Genesis
After the release of Pirates in July 1981, Jones spent 1982 on the road on tour before kicking her addiction to heroin and cocaine. A 10-inch EP, Girl At Her Volcano, had been released in 1983 and Jones took up residence in Paris in April 1983 for four months. Jones said: "I got an apartment for $800 on the Boulevard des Invalides, where they have all the political demonstrations. I wasn't in such great shape and, appropriately, I lived with the invalids." It was also in Paris that Jones kicked her alcohol habit. She told Timothy White in Musician in 1984: "I started drinking...more heavily than I had ever drunk in my life. I drank for about six weeks. When I started waking up and drinking in the day, I figured-umm, bad news. I don't know how I quit drinking; I finally just drank too much one night an said "That's enough of this, it's awful." I think I went to Paris to put it together; I had to be in an absolutely foreign environment, to take stock."
Jones had been working on fragments of songs, such as "Juke Box Fury," "Gravity," and the initially Shirelles-inspired "Runaround," since 1981, before finding more inspiration in Paris. The first full song written was "Deep Space," precipitating a spurt of creativity from October 1983. Recording work for the album began on January 18, 1984 and was completed on June 1 before a September release date.
The opening instrumental "Prelude to Gravity," written in France and London, was originally titled "Things Made of Glass" and was written by Jones for inclusion in a planned children's fantasy she wrote about "two little girls who keep their most prized possessions, thoughts and dreams in these special jars."
The album ends with a musical suite entitled "Rorschachs," with "Theme for the Pope" co-written by long-time collaborator and former romantic partner Sal Bernardi.
Read more about this topic: The Magazine (album)
Famous quotes containing the word genesis:
“Nature centres into balls,
And her proud ephemerals,
Fast to surface and outside,
Scan the profile of the sphere;
Knew they what that signified,
A new genesis were here.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.”
—Bible: Hebrew Genesis 1:29.
But in a later context, God told the disgraced Adam, “and thou shalt eat the herb of the field” (Genesis 3:18)
“Power is, in nature, the essential measure of right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms which cannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a planet, its poise and orbit, the bended tree recovering itself from the strong wind, the vital resources of every animal and vegetable, are demonstrations of the self-sufficing and therefore self-relying soul.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)