This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
Spatter the stars
Douse their luminosity
With our amniotic retch
Promulgating the birth
Of another Hell on Earth
Shadows gather poisoned henna for the flesh
A necrotic cattle brand
The hissing downfall pentagram
Carven deep upon the church doors of the damned
But no Passover is planned
A great renewal growls at hand
And only when they're running
Will they come to understand
So ends the pitiful reign of Man
When the moon exhales
Behind a veil
Of widowhood and clouds
On a Biblical scale
We raise the stakes
To silhouette the impaled
Crowds
Within this kissed disembowel arena
A broken seal on an ancient curse
Unleashes beasts from the seismic breach
With lightning reach and genocidal thirst
Mountains of archaos theories
In collision as at planetary dawn
Apocalypse's razorbacks
Beat wings on glass as thunder cracks
Unfurled across a world hurled to the black
Cthulhu dawn
Shatter the glass house
Wherein spirits breathe out
Halitosis of the soul
From a recking abscess
Plague of far righteousness
All fates hang in the balance
Mocking crucified dolls
An inquisition outs
When the Sun goes out our powers
Will extend throughout Heaven like Asphodel
As they have for countless lustrum
In dark Midian accustoned
To burning effigies of our enemies well
So begins the sibilant world Death knell
When a corpse wind howls
And awakes from drowse
The scheming dead freed
Of gossamer shrouds
We gorgonise eyes
Of the storm aroused
Red
Blinding time
All lines dine on this instance
A melting spool of beggar, negative frames
The skies teem alive, to watch die
Mankind hauled to fable in vast tenement graves
Cthulhu dawn
Douse their luminosity
With our amniotic retch
Promulgating the birth
Of another Hell on Earth
Shadows gather poisoned henna for the flesh
A necrotic cattle brand
The hissing downfall pentagram
Carven deep upon the church doors of the damned
But no Passover is planned
A great renewal growls at hand
And only when they're running
Will they come to understand
So ends the pitiful reign of Man
When the moon exhales
Behind a veil
Of widowhood and clouds
On a Biblical scale
We raise the stakes
To silhouette the impaled
Crowds
Within this kissed disembowel arena
A broken seal on an ancient curse
Unleashes beasts from the seismic breach
With lightning reach and genocidal thirst
Mountains of archaos theories
In collision as at planetary dawn
Apocalypse's razorbacks
Beat wings on glass as thunder cracks
Unfurled across a world hurled to the black
Cthulhu dawn
Shatter the glass house
Wherein spirits breathe out
Halitosis of the soul
From a recking abscess
Plague of far righteousness
All fates hang in the balance
Mocking crucified dolls
An inquisition outs
When the Sun goes out our powers
Will extend throughout Heaven like Asphodel
As they have for countless lustrum
In dark Midian accustoned
To burning effigies of our enemies well
So begins the sibilant world Death knell
When a corpse wind howls
And awakes from drowse
The scheming dead freed
Of gossamer shrouds
We gorgonise eyes
Of the storm aroused
Red
Blinding time
All lines dine on this instance
A melting spool of beggar, negative frames
The skies teem alive, to watch die
Mankind hauled to fable in vast tenement graves
Cthulhu dawn
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Nearly all of You got the meaning right. I've come to notice that,usually, CoF songs are pretty self-explanatory. But anyway, this is about Cthulhu/Ktulu/Kutulu/Clulu and all his Demon/Evil minions rising up from the bottom of the deepest portion of the sea near Babylon to destroy Humanity. Later, Georgie