Lighthouse Keeper (1996) – My Friend the Chocolate Cake

Lighthouse Keeper is the sixth song presented here from my favourite Australian music group – My Friend the Chocolate Cake and the twelfth song by ‘founder‘ – Australian singer-songwriter David Bridie. The only other singer-songwriters that have been as prolific at Observation Blogger up to this point in the Music Library Project are Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Bruce Springsteen and Christina Perri. So that puts David Bridie into an esteemed mix of contemporary music heavyweights, at least according to my humble opinion.

I wrote in my penultimate article on the Cake‘s: I Guess It Don’t Get Much Better Than This (2002):

At the time this post is written, this song has just 570 views since it was released on You Tube in 2014. So you could say that the song title I Guess It Don’t Get Much Better Than This says it all. I always loved the Cake and they have featured here so much, but the love isn’t reciprocated by the public nor in this blog. I’m sure many of you have had that realisation when something you hear delights you but isn’t received by someone else with the same fervour. Well, that’s always been my case with the music of Bridie and the Cake. This song was released on the magnificent 2002 record Curious by the Cake.

Today’s song Lighthouse Keeper is one of, if not the Cake’s most cherished and familiar song although that’s not saying much since the Cake are scarcely known in Australia. It is undoubtedly in my Top 3 songs by them and I never grow tired of listening to it. My Friend the Chocolate Cake like their former compatriot band The Go – Betweens who feature here regularly, share a lot in common. They encapsulate that ‘quintessential Australian sound‘ like few other groups I have heard. Not consummate with international commercial hot-shots ACDC or way back when INXS.

In my estimation this Australian musical masterpiece Lighthouse Keeper is on par in with The Go-Betweens exemplary Finding You. The Cake’s music is untamed and unspoilt and appears only revered in the music industry and by Independent urban music enthusiasts.

[Verse 1: David Bridie]
Let me be your lighthouse keeper
Protect you from the angry seas
In the storm in times of trouble
When there’s no visibility

[Refrain: David Bridie & *David Bridie & Rebecca O’Mara*]
*When you can’t see out past the first wave*
To what lies behind the flying wall
There’s a *bright light spiraling round tonight, tonight
Turn, turn*
Yeah

[Verse 2: David Bridie]
Come and be my lighthouse keeper
Protect me from the kitsch parade
Come shelter me when all around
Is hollow plastic and ready-made

Lighthouse Keeper was released on The Cake’s third album, Good Luck in 1996 and was co-produced by Bridie and Mountfort with Jeremy Allom. It peaked at No. 44 on the ARIA Albums Chart. Critics claimed it among the band’s most accomplished and direct statements to date. At the ARIA Music Awards of 1997, it won ARIA Award for Best Adult Contemporary Album. The group played a sell-out show at Edinburgh Festival in Scotland and toured Europe. They followed with a live album, Live at the National Theatre, in December 1997.

I hope you enjoy Lighthouse Keeper and I would love to read your thoughts on it. Cheers all!

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“The more I live, the more I learn. The more I learn, the more I realize, the less I know.”- Michel Legrand