Hideous Strength // Sofar // Reading
Water Pageant performing “Hideous Strength” at Sofar Reading on May 19th, 2016.
Overlaps
The video for Overlaps is based on the true events of a 53 year old barrister from Oxford who regularly takes time out from his conventional family & work life to assume the identity of an urban fox…badger, otter, deer or swift.
He often spends nights and days wandering around on all fours in pursuit of these other mammal communities and short of living in a set chooses to sleep in bushes, lurk in back alleys and scavenge dust bins in order to achieve a oneness with his mammalian cousins.
Exploring habitats which human senses are less attuned to he has learned to refine his sense of smell, taste & sound and alter his diet accordingly to bring himself ever closer to his subject. He details his experiences in his book: Being A Beast
The idea for the song itself evolved along a slightly different but not unrelated path in that it explores ideas surrounding identity especially in the modern sense of the word; in a world which seems to be having an identity crisis all of its own. Has it ever been any different? Won’t it be ever thus? ‘Never dissovles completely, never resolves completely’.
The ‘sleeper train’ refers to the Caledonian Sleeper service from Euston station to the Scottish Highlands.