Fai-Ya-La

The first of our songs to feature Gerard on the Berimbau.

The lyric is literally nonsense; a “vocable” expressive attempt to utter... the “Ur-word”. Oh yes. John of the band has rightly referred to the track in relation to Dadaist Kurt Schwitters’s “Ursonata” (mention should be made of John's excellent guitar as it accompanies the voice). The one word, or "homograph", that stands out clearly enunciated and which I know to be from a language, is “flower”. Pronounced as in flora here, but it could also to be understood in the sense of running water, as in river, etc. “Fai” is pronounced “eye”. The ancient Mesopotamian city of Ai is pronounced “eye” (Mesopotamia: “between rivers”, part of the “Fertile Crescent” (like a bow), “cradle of civilisation”).

“Fai-Ya-la” is the one occasion, thus far, on which we have used the Berimbau.

What is the “Ur-word” (Ur, another ancient Mesopotamian city)? “An ur-word (or Urwort GG, 10/10/26)