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Julie With... Lyrics
I am on an open sea
Just drifting as the hours go slowly by
Julie with her open blouse
Is gazing up into the empty sky.
Now it seems to be so strange here
Now it's so blue
The still sea is darker than before
No wind disturbs our colored sail
The radio is silent, so are we
Julie's head is on her arm
Her fingers brush the surface of the sea.
Now I wonder if we'll be seen here
Or if time has left us all alone
The still sea is darker than before
Just drifting as the hours go slowly by
Julie with her open blouse
Is gazing up into the empty sky.
Now it's so blue
The still sea is darker than before
The radio is silent, so are we
Julie's head is on her arm
Her fingers brush the surface of the sea.
Or if time has left us all alone
The still sea is darker than before
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This song continues the relaxed atmosphere of the previous song, moving us further in the direction of stillness with a reduced tempo, languid synths and guitar arpeggios, and no percussion whatsoever. Death seems constantly immanent in this song and the next (as well as the previous one, for the matter).
Science gets pretty useless when you're dealing with death, I think. The protagonist of this song is floating idly in the sea with "Julie" of the title, with her "open blouse" flapping in the breeze. Did the protagonist kill Julie, causing the water to become "darker than before?" Or is that just the sunset of their approaching end, as both are seemingly stranded at sea ("now I wonder if we'll be seen here, or if time has left us all alone"). Personally I doubt that Julie is dead. Most likely she & Eno are simply adrift in the open ocean. Eno does not say why, leaving the question open.
The overall mood is pensive. Despite impending death at sea, fear, loneliness, at a time of maximum desperation, the music simply records impressions of senses in the location, only once or twice tracking an abstract thought that may pass by. The music and words work together to create a stillness in the face of death, of calm acceptance even, and love. Why panic? Death is nothing to fear -- Eno's perspective undercuts basic mainstream assumptions in the West, yet become ever more urgent day by day (the wretched fuel for the rat race, I think...).
The next song, another still, water-based number, continues these themes further.
I read that the narrator of the song has killed/will kill Julie. I totally wouldn't have guessed that, but now I see it! I think the song's hauntingly beautiful. When I have a girl later in my life, I'm naming her after this.
I've always thought that the two of them floating on the dark sea is about being lost at sea in a life boat and that the end is near. The clue for me is the hopelessness I hear in the music and the line "Now I wonder if we'll be seen here"
What a beautiful and mysterious song. "Eno" is in an open sea, drifting. He is just flowing, to where the Sea or the Winds take him. The hours pass slowly. He has no hurry. Julie is with her breasts exposed to an empty sky, gazing at It. I wonder if as the sky is "empty", maybe Eno thinks that the sky should have something there, like God or some angel. Maybe Julie gazes at the empty sky as if waiting for something like a divine answer, a direction.
Eno is in a strange, darker-blue place. But. He is accompanied by a gentle stillness. There is no winds, the radio is silent... there seems to be peace. For a man that has sung that everything merges with the night, maybe a darker sea is something interesting.
It seems like "Eno" and Julie are close to each other, but there are no interactions between them.They are alone in this scene, with nobody seeing it. It seems like Eno wishes that anyone or some people could see them. As if Time could manage to do that. But in this moment alone with Julie, Eno only has at his disposal the Sea, the Wind, the Sky... and the Music.