Brushed with Oil, Dusted with Powder

In an ideal world we wouldn't have to say this, but just to say that this is a highly subjective and personal interpretation of what this song means based entirely on pure speculation. Because obviously I haven't been living with Green Gartside in his house observing first hand what he does with his wife and whoever else. So I can't claim to know anything about his life. Obviously, when something is based on my personal speculation, it could be riddled with all kinds of things that aren't true and distortions based on my own transference. I hope this contextualizes my speculative interpretation and my position of the likelihood that it may bear no relationship to reality at all. The only person that knows for sure what goes on in Green Gartside's life is .. Green Gartside. ..and some of his close associations. Not me.

It's my impression based purely on pure speculation from a distance that this song is about an incidence of wife beating or physical violence towards a woman and in this particular instance the violence is towards a female that he is staying with whilst travelling in America. Generally, when these incidents occur, they're not isolated, so it doesn't just apply to this one situation. It's a whole overview, meaning it's a long-standing problem.

At the very least involving his long-term partner and wife, a female designer who's lived in London for a long time. But I guess that this behavior applies not just to her, but to other people he is involved with while he is traveling with work.

Gartside makes no secret of his mental health difficulties, which I think is a good thing. And actually, I rather like the way he talks about his angst. However, he doesn't strike me as somebody who has found a way to deal directly with his problems. He talks about failed appointments with various high-level therapists or psychiatrists. It's disappointing as with appointments with therapists or psychiatrists is particularly normal for anyone looking for a good therapist to see lots of bad ones before you find a good one. Normally if it's a bad fit you persevere until you find one that suits you.. and unfortunately he decided not to persevere and find one.

From an artistic standpoint and a creative standpoint, I do enjoy his work and I like what he has to say about the creative process. However, I think on a personal level there are many kind of unresolved problems there, some of which are very hostile and antagonistic to women that have not been addressed.

He currently lives in Hackney with his London wife dating from the 80s.. and London has some really fantastic therapists who deal directly with men who batter women and so there's no excuse.. He could have availed himself of spectacularly good help. Adam Jukes for instance.. A particularly gifted therapist who has a lot to say about the way men relate to women. He's got some fantastic books, one called why men batter women.

Having read Adam Juke's material, I do have, you know, sympathy and understanding for men who are caught up in the psychological problems which cause them to batter women. I suppose that I do like his creative work, but I'm always disappointed when people in the public eye don't get some excellent therapy or something, because they can afford to.. there are some fantastic therapists out there.

So I am sympathetic and I personally would prefer a world in which he really found a method of dealing with his psychological problems which worked. I just don't think he's going to do it. I think he spends all his time in the pub and that's his cultural norm. He tends to hang around sort of habitual drinkers and drug takers, which I think is probably normal in the music industry, but there are plenty of very gifted musicians who have walked away from that life and are trying to deal with their problems.

People like Eric Clapton or Ringo Star or Jimmy Paige.. They've all walked away from drugs and what have you.. And I think they are better people because of it.

So apologies for the war and peace preamble. But I suppose I feel a sense of tragedy and loss about his, you know, prognosis. I just don't think he will change. I don't think he will follow in the footsteps of Eric Clapton or all those people. I think he will stay in his local hackney pub hanging around people who are drunk.

Underneath the habitual drunkenness, poor choice of association with drunk friends and a codependent wife, I think there's actually quite a nice personality underneath which could be redeemed and would be a lot more visible and accessible in the absence of alcohol and drugs. I get frustrated when I see what looks like a nice personality that sort of shrouded over with sort of self-destructive, drinking and drugging habits and association with equally drunk and drugged people. To me it's a waste.

but I feel like a great sense of sadness about his psychological condition and that he will not choose to try and do something about it. I realize I'm just waving my fist at the sky knowing that nothing I say will make any difference. But I am sad about it. I grieve all the opportunities for mental health that people did not choose. It's my belief that what he is suffering from is eminently treatable and fixable but he doesn't know this and he's just very cynical and he sees no point in even trying.

Really, I'm just venting here and I know it. So, I'm sorry for boring you all with this.

I experience a sort of deep longing for people who I believe to be nice people underneath their habitual tendencies. I want them all to seek help and to be returned to some kind of mental health. But I don't get my way. Hey ho. I feel terrible knowing that people are suffering and that it probably won't change, but there's nothing I can do.

Maybe he would listen to someone like Ringo Starr because he liked the Beatles who knows. I doubt he would listen to someone like me. I feel a bit sorry for his wife as well because they've had this sort of strange relationship since the 80s.

I like this song but then I like most of his songs.

My interpretation is that this is about a trip to the States at some point whereupon.. as is the usual custom. He sort of spends time with somebody he's already known, some kind of association outside of his long-standing relationship that he avails himself of when he's traveling. An affair kind of thing, somebody he connects with off and on, depending on where he happens to be, so in this case it's the States.

They're staying in a hotel somewhere in Hollywood and it goes a bit south. They have an argument and he somehow damages a door in the hotel. He may have also damaged the blinds and that's why you can see the sun through them because they were sort of wrecked a bit so you know light was coming through which shouldn't have. Perhaps because as is common amongst men who have battered women they will punch holes in things as a way of sort of threatening the other person or it may be a way of trying not to hit the female but it's very intimidating even if it doesn't involve hitting the woman.

It may be more than just a bash door that's the problem, it might be that the woman is saying that he hit her and she's really pissed off or something and in a fit of anger she decided to, you know, call the police.

For some reason, there's a necessity to file some kind of police report, maybe some paperwork that the hotel insisted on as part of the procedure. Either way, he ends up having a conversation of some kind with the police officer and they have to explain what happened.

