Okay! I'm listening to the old Al Stewart tune

[freethought]

"Time Passages". There's a saxaphone and strings. This is a seriously soft a 'mushy' tune. BUT I'M LOVIN' IT! And I grew up on heavy metal/hair band music. Guess I'm weird.

[Hatalles]

1. I've never listened to a whole lot of Al Stewart

But the one I tend to play ever so often is "Year of the Cat."

[freethought]

2. I have that one too!

But "Time Passages" has a sort of mystical power. It makes you feel all warm and fuzzy. Then you have to listen to it over and over and over.

[onager]

3. Speaking of weird...

"Roads To Moscow!!!"

I'm a history geek. AFAIK, Al Stewart is the only person ever to write a pop song about the Nazi invasion of Russia.

And work the name of the German general Heinz Guderian into it.

[freethought]

4. I'll have to check that one out! n/t

[ThoughtCriminal]

5. Haunting isn't it?

"Two broken Tigers on fire in the night flicker their souls to the wind"

[onager]

6. Yes, incredibly haunting...

Here's all the lyrics...which I hope is not a SPOILER for freethought...:hi:

They crossed over the border the hour before dawn
Moving in lines through the day
Most of our planes were destroyed on the ground where they lay
Waiting for orders we held in the wood, word from the front never came
By evening the sound of the gunfire was miles away

Softly we move through the shadows, slip away through the trees
Crossing their lines in the mists in the fields on our hands and our knees
And all that I ever was able to see
The fire in the air glowing red silhouetting the smoke on the breeze

All summer they drove us back through the Ukraine
Smolensk and Vyasma soon fell
By autumn we stood with our backs to the town of Orel
Closer and closer to Moscow they come - riding the wind like a bell
General Guderian stands at the crest of the hill

Winter brought with her the rains, oceans of mud filled the roads
Gluing the tracks of their tanks to the ground while the sky filled with snow
And all that I ever was able to see
The fire in the air glowing red silhouetting the snow on the breeze

In the footsteps of Napoleon the shadow figures stagger through the winter
Falling back before the gates of Moscow, standing in the wings like an avenger
And far away behind their lines the partisans are stirring in the forest
Coming unexpectedly upon their outposts, growing like a promise

You'll never know, you'll never know which way to turn, which way to look, you'll never see us
As we're stealing through the blackness of the night
You'll never know, you'll never hear us
And the evening sings in a voice of amber, the dawn is surely coming
The morning road leads to Stalingrad, and the sky is softly humming

Two broken Tigers on fire in the night flicker their souls to the wind
We wait in the lines for the final approach to begin
It's been almost four years that I've carried a gun
At home it'll almost be spring
The flames of the Tigers are lighting the road to Berlin

Ah, quickly we move through the ruins that bow to the ground
The old men and children they send out to face us, they can't slow us down
And all that I ever was able to see
The eyes of the city are opening now it's the end of the dream

I'm coming home, I'm coming home now you can taste it in the wind, the war is over
And I listen to the clicking of the train wheels as we roll across the border
And now they ask me of the time that I was caught behind their lines and taken prisoner
"They only held me for a day, a lucky break", I say;
They turn and listen closer

I'll never know, I'll never know why I was taken from the line and all the others
To board a special train and journey deep into the heart of holy Russia

And it's cold and damp in the transit camp, and the air is still and sullen
And the pale sun of October whispers the snow will soon be coming
And I wonder when I'll be home again and the morning answers "Never"
And the evening sighs and the steely Russian skies go on forever

[Melynn]

7. Weird, I just thinking about Al Stewart today.

and now just a few hours later someone starts a thread about him.