L’Amour Looks Something Like You

[Admin]

You came out of the night
Wearing a mask in white colour
My eyes were shining
On the wine, and your aura
All in order, we move into the boudoir
But too soon the morning has resumed

I'm hanging on the Old Goose Moon
You look like an angel
Sleeping it off at a station
Were you only passing through?

I'm dying for you just to touch me
And feel all the energy rushing right up-a-me
L'amour looks something like you

The thought of you sends me shivery
I'm dressed in lace, sailing down a black reverie
My heart is thrown
To the pebbles and the boatmen
All the time I find I'm living in that evening
With that feeling of sticky love inside

I'm hanging on the Old Goose Moon
You look like an angel
Sleeping it off at a station
Were you only passing through?

I'm dying for you just to touch me
And feel all the energy rushing right up-a-me
L'amour looks something like you
L'amour looks something like you
L'amour looks something like you

[Admin]

As difficult as we all know it is to pick a fave Kate song, this has always been 'amongst' my favourites. However, I've never really 'got it' as I could say for a lot of her songs. I think also the strange terms knock me off track too...

"I'm hanging on the old goose moon"

...etc.

[Adey]

I agree with you Lori. This is such an enchanting little song. For once I don't even feel the need to understand all of the lyrical images here. Some of them will no doubt be entirely personal images that only she can explain.

The expression "the old goose moon" is one I have heard before, but I can't remember in which context. I once the phrase into a couple of internet search engines to see what would turn up, but nothing did.

[Adey]

Lori said:

As difficult as we all know it is to pick a fave Kate song, this has always been 'amongst' my favourites. However, I've never really 'got it' as I could say for a lot of her songs. I think also the strange terms knock me off track too...

"I'm hanging on the old goose moon"

...etc.

After a bit more digging, I came up with this.

Kate is probably referring to the nursery rhyme Mother Goose - here is the last verse:

" Jack's Mother came in,
And caught the goose soon,
And mounting its back
Flew up to the moon. "

[Admin]

erm ok... I'm still lost though. What would that mean in relation to the song?

[Adey]

LOL. No it doesn't help very much does it? This chorus contains 2 references/mental images that probably only Kate can properly explain.

The moon is sometimes associated with songs though, there is an old USA country tune called " Hanging a tune off the velvet moon " . Elton John used it as a reference too, in one of his songs - " You can shoot down the moon, somethings never change, you can build a bridge between us, but the empty space remains.. " (though in that case, the purpose of the reference is to suggest the death of ambition and aspiration). Shooting for the moon, is an expression that suggests ambition and confidence in something difficult being achieved.

As for Kate's use of the moon symbol, well who knows. What do you want it to mean? I always understood it as a way of suggesting that she was waiting for something, or to be informed, as in " hanging on your every word " I'm hanging on the old goose moon waiting for something heavenly (her lover?)

There's also this reference to the " look like an angel, sleeping it off at the station " which in the context of the song, I took to mean someone heavenly but still all too human, a description of the character's lover. It reinforces the moon in the sky idea - the moon also being heavenly.

None of this probably helps, but its the closest I can get to second guessing Kate. If she ever comes this way, perhaps we could ask her. " Kate, if you're reading this... "

[Sven Golly]

I like your comments here Adey. Also, Lori, it's really great having the lyrics to refer too. Maybe after your 'tour of duty' you'll post the rest.

[Adey]

SvenGolly said:

I like your comments here Adey. Also, Lori, it's really great having the lyrics to refer too. Maybe after your 'tour of duty' you'll post the rest.

Thanks Sven, glad it made sense of sorts, I was starting to confuse myself - let alone Lori

[Cheesy]

The Goose Moon ("Niskepesim") is a Native American name for the moon of April. We can see from her other songs that Kate does not constrain the symbols in her lyrics to one particular ideology: on this one album there are conspicuous references to Greek mythology, Buddhism and Gurdjieff. Geese feature in more than one moon name among the native tribes of America. I have more confidence in the notion that this is a reference to a belief system unfamiliar to most of us than in the notion that it is a reference to a nursey rhyme. Of course, I may have grasped the wrong belief system myself but given Kate's fascination with mysticism and the moon in particular (at the time the song was written at least), I think this line of thought will be more fruitful than trying to figure out how a Mother Goose reference shapes the situation being portrayed.