Why they are with the police, and they're asking him what happened, it occurs to him that he doesn't actually know what happened. Again, this is totally normal for men who batter women. You know, really minor infractions can trigger this sort of explosive anger. And they genuinely don't know where it comes from, but it sort of makes sense to them. And paradoxically, they think that They are sort of misunderstood or they were provoked or they're actually quite nice people and they are a good provider. There's all sorts of things like that. It's chronic denial basically. They won't see that what they're doing is a bit messed up. Adam jukes breaks down all these patterns very well in his books.

So in the lyrics he's saying, well yeah I don't know when this started and he thinks back and he thinks well this isn't just an incident in the Hollywood Hills. This is a problem that I've had going back all the way to when I first started seeing this woman in London and it became a little bit violent you know so that's why he says highbury fields or could it have been you know the journey up on the highway or Was it something that happened, you know, today in the hotel?

This confusion about the source is, very common amongst men, who batter women. They really don't know why they're doing it, although a lot of them think they have been provoked, blaming the victim essentially.

But yes, he's right, in part, to say that the problem wasn't just what happened in the hotel. But the problem has been going on for a long time and it started way back in the 80s, you know, in London.

And then he goes on to say it was love no matter what they say. I believe that he believes that it's love no matter what they say. You know, he believes that it's love even though he is beating his longtime girlfriend now wife since the eighties and that he occasionally gets violent with these liaisons when he's traveling.

Again, self perception of these men.. That they are sort of devoted parents, good fathers, good providers, despite putting their wives or girlfriends in the hospital on a regular basis. This is a normal perception amongst wife beaters. The denial is really staggering to be honest, and Adam Jukes was really surprised and taken aback by the level of denial of men who batter women. It was a fascinating book.

I think it would be more accurate to say that what he feels is some kind of emotional hunger to do with his particular attachment pattern that he developed in childhood. You know, if he had a good therapist who understood attachment theory, they would be able to spell it out for him.

So I hate to tell you Green that this is not love. It's not love when you are smashing up doors because you're trying not to hit your girlfriend because you've had an explosive rage that you can't control. It's definitely not love, but I understand his attachment to the feeling that he gets from being in the company of certain people that he thinks is love. But if you're beating people up, if you're being aggressive to them, if you're intimidating them psychologically, if you're making them feel diminished and belittled and small and tiny, because you have uncontrollable rage, that's not love, it isn't. This all just means that you have a problem, a quite widespread, identifiable problem with a proven and effective clinical pathway for treatment, which for some reason you haven't chosen to take as yet. Probably because it's not easy to get effective treatment and you didn't do the research, but someone like Adam Jukes knows exactly what to do with people like this.

If Adam Jukes isn't able to help him personally, he would know someone else that could, or he would be able to suggest something else.

He then goes on to talk about his father sort of affair with somebody he called an angel.. And then he says, I make my excuses and I like the way it feels. Well good for you, Green.

But you know, why not look at this as a springboard to propel you into some sort of treatment psychologically for these issues? All these habitual patterns of destructive behavior, whether it's beating up your girlfriend then wife, or beating up somebody you have an affair with, or scaring them in a hotel room, or liking the way it feels to have somebody on the side. These are all opportunities for you to look at yourself and look at what's going on and figure out a better way of doing things.

I know I'm wasting my breath when I say this. It annoys me because underneath all those horrible destructive tendencies is a nice person, (imo) but I don't get to see it if it's sort of surrounded by destructive behavior towards the people he claims to love.

Now I'm just ranting so my apologies.

What a waste. He could have ended up like Ringo Starr psychologically. But here he is. Still wondering why he's smashing up doors in hotel rooms with women who he's having affairs with in the states. I can totally relate to his angst, you know? I think it's very familiar. Plus I like what he's able to contribute from a creative standpoint. And this is why I think I feel a lot of sympathy for him even though I hate the way he's behaving and I would much rather he chose a different path in life.

But like I said, I don't get my way. So instead I just rant, wave my fist in the sky, and write stupid things like this, that make no difference. Just because I need to get it out of my system, because it does really bug me. Anyway, thanks for listening. I needed to get that off my chest. Why does nobody ever do what I want? Lol

I have a lot of respect for the psychological profile of someone like Ringo Starr or other people like him.. and I really like this song that he did called LA de da.. I think it's brilliant in many ways. I need to adopt his strategy in that song for accepting life on life's terms, including all the people that don't seek out the help they need.

Thankfully he's still around and I hope he continues to stick around because he's a lovely human being and he's in his 80s so I'm not sure how long we have left of him. He's got his issues too, just like every other human being, but you know, he is trying to deal with them.

The long musical outro at the end I think sort of sets the mood of the piece and I think what's being conveyed is a sense of bittersweet loss.

For some reason he's been caught out in the hotel room and his girlfriend is in London has found out and she is the authority he refers to and the song where people have found out. So this thing is going to be wound up and you know he thinks it's sad really and he thinks it's love even though the behaviour is a bit weird. It's bittersweet because I suppose he thinks the emotional hunger or his attachment injuries amount to some kind of feeling of love, even though the behaviour is far from love.

So he's conflicted between the feelings of attachment he has towards this sort of occasional lover on the side that has now come to an end and you know all the conflict and weirdness that went down

I really like the musical outro.. I think it's really has a wonderful feeling. They kind of lost and conflicted confusion of bittersweet feelings. And the realization that this is going to be the end of this particular association. The unresolved polarity between the anger, confusion, hostility and the feelings of attachment which feel real and might feel like love.. but it isn't love if the behaviour is destructive.

Lol War and peace Apologies

Just a reminder.. PURE SPECULATION lol