Anthems

Uncivilized Pampanggo…" That was how we used to make fun of a song, or a cohort from San Fernando at a beer garden, way back in the ’70s. No offense meant, really, to either the province or its people. Hey, my mom was half-Capampangan.

It was just the way one of us heard the line and took to reeling off the Procol Harum monster hit, A Whiter Shade of Pale, which went on to become one of the most recorded songs in music history.

"Skip the light fandango…" Those were the correct lyrics, of course, followed by "Turned cartwheels ’cross the floor…" etc. – obtuse as these seemed to sing-along’ers expecting lyrics as clear as the text on a Hallmark greeting card.

Well, three decades later, or close to four, since the song broke out in 1967, what happens but that I wake up one bright morning with this anthem humming along in my head. By itself.

I suppose J.S. Bach had something to do with it. How often does Air on G-String suddenly impose itself on one’s ruminations, er, improvisations, while enjoying a hot shower? In any case, I found myself clinging for days to the familiar if rather un-singable strains:

"…I was feeling kinda seasick/ but the crowd called out for more/ The room was humming harder/ as the ceiling flew away/ When we called out for another drink/ the waiter brought a tray/ And so it was that later/ as the miller told his tale/ that her face, at first just ghostly,/ turned a whiter shade of pale…"

For years we sang that last line the way we heard it – "…turned a-awaaay…" And how many other karaoke fanatics have simply drifted into parts of the song whenever the anthem was raised, which has been often through the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s, and now the decade of "the noughts" or zeroes?

But here’s the next stanza from songwriter Keith Reid:

"She said, ‘There is no reason/ and the truth is plain to see.’/ But I wandered through my playing cards/ and would not let her be/ one of sixteen vestal virgins/ who were leaving for the coast/ and although my eyes were open/ they might have just as well been closed." Then the refrain is repeated, till that now-famous phrase that lent itself to a classic title: "…turned a whiter shade of pale."

In Lives of the Great Songs (Pavilion Books), author Tim de Lisle renders a fascinating account of the song’s creation.

"It was among the first batch of songs produced by the songwriting team of composer-singer-pianist Gary Brooker and lyricist Keith Reid…" Reid recounts how he overheard a guy saying to a girl at some gathering, "You’ve gone a whiter shade of pale."

"That phrase stuck in my mind. It was a beautiful thing for someone to say. I wish I’d said it… The title came first. It’s always like that; like a puzzle. After the title you find the rest of the pieces to make a picture."

De Lisle analyzes the song: "The found phrase is felicitous. It has the authority of a line from Shakespeare, and is as catchy as the most persistent jingle – which, inevitably, was to be its fate. The ad, just as inevitably, was for Dulux.

"Brooker’s setting was a motley synthesis, derived from Bach… Reid’s cryptic lyrics inject some of the waywardness of the counter-culture. There’s a tension between the placid majesty of the music and the paranoia and messiness of the subject matter. The disjunction may account for the common perception of A Whiter Shade of Pale as impenetrable and obscure."

De Lisle himself reads the lyrics as an exploration of "…what it means to be wrecked (when a) nervous seducer sustains his courage with alcohol. As he becomes more drunk, his impressions of his unfamiliar partner become confused by stray thoughts, fragments of childhood reading and his own faint-hearted aspirations… As befits a night of excess, there are gaps in the telling. The evasive ‘And so it was that later...’ is given weight by repetition and its positioning just before the hook (‘Her face at first just ghostly / Turned a whiter shade of pale’). The listener is invited to fill the gaps with his or her own (prurient) imagination."

A case is also made for the literary allusions, such as to Chaucer’s "Miller’s Tale" from Canterbury Tales, and Lewis Carroll (the "playing cards" and "sixteen vestal virgins" – 16 being the acceptable age for ogling teeners). Unbeknownst to many, a couple of other verses were dropped before the recording. Used by Procol Harum in some live performances, these include "If music be the food of love/ then laughter is its queen/ and likewise if behind is in front/ then dirt in truth is clean…" The reference to Shakespeare, per De Lisle, is clunky, so that the extra verses had every reason to be dropped.

Anyway, with the song inexplicably making a comeback in my inner-voice playlist, I scoured share-ware programs via the Internet and managed to download 25 versions or covers thus far, ranging from schmaltzy Richard Clayderman’s to the awful, extended techno-disco take by Sarah Brightman. Best are the covers done by Percy Sledge, Annie Lennox, King Curtis on saxophone, the reggae version by Pat Kelly, and the guttural duet by Willie Nelson and Waylon Jenning, where "the miner…" becomes "the mirror told its tale…" Lyricist Reid was to acknowledge it as a good revision, especially since he had never read Chaucer, anyway.

