(“And as he drove on, the rainclouds dragged down the sky after him, for, though he did not know it, Rob McKeena was a Rain God. All he knew was that his working days were miserable and he had a succession of lousy holidays. All the clouds knew was that they loved him and wanted to be near him, to cherish him, and to water him.”
- Douglas Adams, So Long And Thanks For All The Fish
Here’s to the Rain Gods.)
Today’s Track: “Kingdom of Rain” – The The. Matt Johnson saw the future. The opening track of 1989’s Mind Bomb predicted an inevitable war, a global conflict between rising Islam and a mobilizing Christianity that has “forgotten the message and worships the creeds.” Few ears were willing to hear. We were all too busy “Hangin’ Tough” with the New Kids and finding ourselves “Lost” in Debbie Gibson’s eyes.
“Kingdom of Rain” is just as scathing, though on a far more personal level. While most duets accentuate the positives of human relationship, this collaboration with the then-barely-known Sinead O’Connor is confessional, brutal and just this side of brilliant. The presence of former Smith’s guitarist Johnny Marr doesn’t hurt either.
“Kingdom of Rain” appears on the 1989 RCA album, Mind Bomb
(And with any luck, the site will stay up long enough for at least one or two people to actually hear this. Didn’t we just switch hosts a month or two ago to get away from these damnable downtimes?)
