Wish

This song was written in Bow, East London in 1978.  Inspired by Bertold Brecht plays, this song brought it’s own discord and dissonance.  It always went over well with live audiences, a tornado of melody and angst.  We usually used it to close out shows.  It was recorded at Advision Studio and appeared on The Original Sin album.  We’d completed recording the basic tracks and were doing overdubs when Keith Levene came with his Travis Bean wedge guitar to record on this track.  Watching him standing on the couch in the control room thrashing his way through this track was a sublime experience.  Dennis MacKay was producing and Laurence Diana engineering the session.  His take was both at odds with and now part of the track.  Dennis solved the ‘how to make it fit’ problem nicely.  He bounced the take down to two track, reversed the tape and then flew in the reverse parts in the break down of the song, while using the original take in selected parts to taste.  The experience that Dennis brought from Trident and other studios over the years was huge.

Footnote:  The  Travis Bean guitar used by Keith on this track was later lost in New York now reported owned by Vincent Gallo.

Here is the lyric:

there’s nothing in this world
i would wish for
that could mean more to me
than you
nothing!
i’d wish for nothing

some things in time
you can reach for
but there’s sometimes
you can’t let go
of nothing!
i’d give up nothing
for you

even if they asked me
to exchange
one little part for
all their gold
there would be nothing
i’d give them nothing

so let this picture take you
and read in between the lines
depend on nothing
i would do nothing
for you

there’s nothing in this world
i would wish for
that could mean more to me
than you
nothing!
i’d wish for nothing

some things in time
you can reach for
but there’s sometimes
you can’t let go
of nothing!
i’d give up nothing
for you

nothing!

Copyright © 1979 EMI Virgin Songs Inc