Ah, anthems. What is it in these pop classics that hook up so pit-bullishly into our memory banks? Whiter Shade… has been defined as a "threnody for a generation," meaning a lament, which of course has turned universal.

Only recently, I suggested to a brilliant young guitarist how he could consider including such vintage memorabilia in an upcoming CD. Or better yet, I said, why not produce one entire album and call it "Anthems"? You know, with Whiter Shade…, MacArthur Park, Bohemian Rhapsody, Suite: Judy Blue Eyes…? He looked at me with a twinkle (of trepidation?) in his eyes (and fingers?).

Well, you know, getting old. So I guess there’s some desperation in needing to reinvent the retro and all that, heh-heh, I said sheepishly, inchoately.

Okay, so if he’s not gonna do it, I can just fall back on singing – to myself in the shower stall – a parody of MacArthur Park, that other anthem with the equally mystifying lyrics. Weird Al Yankovich’s take is titled Jurassic Park, and goes: "Jurassic Park is frightening in the dark/ All the dinosaurs are running wild/ Someone shut the fence off in the rain/ I admit it’s kinda eerie/ But this proves my chaos theory/ And I don’t think I’ll be coming back again/ Oh no//… Jurassic Park is frightening in the dark/ All the dinosaurs are running wild/ Someone let T. Rex out of his pen/ I’m afraid those things’ll harm me/ ‘Cause they sure don’t act like Barney/ And they think I’m their dinner, not their friend/ Oh no…."

While we’re at it, here’s another classic’s version, a translation into Tagalog at that, of yet another popular song I’ve lately been downloading covers of. La vie en rose per Pete Lacaba’s Kulay-Rosas goes:

"Nang ibigin mo ako,/ Nagbago ang mundo./ Ito’y nagkulay-rosas.// Sa init ng ‘yong halik,/ Yakap na mahigpit,/ Mundo’y nagkulay-rosas.// Puso ko’y umaawit,/ Pag-ibig ang himig,/ Sa tuwing maririnig...// Ang tinig mong/ Katulad sa anghel/ Na may timyas/ Ng tunay na dalangin.// Dahil sa pag-ibig mo,/ Ngayon ang buhay ko:/ Kulay-rosas."

If you want to hear him sing it, complete with the nearly atonal pasakalye, show up at Conspiracy Garden Café on Visayas Avenue, Quezon City tomorrow, Nov. 8. From 7 to 10:30 p.m. you can catch "Singing Writers Night" and be treated to a (musical) score of pen-pushers, including poets, aspiring to the sublime art.

Quite a cast it is, too, ready to hit the high seas and drown you with their intrepid warbling. Besides Pete, there’ll be Charlson Ong, Gougou de Jesus, Mike Coroza, Dong Abay, Gerry Peralta, Joel Saracho, Lorna Kalaw Tirol, Behn Cervantes, Vehnee Saturno, Julie Aurelio, Vergel Santos, Edson Tandoc, Neil Garcia, Girl Valencia, Susan Fernandez, Celin Cristobal, Marne Kilates, Lorraine Javier and Tita de Quiros.

Other, professional writer-singers in our midst include Joey Ayala, Heber Bartolome, and Isha, but maybe they’ll set up a night of their own, backstopped by ivory ticklers Greg Brillantes, Ophie Dimalanta and Ernie Yee (who BTW just launched a novel, Out of Doors, in Dumaguete on his 52nd birthday on Oct. 29). Maybe they’ll even be joined by Elvis impersonators Erwin Castillo, Caloy Aureus and Conrad de Quiros, as well as baritone Butch Dalisay and aria specialists Erlinda Panlilio and Jaime Laya.

Me, I’ll be content to heckle in the peanut gallery, or hum silently along. A good thing no shower stall stands onstage at Conspi, else I could be persuaded to come up and turn a whiter shade of pale beneath the suds.

But if you appreciate readings, that I’m able to do, as I will on Saturday night, Nov. 12, at NewsDesk Cafe, No. 8 Scout Madriñan corner Scout Tobias Sts., in Quezon City, for the first of three consecutive Saturdays, 8 to 9:30 p.m., billed as the "Pete Lacaba Retrospektib."

Pete’s friends in show biz (like me) will read his poems or sing his lyrics. I will read; let’s get that clear. This Saturday will also feature, as my front act, Armida Siguion-Reyna, Bibeth Orteza, Pinky Amador, Susan Fernandez, Girl Valencia and Khavn de la Cruz. Nov. 19 will have Ricky Davao, Albert Martinez, Raymond Bagatsing, Boy Abunda and Lourd de Veyra, while Nov. 26 will have Bembol Roco, Gina Alajar, Cooky Chua, Dong Abay and Danny Dalena.

It’s all for a good cause. The proceeds will cover the imminent lamination cost of Pete Lacaba’s senior citizen’s card.