It seems to me that the song is about hanging on to the memory of an ended relationship, or one that is unstable, and dwelling on the evening it was consummated, or perhaps the last night they were in union. Whatever, one night that holds greater significance than the rest, with sex a key factor in making it such.

The first verse sets the scene.

I interpret the first stanza of the chorus thus:
Through the eyes of love, she sees her partner as an angel. An objective eye, though, sees that after a night when there was much exertion and little sleep (combined with plenty of alcohol, as hinted at the start of the song), he is as dishevelled as one who didn't quite make it home from a night on the town and spent the night asleep on a bench at the station. He is both and so both similes are combined into one. It ends with the first clue of uncertainty in the relationship.

The second stanza of the chorus is straightforward.

The second verse expands on the theme of uncertainty with its black reverie and, continuing with the sailing metaphor, being cast aside, dashed on the pebbles (because that's more lyrical than boulders, rocks or stones) where the boatmen skate, as in water boatmen, the water-dwelling insects. Pebbles being at the water's edge, where water boatmen are most commonly found. This verse ends with a clear sexual reference.

And there my interpretation stands. Like previous posters, I find the "Old Goose Moon" the most difficult symbol to get a credible lead on. It could be a literary reference, which I've not been able to follow up, though I still don't include the nursery rhyme theory in that.

[Adey]

Hi Cheesy & welcome to the Forum. This is a nice piece of work indeed, as is the other analysis you posted of TMWTCIHE.

Your suggestion on a possible reason for using the "Goose Moon" motif is one I'd never considered. I agree entirely with the rest of your precis and look forward to reading any others you may care to contribute.

I'm sure we all agree that whatever the central image actually means, L'Amour is a very fine song especially given the age of the composer at the time of it's writing, and that it contains some memorable imagery.

Enjoy your time here.

[Cheesy]

Thanks, Adey. This is indeed a fine song and whilst I have a hunger to get to the bottom of the moon, I'd leave my analysis there. I can empathise with the characters in Kate's songs, and for those that also resonate with my own experience, it's comforting, sometimes cathartic, to hear of someone else's experience. This is not news to most of us here, I expect. Personally, although I can get some solace from songs in this way, I think I prefer a little distance from the artist, in that I don't think it would benefit me to know that they are writing from first-hand experience. In other words, I wouldn't want to find out who Kate was writing about in this song, it is enough for me that she can express the feelings.

[Adey]

Cheesy said:

I think I prefer a little distance from the artist, in that I don't think it would benefit me to know that they are writing from first-hand experience. In other words, I wouldn't want to find out who Kate was writing about in this song, it is enough for me that she can express the feelings.

For what it's worth, I think that's to be applauded. Reasonable curiousity over obsession has to be the way to go. Perhaps Kate may now be more accessible and maybe more productive, had she not been the subject of overly demanding fanatics in the past.

Just a thought..

[tannis]

L'Amour Looks Something Like You...

I'm hanging on the Old Goose Moon.
You look like an angel,
Sleeping it off by the station.
Were you only passing through?

The "Kate" Christmas TV special aired December 28, 1979. Kate's only guest (aside from the KT Bush Band and her usual dance partners) is Peter Gabriel. The show features an a cappella introduction for Peter "the Angel" Gabriel.

Through velvet storms
And the rains that fell
Here comes the man
With his tale to tell
And some have named him
Peter, The Angel Gabriel...

This is sung by Kate, Paddy and one of Kate's female vocal supporters from the 'Tour of Life'. The brief introduction segues directly into Peter Gabriel's performance of his song 'Here Comes the Flood', which he sings at an electric piano. The show also features Kate and Peter covering "Another Day".

Kate Bush ~ Christmas 4 (12.28.79) ~ Peter Gabriel
www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6PiSdzp7S4

Kate Bush & Peter Gabriel "Another Day"
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hcxc7ah7Q8M

So, could the "angel, Sleeping it off by the station" ("L'Amour Looks Something Like You") refer to "Peter, The Angel Gabriel"? After all, KaTe does make exceedingly good puns! Also, the Genesis Shepperton Concert Movie sees Gabriel wearing batwings and "a mask in white colour", and maybe the show inspired 'The Tour Of Life'. Maybe Kate was in the audience, eyes shining on the wine and the aura...

