and the evil one / Crept up and slipped away with her. The "girl" in the song is, of course, the One Ring, with the song rambling through a journey that may be Frodo's, or may be Bilbo's. However, as 60s and 70s rock bands were wont to do, Led Zeppelin wrote more songs about The Lord of the Rings.
"The Battle of Evermore" chronicles what could be the end of The Return of the King, where Sauron's forces head to the Shire to wreak havoc. The lyrics describe a beautiful valley rich with earth and apples. However, the people of that valley must take up arms against the Ringwraiths and the might of the Dark Lord as they descend upon their land.
Still, there are hints that "The Battle of Evermore" could also be about the Battle of the Hornburg. The lines, Tired eyes on the sunrise / Waiting for the Eastern glow, could reference Gandalf leaving Helm's Deep to find Erkenbrand, lord of the West-mark, who assists Théoden's army in defeating Isengard's forces. Gandalf and Erkenbrand travel to Helm's Deep from the East. Translated in the movies, Gandalf says, "Look to my coming at first light on the fifth day. At dawn, look to the East."
Released in 2005 from Panic! at the Disco's debut A Fever You Can't Sweat Out, "Time to Dance" references many themes and images from Chuck Palahniuk's book Invisible Monsters. The novel opens at Evie Cottrell's wedding, where Evie has shot Brandy Alexander, who asks the narrator, a disfigured former model, to tell her life story. The song opens with, Well she's not bleeding on the ballroom floor / Just for the attention, in reference to Brandy Alexander's predicament.
Give me envy, give me malice, give me your attention, is in reference to the narrator's story as she describes her life as a model, mirroring what photographers would tell her. While the novel is convoluted and non-linear, "Time to Dance" gives it proper homage through such references as Brandy's favorite shade of eyeshadow, Aubergine Dreams.
There's the line Boys will be boys / Hiding in estrogen and wearing Aubergine Dreams, cleverly depicting Brandy's outward identity as a transgender woman, but her secret, actual identity as the narrator's brother. As it turns out, Brandy is not actually a trans woman, but the narrator's brother looking to destroy his former identity through surgery to look like his sister due to traumatic events.
"The Odyssey" by Symphony X, released in 2002, is just as epic as the source material it's based on. Clocking in at just over 24 minutes, the song takes listeners through the tales of Odysseus following the Trojan War. Odysseus has been a captive of Calypso for seven years, and yearns for home, where his wife Penelope and son Telemachus await him. Once freed, he travels for 10 years to get back home, encountering all sorts of strange things on his way there.
The song details much of what Odysseus encounters while on his journey, including the incident with the cyclops, Polyphemus. Search all the grounds, find food and water / But journey not into the caves of woe ... Mountainous black, engulfed in a shadow / A bone-chilling growl and an eye of hate / A ghastly fate, held prisoner by the eye / Yet he must sleep, as the daylight fades / We focus our senses and sharpen our blade / We take aim, in silence we strike. These verses depict the predicament Odysseus and his men find themselves in when faced with the cyclops, and is just a taste of the clever and in-depth narrative that Symphony X crafted.
Elton John took an interesting turn on his 1982 album Jump Up! with "All Quiet On the Western Front," based on the kind of depressing World War I novel of the same name. The song only has about three verses, but it beautifully paints a picture of the tragic times that Erich Maria Remarque wrote about in his book.
The song opens with, All quiet on the Western front, nobody saw / A youth asleep in the foreign soil, planted by the war / Feel the pulse of human blood pouring forth / See the stems of Europe bend under force. There's a darkness to the first verse that mirrors the novel, depicting the loss of life, the blood, and the waves of attacks by the enemy bending until they break.
The final verse is more hopeful as the war runs its course. It's gone all quiet on the Western front, male angels sigh / Ghosts float in a flooded trench as Germany dies / Fever reaps the flowers of France, fair-haired boys / String the harps to Victory's voice, joyous noise. However, there are still smudges of that darkness lingering at the end, as the casualties climb higher and higher.
"Exit Music (For a Film)" is a pretty straightforward reference to the play Romeo and Juliet. The song is more complex in its melody than in its lyrics, however, it's still a nice littler homage to the bard.
Wake from your sleep / The drying of your tears / Today we escape, we escape, the first verse begins, letting us know this is from Romeo's point of view. He's attempting to wake Juliet from her poisoned-induced coma, as we all know from our no doubt copious readings of this play in high school English class.
Eventually, though, Romeo kills himself to be with Juliet, or so he things. There's such a chill / Such a chill, the song continues, ending in And you can laugh a spineless laugh / We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace / We hope that you choke, that you choke.
Of course, any Kate Bush fan knows her classic song "Wuthering Heights," based on Emily Bronte's book of the same name. However, Bush also penned another song based on a book -- "Flower of the Mountain" based on James Joyce's Ulysses. "Flower of the Mountain" started as the 1989 track "The Sensual World," but Bush did not have permission to include lines from Ulysses, so she reworked the lyrics.
In 2011, the James Joyce estate was willing to allow the use of his texts, so Bush rewrote "The Sensual World" and included lines directly from Molly Bloom's soliloquy from the book. The final verse is Molly recounting the day Leopold proposed to her, with Bush singing the lines, And then I asked him with my eyes to ask again, yes / And then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower / And first I put my arms around him, yes / And drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes / And his heart was going like mad and yes / I said yes I will / Yes.