This is a beautiful song which raises more questions than it answers. This is Björk before she was Björk, but long after she was Björk. At this point, she was a Sugarcube, and this is one of their few songs not to be, shall we say, compromised by Einar’s sprechgesang. You ain’t Fred Schneider, mate.

Björk tells the tale of a young girl…

She lives in this house over there
Has her world outside it
Scrabbles in the earth with her fingers and her mouth
She’s five years old

She keeps spiders in her pocket.

She has one friend, he lives next door
They’re listening to the weather
He knows how many freckles she’s got
She scratches his beard
…
He’s got a chain of flowers
And sews a bird in her knickers

People read a lot more into this song than is necessary. It is a simple song about childhood and love and friendship.

Songwriters have a lot of very serious, heartfelt decisions to make. You could write a song detailing the brutal angst and misery of existence, whilst finding redemption in love and the shared human experience. Or you could write a song about banana chips:

Banana chips, banana chips
Banana chips, banana chips
Banana chips, banana chips
Banana chips, oh yeah!

Banana chips for you!
Banana chips for me!
In the afternoon, banana chips and tea

Whilst the lyrics may seem ambiguous in their subtlety, I’m fairly sure Shonen Knife’s Naoko Yamano may have opted for the latter here.

And why not. It’s impossible to watch Shonen Knife without grinning like an idiot. The band have spent decades bringing nothing but joy and happiness and loud music to the world. And here at Threehundredsongs, we fully approve of that sort of thing.

Related: Music to Get You Through It, part i: Shonen Knife, boygenius, Ryan Adams

It was inevitable that Mark Eitzel would put in an appearance here before long.

I laid all my songs at Johnny Mathis’ feet

I interpret this to be a song about turning to your heroes, in hope of validation and approval. I’m not sure it initially works out quite the way Mark hoped:

Johnny looked at my songs and he said:
“Well at first guess, never in my life
Have I ever seen such a mess”

Thanks for that, Mr. Mathis.

“Why do you say everything as if you were a thief?
Like what you stole has no value
Like what you preach is far from belief?”

Certainly, these are questions which do need addressing. At least the criticism is finally becoming constructive. The redemption?

“A real showman knows how to disappear in the spotlight”

We all disappear sometimes, hiding from, or in, the spotlight.

The album is 1993’s Mercury, one of scant few albums produced by Mitchell Froom not to be utterly ruined by his usual tedious, narcissistic, kitchen-sink production.

The album is beautiful from start to finish. Mark Eitzel has an uncanny knack for capturing and communicating human sadness, whilst enrobing it in poetry and glitter and glamour and beauty. His words take to the spotlight like a lonely, tired drag queen still putting on a beautiful, joyous show.

All lyrics © 1993 Mark Eitzel/I Failed in Life Music/Island Music.

Let’s just have some music again.

Morphine were unique.

The band’s frontman was Mark Sandman on two-string bass, with his “mysterious demeanour” and “deep, laid-back croon” [citation: stuff on the internet]. Two-string bass, baritone sax and drums. Who needs more?

Someday there’ll be a cure for pain
That’s the day I throw my drugs away
When they find a cure for pain

Well, here at Threehundredsongs, we hold very little hope of that ever happening. But here are Morphine on the Jools Holland show in 1994:

Mark Sandman passed away onstage in 1999. Best or worst way to go? I’d like to say he died doing what he loved, but he never really seemed particularly happy about anything.

Is there a cure for pain? I wish we could ask Mark.