Jul19
A Musical Note: Dido – White Flag
on July 19, 2010 at 1:30 pm
Today’s musical interlude comes from the amazingly named Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle O’Malley Armstrong, better known as Dido. This British singer/song-writer has an amazing number of excellent songs that seem to be by and large ignored. I may be wrong about that, but I just don’t hear her on the radio very often. When she does appear it is typically for her song “White Flag”
If you are not familiar with her work, seek it out. 
To “prime the pump”, I give you…
White Flag
Plugin by: PHP Freelancer
QR Code - Take this post Mobile!
Use this unique QR (Quick Response) code with your smart device. The code will save the url of this webpage to the device for mobile sharing and storage.
Loading ...
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio... and isn't it time you experienced some of them?
I know you think that I shouldn’t still love you
I’ll tell you that
But if I didn’t say it
Well, I’d still have felt it
Where’s the sense in that?
I promise I’m not trying to make your life harder
Or return to where we were
Well I will go down with this ship
And I won’t put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I’m in love and always will be
I know I left too much mess
And destruction to come back again
And I caused nothing but trouble
I understand if you can’t talk to me again
And if you live by the rules of “It’s over”
Then I’m sure that makes sense
Well I will go down with this ship
And I won’t put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I’m in love and always will be
And when we meet
Which I’m sure we will
All that was then
Will be there still
I’ll let it pass
And hold my tongue
And you will think
That I’ve moved on
Well I will go down with this ship
And I won’t put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I’m in love and always will be
Well I will go down with this ship
And I won’t put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I’m in love and always will be
I will go down with this ship
And I won’t put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I’m in love and always will be
This is interesting. We’ve had two concepts of surrender.
The post on surrendering to love, and this one on not surrendering being in love. Come to think of it, that does ‘make sense’.
This is a description of the only ‘sinking ship’ I have ever been on. But sometimes you can be on a sinking ship just because you refuse to surrender, but not like in the song by Dido!
Penny took a step away from the cell door, and turned to get her thoughts in order. She would go to bed early, and hope it would be better tomorrow. That woman was still sitting on the top bunk, with her feet dangling over the edge, staring at her. “We’re not going to keep this one.” The woman looked frightened. And the look was frightening. Or was it that she was frightened. “You don’t want to see this one.” No. The woman was angry. And the woman was angry at Penny. And she had seen that face before; when she was a child. “So this time, I want you to relax a little bit… and smile.” She was in danger. This woman could hurt her. She could not sleep in this room. She could not stay in this cell, with that woman, through the night.
“Guard!” Penny yelled out at the door, grabbing the bars with her hands as though they were life-supports, only to find they were secured to the side of the sinking ship. “Guard!”
“What do you want?” It was Vanilla, the stripper cum prostitute, and she was walking towards her. And Penny got the impression that what she had to say had better be important.
“I want to move to another cell. I can’t stay in this one. It’s too frightening.” Vanilla is staring at her, long and hard. Perhaps she has been too demanding. Or, on second thought, perhaps she has been too apologetic. How do you converse with these girls? Vanilla is now looking at the other woman.
“You can come in our cell.” Vanilla says, and she starts to walk towards the barred window that separates the range from the corridor. “I’ll get the guard.”
Penny turns to pick up the pillow case packed with linen, pajamas, towel and toothbrush, and finds herself once more confronting the countenance of the unfamiliar, the unknown. “This was not real.” This portrait before her is an expressionistic painting. “This was not true.” These features before her are a frame taken from a filmstrip. “This was a front.” This was not her photo. “This was a facade.” This is not the picture of a pumpkin. “This was a false face.” But if it is not that woman who is frozen in fright, then who does this fear belong to?
“Hey. Leave her alone. You’re coming in with us. And don’t try talking to her….” “And that is the brain that is born out of brawn,” Penny thought as she tried to find a reason why the order seemed so emphatic. Why she felt she had to take it seriously. “She’s schizophrenic,” Vanilla said, as if she owed Penny an explanation; as if she owed Penny an answer.
RikScott: Please tell me to desist if these explorations of similarities in context are out of order. Thank you. In any event, will attempt to ‘control myself’. It may just be self-promotion. Thanks.
I first heard of Dido through the TV series Roswell. She sang the theme tune “Here With Me.” As Michael Caine might say, “Not a lot of people know that.”