Agony Shorthand


Wednesday, January 21, 2004
PSYCHEDELIC MYSTERY....We've got a member of the Agony Shorthand posse who's doing his thesis on psychedelic music (!) and has a real tough quandry to untangle. It's the lyrics to LOVE's "Seven and Seven Is". I don't know if Arthur Lee is in the house, but short of that, can you be the one to help our friend? :

"I'm wondering if anyone knows for sure (or at least has an opinion) on what the correct second line is in the second verse in Love's "Seven and Seven Is." I always heard it as "My bible's in the fireplace and my dog lies hypnotized." Most transcriptions of it on the internet, however, say, "My father's in the fireplace and my dog lies hypnotized." (This is maybe weirder, but maybe relates to the first verse, in which he's singing about when he was a boy and how he'd sit in the bottle and pretend that he was in a can and all of that.) I just can't tell from the record if it's "bible" or "father." Anyone know of any alternate versions or live versions in which it's really clearly one or the other?"

I'm going with "bible". Those freaky hippies really had it in for dad to be sure, but God and Country were top o' the list.