Bad times sometimes bring forth beauty.
1987 in
South Africa was just about the
worst of times; it was a year of brutal
repression, anger, terror, a
state of emergency, despair and madness... but also
Weeping , still one of the most perfect songs this country ever produced. It was recorded and released by
Cape Town band Bright Blue in that year; for some reason it escaped the
censors, despite including several bars of the struggle
anthem Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrica, and reached the top of the charts. It was released on an album called
The Rising Tide which is very, very hard to get hold of now, but the song lives: in 1997, ten years and more history than anyone would have thought possible later,
Vusi Mahlasela revived it on his third album
Silang Mabele , which is still easy to find. The song is far more than the lyrics, of course, but the lyrics are worth recording:
Weeping
I knew a man who lived in fear
It was huge, it was angry, it was drawing near
Behind his house, a secret place
Was the shadow of a demon he could never face.
He built a wall of steel and flame
And men with guns to keep it tame
Then, standing back, he made it plain
That the nightmare would never ever rise again
But the fear and the fire and the guns remain.
It doesn’t matter now
It’s over anyhow
He tells the world that it’s sleeping
But as the night came round
I heard its lonely sound
It wasn’t roaring, it was weeping.
And then one day, the neighbours came
They were curious to know about the smoke and flame
They stood around outside the wall
But of course there was nothing to be heard at all.
"My friends", he said, "we've reached our goal
The threat is under firm control
As long as peace and order reign
I’ll be damned if I can see a reason to explain
Why the fear and the fire and the guns remain".
It doesn't matter now
It's over anyhow
He tells the world that it's sleeping
But as the night came round
I heard its lonely sound
It wasn't roaring it was weeping
It wasn't roaring it was weeping.