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À propos de cet album
The City That Left the Earth est un album-concept de rock progressif symphonique en neuf titres, imaginé à travers le langage sonore et visuel de 1972. Mellotron, orgue Hammond, synthétiseur Moog, piano électrique, basse mélodique, guitare électrique claire, batterie acoustique, écho à bande, bruit de surface du vinyle et production analogique chaleureuse façonnent un voyage continu dans une vaste ville qui s’éveille avant l’aube.
L’album alterne passages vocaux nocturnes, changements de mesure, arrangements menés par l’orgue, transitions psychédéliques, sections proches de la musique de chambre, motifs de basse récurrents et développements instrumentaux au long cours. Son identité musicale repose sur un signal récurrent de trois notes et une ligne de basse descendante de quatre notes, qui reviennent tous deux sous des formes modifiées à mesure que le récit avance.
Chaque morceau révèle un nouvel aspect de la transformation de la ville. Signals Before Dawn introduit la transmission. Midnight City explore les rues au-dessus des machines enfouies, tandis que The Glass Parliament suit l’effondrement de son gouvernement transparent. Beneath the Electric Sea transforme le signal en une pièce instrumentale fondée sur un thème et ses variations, et The Chain introduit le lien musical qui unit la ville, ses habitants et l’album lui-même.
Le mouvement final traverse des pièces impossibles, une rébellion céleste et une dérive cosmique hypnotique, avant que le morceau-titre ne réunisse les principaux motifs de l’album dans un départ symphonique. Il s’adresse aux auditeurs attirés par le rock progressif vintage, les albums-concepts immersifs, les textures de claviers analogiques et les disques qui récompensent une écoute ininterrompue.
Année d’archive : 1972 · Publié :
Liste des titres
- 1Signals Before Dawn5:12
- 2Midnight City5:09
- 3The Glass Parliament5:07
- 4Beneath the Electric Sea Instrumental4:51
- 5The Chain4:32
- 6A Thousand Rooms Without Doors5:46
- 7The Astronomer's Revolt4:43
- 8Space Song5:04
- 9The City That Left the Earth5:27
Notes d’archive
Le premier signe ne fut pas visible. Il fut entendu.
Peu avant l’aube, trois notes commencèrent à circuler dans le réseau électrique de la ville. Le signal passa sous les rues, traversa des pièces abandonnées et des salles parlementaires, puis pénétra dans des machines restées inertes sous les fondations pendant des générations.
Lorsque les moteurs cachés se mirent à tourner, les horloges perdirent leurs aiguilles et les tours se déplacèrent contre le ciel. Les dirigeants du Parlement de verre tentèrent de contenir le bouleversement, mais l’architecture de la ville avait déjà commencé à répondre à la transmission.
Un astronome, dans la tour orientale, détourna ses instruments du ciel pour les diriger vers les rues en contrebas. Son dernier signal acheva la séquence. Les ponts se séparèrent de leurs rives, les avenues s’élevèrent dans les airs et la ville quitta la Terre, toutes lumières encore allumées.
La transmission de trois notes se fait entendre tout au long de l’album. La ligne de basse descendante introduite dans The Chain revient pendant l’ascension finale et ne trouve sa résolution qu’après que la ville a dépassé le monde qui l’a construite.
Paroles originales en anglais & sous-titres
Ah Ah Ah Before the dawn Three notes are falling Before the dawn The city is calling Under the street Under the stone Something is turning Something unknown Can you hear it? Can you hear it? Before the dawn The wires awaken Before the dawn The silence is breaking
Twelve bells fall through empty streets Silver rain moves through the square Windows burn above the roofs But no one seems to live in there Midnight city Turning without sleep Midnight city What do your foundations keep? Underneath the avenue Hidden engines breathe below Every tower leans to hear Words the living never know Ah Ah Ah Midnight city Open up your eyes Midnight city Something underneath you rises Leave the sleeping world below Go where no living map can go Midnight city Carry us into the night
The glass parliament gathers at two With silver tongues and transparent views They vote on the colour the morning should wear Then close every curtain and leave it nowhere They measure the rain They number the sky They write down the reasons The daylight must die The glass parliament listens in rows To speeches delivered by mechanical crows They draw little borders around every sound Then wonder why silence is filling the town They catalogue thunder They regulate dreams They seal every doorway And widen the seams The ceiling bends The columns breathe A silver crack Runs underneath Who gave the city permission to rise? Who gave the city permission to rise? The tables turn The windows shake The chamber fills With waking light The glass parliament gathers no more Their names lie scattered across the floor The chairs remain seated in perfect rows While something beneath them awakens and grows
Instrumental — sans paroles.
The chain begins beneath the floor A quiet weight behind the door It joins the tower to the street It joins the engine to our feet The chain runs underneath the square Through every wall and every stair It knows the path that no one sees It binds the locks and keeps the keys The chain remembers every name The lost, the silent and the blamed It circles back through steel and stone And makes the borrowed city home I pulled until my hands were red I heard the words the sleepers said You cannot break What has no end You cannot leave What you defend The chain is neither lock nor wall It is the thread between us all The city rises, links remain We leave the Earth but keep the chain
The first room held a map of home But every road was drawn in smoke The rivers climbed the paper walls The compass pointed through the floor A hundred clocks without their hands Were ticking underneath the sand Each second opened like an eye Then closed before it saw me pass The third room floated upside down With chairs suspended from the ground A pale moon trembled in a glass And whispered that the night had passed The walls began to speak my name In voices borrowed from the rain They said the city knew the way But every answer changed its shape Keep walking Keep walking There is no door behind you The final room contained no wall No ceiling, window, floor at all A thousand rooms fell out of sight And left me standing in the night Far below The engines turned Far above The signal burned
Who drew the border around the stars? We did not Who placed the night behind iron bars? We did not The astronomer climbed the eastern tower With broken charts and a stolen hour He turned the lenses away from Mars And aimed them down at the city's heart Who told the heavens where to end? No one knows Who made the planets our enemies? No one knows He cut the wires beneath the dome And sent one signal into the unknown The engines answered under the street The constellations moved beneath his feet I watched the moon Turn inside out I watched the sky Release its doubt No throne above No chain below Only the road The planets know Who gives the city the right to fly? We give it now Who opens the road beyond the sky? We open it now The astronomer raised his empty hand The towers rose at his command
Carry me beyond the turning world Space song Carry me beyond the turning world Space song No north above No south below No road to leave No road to know Carry me beyond the turning world Space song The stars are windows The dark is clear The Earth grows smaller Then disappears Carry me beyond the turning world Space song Carry me beyond the turning world Space song Beyond the world Beyond the world Space song
Before the dawn The signal came Across the roofs Across the rain Beneath the streets The engines heard Three notes became A waking world The bridges loosen from the shore The towers rise without a sound The avenues become the sky The rivers leave their beds below No king commands No clock remains The glass has broken From its frame City of midnight City of light Carry our names Out of the night Leave every border Leave every chain Never return To the Earth again Ah Ah Ah The oceans became a mirror The mountains became a line The world became a distant lantern Turning beneath us After the night A morning came Without a shore Without a name Every window faced the stars Every street became a road The city carried all we were Into the endless afterglow City of midnight City reborn You carried the night And returned it as dawn Beyond every border Beyond every chart The city that left the Earth Still turns in the dark
Explorer cet album
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