You came out of the night,
Wearing a mask in white colour...

GENESIS CONCERT MOVIE

In 1973, the band Genesis was filmed live with an audience, filmed at Shepperton Studios, Borehamwood, England, on 30-31 October 1973. This is how 'Gabriel-led Genesis' looked like in those old days of masks and costumes. Visually, it focuses on Gabriel and his acting. Only in 2007 were the original reels discovered, and purchased, though the band themselves do not have copies of the actual master film, but of a different transfer.
Songs: "Watcher Of The Skies", "Dancing With The Moonlit Knight", "I Know What I Like", "The Musical Box", "Supper's Ready".

Watcher of The Skies - Genesis - Live Shepperton 1973
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBwVo27KJ1I

Genesis - Dancing/Moonlit Knight, Six Hours Live
www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uAXTwCXwks

genesis I KNOW WHAT I LIKE live 1974
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HU-Xv7j9S70

genesis THE MUSICAL BOX live a shepperton 1974
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Va8xF6UtnOE

Genesis - Supper's Ready - Shepperton - Six Hours Live
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PN1IWmQ6A_I
Coming closer with our eyes, a distance falls around our bodies.
Out in the garden, the moon seems very bright.
Six saintly shrouded men move across the lawn slowly,
the seventh walks in front with a cross held high in hand.
...And its hey babe your supper's waiting for you.
Hey my baby don't you know our love is true.

Genesis live in concert 1973 in shepperton (complete concert) (16mm)
video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7866620581237304585

The Shepperton concert was originally an official film, produced by Tony Stratton-Smith, who was until mid 1973, Genesis`manager. The film starts with "Watcher of the Skies", in semi- darkness, with Peter Gabriel wearing a costume which had "batwings". In "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" he appears in the beginning of the song wearing a "Brittania" costume. In "I Know What I Like" Gabriel looks a bit like a "hippie" wearing a hat. "The Musical Box" starts with Gabriel telling the story related to the song, and in the mid of the song, Hackett and Banks trade very good solos. In the end of the song Gabriel wears his "Old Man Mask". "Supper's Ready" is very interesting and very well played. Gabriel changes costumes several times, and the song ends with energy while he wears a silver coloured costume with the lights reflected very well in his costume while he has a fluorescent cross in his hands. A great finale to this song.
www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=11485

In 1979, Gabriel recruited Kate to provide backing vocals for the songs 'No Self Control' and 'Games Without Frontiers' on his third solo album, called Peter Gabriel. (The album bears the same title as its two predecessors due to Gabriel's wish that his albums be regarded as if they were successive issues of a magazine, although this idea was subsequently abandoned. To distinguish it from its predecessors, this album is sometimes called "Melt" or "Melting Face" in reference to the striking cover art.) Kate's exposure to Gabriel's method of composing with a Fairlight CMI and a drum machine profoundly influenced her own approach to songwriting.
At around the same time, Gabriel appeared with Kate and Steve Harley at a memorial concert for Bill Duffield at the Hammersmith Odeon on 12 May 1979. At the end of the year, Gabriel made a guest appearance on the television special Kate, singing his own Here Comes The Flood and joining Kate for a cover version of the Roy Harper song 'Another Day'.
Kate has joined Gabriel onstage at least once since then [28 June 1986: Kate made a guest appearance to duet with Peter Gabriel on "Don't Give Up" at Earl's Court, London as part of his "So" tour]. The two returned to the studio to record a new version of Another Day and a new song called 'Ibiza' [November 1980], but neither song has been released. The only other recorded collaboration between the two which has been heard by the public is the song 'Don't Give Up' on Gabriel's album So.
The Gaffaweb Dictionary
gaffa.org/diction/index.html

WUTHERING HEIGHTS, THE OLD GOOSE MOON, AND OLD MOTHER GOOSE

I'm hanging on the Old Goose Moon.
You look like an angel,
Sleeping it off by the station.
Were you only passing through?

