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DOMINOES (#2 of 10)
To my ear, Barrett is more distant than Madcap. It contains some of Syd’s very best work, but there is a sense that he is somehow less engaged in these songs. The abstract poetic content so beautifully realized on Madcap, seems to be taking on a different life on Barrett. When one looks across the recording dates for Barrett, it is striking how much work Syd produced in a scant few days. It appears that the released versions of “Wined & Dined,” “Dominoes” and “Effervescing Elephant” were all done on July 14, 1970. Just three days later, Syd would spend his last productive day (if not his last day) at Abbey Road, finishing “Love Songs” and “It is Obvious.”
Barrett embodies incredible stylistic variety, perhaps through the influence of producer David Gilmour. “Baby Lemonade” and “Gigolo Aunt” sound as if they were intended to be the album’s potential singles. “Rats” is a raving, abstract work, full of wonderfully evocative melodic explorations and built upon seemingly improvised lyrics. Robyn Hitchcock would mine ideas from “Rats” for years. “Maisie” at first seems very dark and odd, but then Syd chuckles at 1:48, as if amused by the silliness of his own lyric. “Wolfpack” glistens with psychedelic imagery and “Elephant” takes us back to his youth. Overall, it sounds to me as if Syd is turning a corner in his music, his life and perhaps in his mind. Whatever change was occurring; it wasn’t conducive to recording more music. Barrett became Syd’s last album. For me, “Dominoes” captures the deep essence of this period of change.
Like a cosmic tractor-beam reaching into this dimension from hyperspace, “Dominoes” pulls the careful listener into its orbit for exactly 4 minutes and 8 seconds. There is no escape. Some of the other tracks on Barrett sound over-polished to my ear, but this production is just right. Syd’s rhythm guitar, vocal delivery and famous backward solo work perfectly. David Gilmour provides the simple drumming and Rick Wright sweeps over the background, tastefully adding atmosphere, without getting in the way.
The melody is strong and the lyrics are beautifully sung. Syd enunciates crisply, but the first lines feel tentative. He begins a half beat behind and there is an almost palpable despondency in his voice as “the day goes by…” trails off. It makes me feel like “You and I” are Syd and Roger, sitting alone, pondering, dreaming, “thinking of nothing” as Jenny Fabian quoted him, helplessly watching the dominoes fall.
The lyric slowly transmutes into an abstract, emotional dialogue. His words fall into the melody with logic based on sound and syllable rather than primary meaning, but somehow meaning unfolds and emerges and ripples across the mind in slow emotional waves, washing beyond the horizon and toward a far distant shore…
It’s an idea, someday
in my tears, my dreams
don’t you want to see her proof?
Life that comes of no harm
you and I, you and I and dominoes, the day goes by...
Someday has become only an idea, seen now through his tears and his dreams. “Don’t you want to see her proof?” A question of deeply sexual undercurrents, he wonders why he doesn’t want to see it. Perhaps he’s seen enough of those girls, those rock star girls… Here in the depths of ideas, life comes of no harm and the day goes by…
You and I in place
wasting time on dominoes
a day so dark, so warm
life that comes of no harm
you and I and dominoes, time goes by...
He is now in place, this is the position, the location, assigned seats are taken. He uses “time” twice in this verse and nowhere else in the song. Time is wasted watching dominoes fall. Now the day itself takes on a sexual tone, “so dark, so warm.” In the depths of this place, life comes of no harm… The melodic phrasing of “no harm” is so original and emotionally effective. Only Syd could cast two vowels into such an eternal love affair. The resignation in his voice as “time goes by…” is aching in its finality.
Fireworks and heat, someday
hold a shell, a stick or play
overheard a lark today
losing when my mind’s astray
don’t you want to know with your pretty hair
stretch out your hand, glad feel,
in an echo for your way.
Images of the idea that someday has become; images of summer of sea of play. A lark calls. So gently he sings, “losing when my mind’s astray,” as if to a frightened child. Now closer, she has her own agenda. Doesn’t she want to know this place he inhabits? Doesn’t she want to know him? Go ahead, feel me not as I am, but as you wish, it is only an echo of will.
It’s an idea, someday
in my tears, my dreams
don’t you want to see her proof?
Life that comes of no harm
you and I, you and I and dominoes, the day goes by...
Repeating his opening verse, the lines are sung stronger. There is acceptance, resolve and a haunting finality as the last word falls away.
According to Beatles Engineer Geoff Emerick, George Harrison and John Lennon spent hours working up the backward guitar solos for the song “Rain.” David Gilmour says that Syd did the backward solo on “Dominoes” in one take. Mind-boggling indeed. Nowhere does Syd’s solo sound wrong. A sonic spider weaving its way through the song, appearing and disappearing like a playful apparition. When I think about this, I cannot believe it. For mortals, recording a backward solo is more a process of trial and error than anything else. The probability of it accidentally working out perfectly is practically zero. One would have to be able to listen to the backward song, but actually hear it forward, while placing notes exactly where they belong. This solo may the most perfect window into the invisible depths of Syd’s genius.
If you see this Kyle...you're absolutely amazing!
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