The Chemical Wedding

In the Abominable Void of 1998 the spirit of ‘Seventh Son of a Seventh Son’ had lain dormant for a decade, ignoring a certain Accident of course. In 1998 would its perturbed spirit erupt once again and destroy Pompeii? Or perhaps, it rebuilt Jerusalem with an album that truly was the Marriage of Heaven & Hell, taking the bulk and ferocity present in some modern forms of music and using an alchemist’s touch to add a most vital and oft neglected ingredient, melody.

Lo, a shadow of horror is risen, a ‘King in Crimson’ comes offering a proclamation;
“Yes I am heavy, but I do not suck and I needn’t rely on your petty and weak deathly growls”. Amongst the heaviness, he also offered melody, majesty and might in his twin sons of multi-racial origin, Roy and Adrian. In the year of 1998 the guitar solo had been all but abandoned, left for dead…but just as heavy metal mummies struck from the grave so did these two- sworn to avenge and deliver Old Testament heavy metal guitar! Chemically Wed, the title track emerged from a phase induced muddy haze of guitars, adding colour and depth which emphasised the nature of this marriage (one south of Purgatory, the other slightly to the north), from which the vocals broke through the haze like the beams of all those lighthouses.

A gypsy lady gave me my tarot cards in ‘The Tower’ as the guitars droned and spiralled in a manner most pleasing to these ears. The hangman may have indeed been showing his rictus grin, but that did not match my own smile upon hearing the resurrected ‘Powerslave’ styled melodic intricacy in the post-coital glow of the phallus shaped six- stringed instrument’s solo. Lord, they had remembered all those Christmas cards I hath sent to dearest Saint Nicholas requesting;
‘Dearest Saint Nicholas,
Would you please tell Adrian Smith to resurrect the ‘Powerslave’ styled guitar harmony.
Lots of love, your pal Ed.’
‘Killing Floor’ was indeed a much maligned track, are dearest reviewer thought to himself. But indeed their was much for the children to relish in, he thought. The guitar interplay as per usual was fantastic and a interlude keyboard lifted the song above the humdrum to a point at which it could view the cathedral spires and citadels below as nothing but greyish specs.

Dick Brucington had indeed been know to visit his local book van in the past, but never before had his listeners experienced such a unabashed display of wordiness before. The messages of Blake are rooted deeply in his ‘Chemical Wedding’, with even a smattering of Shakespeare wickedly coming it’s way through the lyrics…albeit not upon a Marriage hearse as Blake’s did.

‘Jerusalem’, the highest point of this album, is based on the poem itself which featured the Giant Albion to who is the embodiment of Britain. Aptly enough, the song itself is fiercely English as well. The folk elements that are a predominant feature of the song are so far removed in terms of dignity and grace from the plastic and shallow attempts of so many Scandinavian, musically inadequate “Vikings” (you drive a lorry and have yet to master the high seas yet alone touch another man’s world serpent) and the guitars harmonies as melodious as a choir of angels, once again lifting the song into a whole new realm of brilliance. The God of Hellfire himself, Arthur of Brown, pops in for a poetry reading before going back to feed the pigs on his psychedelic mushroom farm.

Yet some poor, spiritually deprived vagrants may never understand. Dearest Father, they sleep clutching their Vio-lence and Dark Angel. Thrashing in abject misery, while we, the Chemically Wed, crept out of are bedroom windows, into the night time world. We wander with shitty Ipod headphones firmly in our fully lobed ears, remembering, that God is love and he gave us a son by the name of Adrian of Smith.

Have you not heard the splendour and glory of our ‘Chemical Wedding’? Well, you poor hapless child, take you father’s keys to his cabinet and consume all the bottles of amber and crimson liquid you may find… drink child, drink from the crimson cup of wonder! Now, take your reaching stick and knock haphazardly around in mother’s bathroom until you come across some white and surely delicious sweets, eat them all. Lo and behold! The outside city that entombed you has now transformed into England’s pleasant and green land, run infant, run. The gift of second sight is truly upon you! Collect all your shiny pennies and go now to the Dark Satanic Mills of Virgin Megastore, pay the priestess at the till and take your copy of ‘The Chemical Wedding’, before the drugs and alcohol in your system leave you infirm and dilapidated.

Ye Olde Edit