
The Brothers Grimm - Artwork: Eva Krusche
During the developing stages of creating our first album, my girlfriend Linda Sollacher (stage design, producer, director (film & theatre)), suggested a theme to tie the whole together.
Fairytales.
And so, after considering this I decided to act upon it and so I bought a copy of the collected works of The Brothers Grimm in order to do some research because as we might all know they can be regarded as the original experts.
I dove into the collection, reading avidly and after a while I began to notice how some of the characters in the stories behaved in an intensely immoral fashion. The evil step mother carrying out remarkable acts of cruelty and when not committing atrocities of horrific violence herself, would manipulate situations in which these deeds would be carried out. And this was a recurring theme throughout many of the stories.
But then I sat back and thought for a moment.
What about the Father? The man who brought this evil crone into his home and family? Of course, he's kind and nice and would never hurt his daughter or son.
Or would he?
What exactly does he do to stop the evil machinations and abuse of his children. In most cases absolutely nothing.
What sort of a Father would stand by and let evil happen to his children?
So this is the background to the lyrics of the song. But it wasn't until afterwards that I heard an article about how the fairytale stories and similar tales of age-old origins are not necessarily meant to be taken literally in a literary sense. Rather they reflect universal traits, emotions and conflicts both within us and within society at large. And the reason they have been passed down and survived for so long is that they hold certain truths that resonate with people and give a sense of 'wisdom' that can help people in everyday life.
Because life can be hard and cruel and unfair....
...as well as wonderful, if we listen carefully to Grandma's stories and think for ourselves and carefully about our actions.
Once upon a time in the old cruel world,
Was a daughter pure as the driven snow,
But her step mother, well, well she was a bitch,
What a bitch,
But her Father,
Yes her very own Father,
Well he looked on, but he did nothing,
He said nothing, not a dicky bird,
Maybe later she’ll get her just desserts,
Well of course, don’t be absurd,
Why did her Father just do nothing,
Why did her Father leave her to the evil twisted bitch Step Mother?
Ian Chapman: vocals, cornet, tuba, piano, percussion,
Dine Doneff: drums
Julian Hesse: trumpet
Thorben Schütte: trombone
Niki Kampa: violins
Producer: Dine Doneff
Music, Lyrics & Arrangement: Ian Chapman