Thanks Wes Anderson for putting this song in your movie! I first heard today’s featured song in The Royal Tenembaums which has one of the finest, but non-standard soundtracks I have heard. That reminds me…I must review this movie in ‘Friday’s-Finest‘.
Fly by Nick Drake is a very tender song about missed opportunities and yearning for the opportunity to get to know someone. This song reminds me of two ‘reflection‘ posts I have written, respectively: The Last Words and Mornington. The former exposes ‘Grace’ and the latter is a solemn poem of yearning.
Drake writes in Fly:
“Please give me a second grace, Please give me a second face” contrasted with his comprehension that it’s over – “But she won’t need to cry, For it’s really too hard for to fly“. In his third line he wrote: “And the sea she will sigh but she’ll never deny.”
If you’ll permit me to tether this with my Mornington lines:
“I prefer to revisit one of our earliest performances / than have another day like the one I had yesterday‘ and ‘I was fairly dismissed by you by the quay / in that jumpy district after the third bottle of wine. And regarding the sea: The crooked rocks, waves lapping my legs / Must be Mornington, feels like the beach / you popped in to say ‘hi’, your echo drew me here / To await the ferry to cast me out.
Nicholas Rodney Drake (19 June 1948 – 25 November 1974) was an English singer-songwriter known for his acoustic guitar-based songs. He did not find a wide audience during his lifetime, but his work gradually achieved wider notice and recognition. His reluctance to perform live, or be interviewed, contributed to his lack of commercial success. There is no known video footage of the adult Drake; he was only ever captured in still photographs and in home footage from his childhood.
Drake ended his studies at Cambridge nine months before graduation and in late 1969 moved to London. His father remembered, “writing him long letters, pointing out the disadvantages of going away from Cambridge … a degree was a safety net, if you manage to get a degree, at least you have something to fall back on; his reply to that was that a safety net was the one thing he did not want.“
I can’t help but relay here one of the messages I read in the youtube comments from Zed Cecelja about Fly:
‘Had this beautiful song played at my daughters funeral as I carried her out. Rest in peace my beautiful Stephanie. Love you always, forget you never‘.
References:
1. Nick Drake – wikipedia
2. Song of the Week Blog Week 41 – Fly – Nick Drake
“The more I live, the more I learn. The more I learn, the more I realize, the less I know.”- Michel Legrand
Observation Blogger 
The guy was ahead of the curve…too much for his own time. He should have been celebrated during his life. I’m glad he has got noticed in the last 20 years or so.
Matt…do you moderate your comments? This is like the third time mine have disappeared after I made them. That would explain it…I didn’t want to post the same comment again and bug you if you if they get stored to moderate.
Matt I love Nick Drake…I found him around 20 years ago. He should have been celebrated in his time….but of course that didn’t happen.
I don’t know anything about him from him apart from this song which I liked from the movie. I didn’t know he was a ‘should have been’.
Oh Matt…read his wiki page. It’s beyond sad. No one recognized his talent really when he was alive…around 20 years ago or a little more everyone wanted to know about him. He died really young.
Matt could you check your spam filter? This was the third comment I made today on your blog…I wonder if it thinks I’m spam?
Hey Max, Thanks for the heads up. I just reviewed my Spam comments pages and deleted many spam comments and found a few of yours there which I approved. I don’t know why your comments would go to my spam page.
That is a relief! I thought for a second…did I say something that upset Matt?
Glad you found it.
Upset? Haha. On the contrary, I’m greatful.
I don’t kkow why some of your comments would go there and others not. Wierd. Anyhows, alls sorted for now. I hope it doesn’t happen again.
Remember me saying before…”I could have sworn that I commented on this one” lol…Now I don’t feel like an idiot lol. This time I commented and it vanished right away…I thought…Ok…I’m not crazy!
Anyway…Nick Drakes story is extremely sad.
Yeh, how frustrating is that! I’m sorry that happened Max.
Yeh man, it’s really sad, but he is now being recognised or was even much earlier as you alluded to. This is such a beautiful song.
It’s not your fault Matt…damn WordPress.
Yes it really is.
I wrote a lot about your comments in the upcoming Don Williams song on Saturday. I’m so happy you did that and shared your input buddy 🙂
I’ll be checking it out! Anytime.
You wrote how you knew Don in your hometown and I went ‘all-out’ in the upcoming post of his Gypsy woman
Cool! I appreciate it.
One song that I completely forgot he did was a song called Amanda…I heard it the other day…
That was the first song article I wrote about.
My mind just went blank… I heard that all my childhood!
It’s all good. Same here I heard it plenty as a youngen. I think Amanda has one of the greatest Chorus’ I’ve heard.
I love Nick Drake Matt. For once it made me stop and found Wes Anderson written. Was enough for me to follow you as of now. Meanwhile have you seen Isle of Dogs?
Thanks for following. I’m a great admirer of Wes Anderson and his movies have featured here. I think I was distracted but I tried watching Isle of Dogs, but only got half way through. I have it in my folder, so I will try and give it another go. Are you a big fan of that one?
Thanks for writing and following back. Yes, you got here an admirer too. Well, I watched it four days ago hence it was on my mind and asked you. This being an animated film by him did put me on hold at first but it was a beauty in own intricate ways. I look forward to read and communicate with you as times passes matt. Thanks again.
Thanks Narayan. That’s very kind of you. I look forward to the same.