So let's skip the news boy - I'll go and make that tea
Blood on the rooftops - too much for me
When old Mother Goose stops they're out for 23
Then the rain at Lords stopped play
Seems Helen of Troy has found a new face again...
~ "Blood on the Rooftops" from Wind & Wuthering (Genesis, 1976)

Wind & Wuthering is a studio album by British progressive rock band Genesis, originally released in the UK on 27 December 1976 and in the US and other territories on 7 January 1977. The album's title derives from two pieces: The "Wind" comes from "The House of the Four Winds", the title given by Hackett to a piece that later became the quiet bridge for "Eleventh Earl of Mar"; the "Wuthering" alludes to the novel Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. The titles of tracks 7 and 8 ["Unquiet Slumbers for the Sleepers..." and "...In That Quiet Earth"] are derived from the novel's closing sentence: "I lingered round them, under that benign sky: watched the moths fluttering among the heath and harebells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how any one could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth."

genesis - Blood On The Rooftops - Wind And Wuthering
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UR4C6Zzfj2Y

genesis - Unquiet Slumbers For The Slee - Wind And Wuthering
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4KDnJGQtDk&feature=channel_page

genesis - In That Quiet Earth - Wind And Wuthering
www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZEdFQjivZk&feature=channel_page

So maybe KT's a Genesis fan...

[Barry SR Gowing]

Jan 25, 2009 2:00:46 GMT tannis said:

...the Genesis Shepperton Concert Movie sees Gabriel wearing batwings and "a mask in white colour", and maybe the show inspired 'The Tour Of Life'. Maybe Kate was in the audience, eyes shining on the wine and the aura...

You came out of the night,
Wearing a mask in white colour......

So maybe KT's a Genesis fan...

It's all very interesting, isn't it? It's surprising that KT and PG haven't worked together more, really.

Given that KT must have been quite young when she wrote the song I don't necessarily think it refers to an actual liaison - it's more like a young girl's reverie about what it would be like to be with someone similar to her ideal man. It is full of the sensual/sexual imagery seen on many of her early songs, but it occurs to me that this early fascination was probably indicative of a lack of actual experience. The feeling is one of expectation and longing.

Once KT became a grown woman her artistic focus moved elsewhere - and the less frequent references to sensuality in her later work, eg Hounds of Love (the song), The Sensual World (the song), Moments of Pleasure, have a different feel to her earlier songs. I would suggest that sensuality/sexuality has become part of KT, rather than something that can only be dreamed of and desired.

As for the "Goose Moon", I think we make a direct link. As Cheesy noted earlier, for Native Americans April is the month of the Goose Moon. In effect, this is the time just before the onset of spring when the geese return; it is the return of these migratory birds that indicates that spring is indeed imminent. See also www.giftoflanguageandculture.ca/flash_activities_page/fla/months-holidays-2009-menu.swf

Spring is a time of renewed fertility and growth. Also, as Tennyson noted, "In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love". So, KT is hanging on a symbol of fertility and love, which is quite appropriate given the song's focus.

--Paul--

[tannis]

KaTe demo'd L'Amour Looks Something Like You in The Kick Inside Recording Sessions (July, August 1977).

Jan 25, 2009 10:09:44 GMT Barry SR Gowing said:

As for the "Goose Moon", I think we make a direct link. As Cheesy noted earlier, for Native Americans April is the month of the Goose Moon. In effect, this is the time just before the onset of spring when the geese return; it is the return of these migratory birds that indicates that spring is indeed imminent. See also www.giftoflanguageandculture.ca/flash_activities_page/fla/months-holidays-2009-menu.swf

Spring is a time of renewed fertility and growth. Also, as Tennyson noted, "In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love". So, KT is hanging on a symbol of fertility and love, which is quite appropriate given the song's focus.

--Paul--

Yes, Paul, LLSLY seems to be about the pleasures and pains of a silly adolescent crush. She's hanging onto love's first balloon, hoping to win the one she admires.

I'm hanging on the Old Goose Moon.
You look like an angel,
Sleeping it off at a station.
Were you only passing through?

