UK chart hits of 1989 - Part 1

thousand-shadows.mp3

Machine Soul

In Those Days is the whole film in audio form: score and songs woven into one dark fantasy journey through the book of Judges. Oblige imagines ancient Canaan as a crownless, mythic world where toppled idols, broken vows, and flawed “heroes” move through smoke, brass, and electric shadows.

The Score side carries the cinematic spine: overtures and motifs for a land with no king, sleazy temple grooves for Baal-berith, crooked odd-meter stealth for the left-handed assassin, noir prophecy cues under the palm tree, war engines for iron chariots, midnight jazz in Jael’s tent, Gideon’s winepress anxiety, Jephthah’s vow in the dark, Nazarite themes for a man who looks ordinary but carries impossible power, and the final collapse of pillars and pride.

The Songs side gives those same stories a voice: a rock-opera prologue of “every man doing what is right in his own eyes,” a temple nightclub hymn to Baal, a sly assassin confessional, a haunted Deborah/Barak duet as the stars fight from heaven, a trembling Gideon pulled out of hiding, a daughter caught in the teeth of her father’s promise, and the quiet heartbreak and seduction orbiting Samson.

Musically, it lives where big-band jazz, progressive rock, cabaret noir, and film score collide—horns, upright bass, guitars, piano/organ, drums, and strings all sharing motifs across both albums. Heard together, this “complete motion picture soundtrack” plays like a movie that hasn’t been filmed yet: one continuous arc from “In those days there was no king…” to the unresolved hush of No King in Israel.

After The War

Gary Moore

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