The Free Radical

As I extend my rarified percipience within the tumultuous puissance of humanity’s collective, I find a bit too much of the ‘giving up’ energy. The extended narrative of our imminent deliverance has recently broken many warriors down. Lately I’m being asked “How do we keep the faith through these ‘ugly’ moments?”

Each of us holds different criteria for meeting the burden of proof. Proof of what? That this journey is real and worthwhile… and not just some random gyrations in a purposeless void.

I made some critical choices so very long ago when I was just a silly confused teenager. I decided early on that the victory of the just and good was absolutely assured… if gems of creative complex beauty were disseminated in the wide world with understated regularity. I saw– or rather heard– the singing jewels everywhere!

(Ritual – Overture)

There were certain artists– like Yes– who celebrated our eventual victory already in the early seventies. Their work was so beyond the ability of the controllers to even understand, it went unchallenged.

They were sowing the seeds for these moments we’re living right now… 40 years later. These are the complex patterns of encouragement… affirmations of human vitality. Music engages the whole brain, the entire being. Allow it to assuage your doubts…

(The Revealing Science of God – Dance of the Dawn)

“Dawn of light lying between a silence and sold sources,
Chased amid fusions of wonder, in moments hardly seen forgotten,
Coloured in pastures of chance dancing leaves cast spells of challenge,
Amused but real in thought, we fled from the sea whole.
Dawn of thought transferred through moments of days undersearching earth
Revealing corridors of time provoking memories, disjointed but with purpose,
Craving penetrations offer links with the self instructors sharp
And tender love as we took to the air, a picture of distance.
Dawn of our power we amuse redescending as fast as misused
Expression, as only to teach love as to reveal passion chasing
Late into corners, and we danced from the ocean.
Dawn of love sent within us colours of awakening among the many
Wont to follow, only tunes of a different age, as the links span
Our endless caresses for the freedom of life everlasting.”

I think the lads were onto something…

These excerpts are from the 1973 album Tales from Topographic Oceans which was utterly unique for its time, being a double album featuring only four songs– each of which took the entire side of a vinyl record. It was such a departure from the norm that the album ‘drove’ Rick Wakeman– the keyboardist– to abandon his mates at the conclusion of its worldwide tour. (He would later return in 1977– but more about that in a bit.)

“What happened to this song we once knew so well
Signed promise for moments caught within the spell
I must have waited all my life for this
Moment moment

The future poised with the splendour just begun
The light we were as one
And crowded through the curtains of liquid into sun”

(The Remembering – High the Memory)

The inspiration for the album reportedly comes from a lengthy footnote in the Autobiography of a Yogi, describing four rather obscure scriptures.

“Force the bit between the mouth of freedom didn’t we learn to fly
Remember to sail the skies
Distant suns
Will we reach
Winds allow
Other skylines
Other skylines to hold you”

Here they just slip in the phrase “fail safe now” to let the world know that victory is already assured; we mustn’t sweat it. I took the message to heart at a very young age.

“Relayer
All the passion spent on one cross
Relayer
Sail the futile wars they suffer
Relayer
We advance we retrace our story, fail safe now”

(The Ancient Giants Under the Sun)

The ancient giants under the sun…

“As one with knowledge and magic of the source
Attuned to the majesty of music
They marched as one with Earth”

This is just pure artistry, unparalleled in rock music from any era!

“So the flowering creativity of life wove its
Web face to face with the shallow
And their gods sought out and conquered; Ah Kin”

And I too heard a million voices singing…

(Nous Sommes du Soleil)

“Change we must as surely as time does
Changes call the course
Held inside we enter daybreaks
Asking for… asking for
The source
The source
The source
Sent as we sing our music’s total retain

As we try and consider
We receive all we venture to give”

We are the sun… and we all love when we play…

And “clearer companions shall call to be near you”

(Awaken)

This excerpt seems to complete in 1977 what was begun in 1973… the call to mass awakening…

“High Vibration go on
To the sun, oh let my heart dreaming
Past a mortal as me
Where can I be

Wish the sun to stand still
Reaching out to touch our own being
Past all mortal as we
Here we can be
We can be here
Be here now
Here we can be…

AWAKEN GENTLE MASS TOUCH…

AWAKEN GENTLE MASS TOUCHING…”

May this serve to inspire and fortify your resolve!