It doesn't take much imagination to interpret the classic train-rushing-through-tunnel dream: It's about intercourse, folks. The train is the penis; the tunnel is the vagina.
Exploring Your Erotic Dreams
www.thirdage.com/sex/exploring-your-erotic-dreams

Jan 25, 2009 10:09:44 GMT Barry SR Gowing said:

Given that KT must have been quite young when she wrote the song I don't necessarily think it refers to an actual liaison - it's more like a young girl's reverie about what it would be like to be with someone similar to her ideal man. It is full of the sensual/sexual imagery seen on many of her early songs, but it occurs to me that this early fascination was probably indicative of a lack of actual experience. The feeling is one of expectation and longing.

I'm dying for you just to touch me,
And feel all the energy rushing right up-a-me.
L'amour looks something like you.

Yes, maybe they hit first base, but "too soon the morning has resumed". He falls asleep - too drunk, too tired, too good - and she's left watching him doze, "sleeping it off" with the face of an angel. As she watches him sleep, she feels lost, forlorn, frustrated, but aroused by "that feeling of sticky love inside". She longs for him to touch, to love her, to tune her in on his saxophone, to set her spirit dancing (as in Moving's "Touch me, hold me. How my open arms ache! Try to fall for me", Feel It's "desperate for more", etc.). But nothing happens. It was just lust, no glorious union. And she falls into a black reverie, suggesting morbid embarrassment.

Nov 3, 2004 1:01:58 GMT Cheesy said:

Through the eyes of love, she sees her partner as an angel. An objective eye, though, sees that after a night when there was much exertion and little sleep (combined with plenty of alcohol, as hinted at the start of the song), he is as dishevelled as one who didn't quite make it home from a night on the town and spent the night asleep on a bench at the station. He is both and so both similes are combined into one. It ends with the first clue of uncertainty in the relationship... The second verse expands on the theme of uncertainty with its black reverie and, continuing with the sailing metaphor, being cast aside, dashed on the pebbles...

The thought of you sends me shivery
I'm dressed in lace, sailing down a black reverie
My heart is thrown
To the pebbles and the boatmen
All the time I find I'm living in that evening
With that feeling of sticky love inside

Or maybe her "all in order" boudoir/parlour games and seductive efforts proved regrettable. Her heart and virginity are lost to the rocks; her lily crushed; and she can't clean the stains from her mind. The thought of him now turns her cold. (Though, as in a dream, the "thought of him" could be unconscious content displaced from another onto the current beau.) He was no knight in shining armour, no Sir Lancelot! More like a rough diamond sleeping rough! Nevertheless, her mirror has broken, and like the Lady of Shalott, she sees herself sailing down the river to meet her doom.



And down the river's dim expanse--
Like some bold seër in a trance,
Seeing all his own mischance--
With a glassy countenance
Did she look to Camelot.
And at the closing of the day
She loosed the chain, and down she lay;
The broad stream bore her far away,
The Lady of Shalott.

Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right--
The leaves upon her falling light--
Thro' the noises of the night
She floated down to Camelot:
And as the boat-head wound along
The willowy hills and fields among,
They heard her singing her last song,
The Lady of Shalott.

Here is our "Lady", in her "borrowed-for-the-occasion" boat (complete with her wonderful tapestry getting wet as it drapes over the edge of the bark that she's embarking on her fateful journey in, and with her "name" emblazoned on the prow of said bark) just about to "loose the chain".
"The Lady of Shalott" by J.W. Waterhouse (1888)
uregina.ca/~starkc/psyc_330_2000_shalott.html

see more:
KATE BUSH and THE LADY OF SHALOTT
katebush.proboards6.com/index.cgi?board=kickinside&action=display&thread=1678&page=2

who knows if the moon's

who knows if the moon's
a balloon, coming out of a keen city
in the sky--filled with pretty people?
(and if you and i should

get into it, if they
should take me and take you into their balloon,
why then
we'd go up higher with all the pretty people

than houses and steeples and clouds:
go sailing
away and away sailing into a keen
city which nobody's ever visited, where

always
it's
Spring) and everyone's
in love and flowers pick themselves

e. e. cummings (1894 - 1962)