Wednesday 18 July 2007

If My Heart Were A Ball It Would Roll Uphill

Lyrics

The point of the title being that the heart defies the laws of physics. So, you know, if we're being technically correct (the best kind of correct) it should be something like "If My Heart Were A Ball (Assumed Spherical) It Would, From Rest, Roll Uphill Without Required Force Applied Towards Slope". And, I mean, it's not like the song doesn't already have the most unweildy title of any in the band's catalogue, so really, that lack of attention to detail is just sloppy.

'Love can do the impossible' is the point. Like, say, a band of unfashionable forty-something prog-rockers getting an album's writing, recording, production and release funded entirely by fans' pre-orders through the internet. And this was in 2001, well before the age of Myspace. Or, y'know, the fans of an unexpectedly and unjustly cancelled TV show rallying against the decision strongly enough to get a wrapup miniseries filmed, and through their continued love, keeping it in the public conciousness enough to get further additions to the series made years later. Or, y'know, the kind of love that has nothing to do with fandom, but... that's not really what this song's about. No reason it couldn't be, no reason it shouldn't be, but it isn't.

"If My Heart Were A Ball It Would Roll Uphill" is the final track on Anaraknophobia and it is a decidedly climactic affair. It rocks like a mother for a good long while, and Hogarth's vocals become increasingly frenzied, culminating in a loss of the ability to form sentences.

hard ball dream love now roll
fall clown stain truth space time
race give black white all one
church state god fast as I could cry
laugh hide feel no clouds will
to win sweet seed you me
hard ball dream love now roll
fall clown stain truth space time
never do that, never do that
will to win, will to win, never do that
give black white all one wild
church state now roll
fall clown stain truth space time
race fruit
GIVE
never do that
If my heart were a ball it would roll uphill
All one insane wild sweet heart
Wild rose


I really, really love the stream of conciousness chanting. It's chock full of little callbacks to the rest of the album, and further, and it's all layered over the top of itself so you have many voices all chanting at you from all different directions. That is always a good idea. Trust me.

Video: If My Heart Were A Ball It Would Roll Uphill (Live in Amsterdam, 2001, again)
Did you ever fall in love?

2 comments:

Rafael Castro said...

I think that your interpretation of the title of this song song is not correct. The frase "If My Heart Were a Ball, It Would Roll Uphill" means that his in love, well, thats my interpretation, no the correct one, only mine. Your blog is grate, evry song of marillion in one place is GREAT!!!

I'll trade them this morning for my sweet Ocean Cloud

Anonymous said...

The only interpretation to this song would be: my heart is something that behavesways in a strange, unexpected way. Counter-intuitive. That's all.