Foreigner Suite

one of the most beautiful love songs I know. very optimistic. depicting love to be the one force to set you free (“it's freedom calling”), overcome your fear (“Dreams […] made me scared, But I'm over to that Sunnyside Road”), do what you were meant to do on earth (“find yourself”). goes with the sixties’ attitude to life.

“And in a little while Our love will spread to you” making the world a better place through love and peace. naturally. sooner or later everyone must surely see, that this is the way to live. now, with the benefit of hindsight, we can see that sadly/luckily (I am not quite sure) this wasn’t to come about.

“Take my love That’s all I have at hand” no material girls, please. enlightenment is all we need.

“And I can't wait to be with you tomorrow night” of course the physical aspects of love are fun too.

“There are no words I can use Because the meaning Still leaves for you to choose” nice linguistic touch. steven seems to be thinking along the lines of constructivism theory. we cannot directly communicate our feelings to someone else. Humans need to resort to words to reach another individual. but words are a very poor tool, since they are up for interpretation and you get in real trouble as soon as you want your point to be understood in one single certain way.

“You see my face But it's in my heart That's where it's taking place” nevertheless – since there are no real alternatives – we need to communicate through words, because from the outside only a fraction of our feelings is visible.

“Heaven must've programmed you“ very strange line. combining spirituality with computer-science doesn’t seem to be the wisest of choices. either steven wanted to praise the unity and equality of all creation (admitting even computer-science has a right to exist, as much as it contradicts the idea of love as the driving force behind everything), or he totally blew this one. or maybe the word ‘programmed’ had another denotation in 1973? beats me.

“The moment you fell inside my dreams I realised all I had not seen” does this line refer to the other dream-related lines about being frightened? did the sudden appearance of love in his life frighten him? the fear of losing it before it even started? I don’t think so. I think first he dreams about unpleasant things but then she appears in his dreams and soothes his pain. the time “just last night” then would not necessarily have to be taken literally. it could just mean a recent event that still troubles him and therefore seems closer than it actually is. besides, the metaphor of the ending night is a common one for getting ones hopes up, stepping out of the darkness, leading a better life etc..

“But when you're with me boy it chokes my mind” brain refuses to work. recreation from reasoning. does not go well with achieving things in a capitalist world.

“Man must fight for freedom That's what most other people would say” he does not say so. right he is. you know the saying: bombing for peace is like fucking for virginity.

“Look for a body to lead them But there's too many to lead them away” don’t follow no leaders. they have their own motives for which they want to exploit their followers. think for yourself. get responsible for your life.

whew, that grew rather long. hope you had a good time digging through it.

It's just a song about love, what kind of other meaning is needed?? And the lines "heaven must have programmed you.." do make sense to me. Because sometimes you feel like you're doing something almost automatically and can't exactly understand why, whose program is that. the word "programmed" itself doesn't seem strange to me. in our time of computerization it's common, and anyway it has ancient Greek routes, don't forget.