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Composer:   Ed Hooke
Date of Composition:   April 2015
Date of Recording/Copyright:    2015

Commentary (1)
In memory of former times?

The hunter-gatherer culture is one of the most ancient forms of human civilisation. There are still remote tribes around the world who practise this way of living.

This song is not so much a “lovesong with a difference”, as a “difference with a lovesong in it”.

I originally intended to draw exact parallels between hunter-gatherer behaviour and a modernday supermarket shopping trip, but in the end I thought b******s to that.

We have indeed come a long way though.

Starlit stealth, stake and stalk.

Glow glad gleam of day.

Freed fruits fresh are ours all,

prey prowling our play

We have come a long way.

We shall feast tonight.

Weave wide where woods waver,

hands hooked and feet fleet.

Wealth waits for our pickings,

lush greens plus speared meat.

We have come a long way.

We shall feast tonight.

Καλλιόπη

Come, be mine.

Dance with me before we dine.

Hunters and gatherers

on sacred grounds dwell.

Each sunrise we worship.

Each eve rejoice well.

Clanship our attachment,

tribal tread our track.

Shift shelter each morrow.

Nought that which we lack.

Now it’s time to return.

Arm in arm tonight.

For we have come a long way

And we shall feast tonight.

Commentary (2)
Sometimes I feel almost overwhelmed by the ugly beauty of a song I have created and, other than listening to the song repeatedly (& singing along & jumping up & down to it), I'm not sure what to do with those feelings.

I listen to "Hunters and Gatherers" & rejoice at its features, its assembly & the magnificence of the overall result & its effect on me. It feels like, in the last few years, after all this time, I have finally been able to create & record songs which leave me awe-struck - though I acknowledge that few others feel anything like the same way about them.  Here’s a summary of some of the features:-

* 5/4 time signature (i.e. 5 beats to the bar) - maintained throughout - with a few enjoyably rhythmic drum patterns over the top of it

* chanting backing vocals - the like of which I've rarely used elsewhere

* verses feature simple bass-line (with keyboards & guitar occasionally playing similar lines one discordant semi-tone apart) underneath an unusual, almost haunting vocal melody line (sung in a voice that sounds only partially like me)

* the wibbly wobbly sounds & strange chord progression of the middle section with its 'love song' are possibly the weakest elements, but they add another dimension

* the songwords tell of (& probably over-romanticise) a largely long-lost lifestyle, simpler & less stressful

* there's rather a lot of alliteration - & a basic, hopefully unobtrusive rhyme structure in the verses

* the highlights for me come in the triumphal choruses, with a horrible and slightly strange falling bass progression underneath twin driving discordant distortion-laden lead guitar melodies (again played a semitone apart from each other) in the middle, & then on top the long sustained discordant notes of the vocal melody clashing in turn (a tri-tone apart) with the backing vocals, the words expressing a simple yet evocative self-commentary.

Reviews
1) “I like the chanting combined with heavy riffs”
     [Djack Brissenden, Reading UK]

2) “I like this very much.”         [Paul A Murphy, Brighton UK]