Bring Me the Head

Mirrored in the eyes
Of your dancing daughter
Beauty with youth
Demanding slaughter

When all is said and done
Would you bring me the head?
When the battle’s lost and won
Could you bring me the head?

Faces raised in expectation
And the conversation’s subject-matter
Is the head of the Baptist
On a golden platter

When the human race is run
Should you bring me the head?
Bring me the head
Bring me the head

Bring Me The Head

The Devil on a Summer’s Day

It was deliciously hot
The day I strolled passed the Devil
Blossom-scent and birdsong filled the air

He had on a navy-blue pinstripe suit
White cotton shirt and purple satin necktie
His mousey-blonde hair was parted to one side

His heals clicked and his tongued clicked
As he shook His head
And walked on by

The Devil On A Summer's Day

Liminality

Dream Break

Blazing blank in our pitiless daze
Raising glasses to our own destruction
Lost in a foreign maze
We took direction from the muzzle of a gun

We crossed an ocean to break a dream
And lost our way despite the signs

You looked to me quite out of sight
Like bitter rumours or forgotten landmines
Ocean-green refracting Greek sunlight
And I almost fell into your eyes

We crossed an ocean to break a dream
We’re drawing up the battlelines

But all of the was long ago
A half-remembered lie
Like a little death, like a sordid show
Like a nuclear bomb falling from the sky

Dream Break

I Am Dead

Screams rip around my fire-hot brain
Like flesh-eating tornados

Anchor-bone cracks, splits
Leaving a trail of pistol-shot echoes

Searing truth bites tight into my skull
I feel like I am dead

Where’s the Asprin? I must have Asprin
I feel like a pig shat in my head

I Am Dead!

Fishboy

Into the Void

We are the perfect wild cacophony
Constructing a machine to shatter the constancy of time
With our gravity

So begins the countdown to oblivion
Booster-rockets ignite
Flickering fatal flames

With the silence of questions
We dearly depart
Separating in stages

Negative return is confirmed
A final utterance
Into the void

Into The Void

Lifesigns

Cosmos

Objectivity

Subjectivity

Nick J Taylor’s new album, Wake, takes on themes of life, death and the universe, in three long tracks that combine elements of electronica and prog-rock, with swirling guitars, spacey keys and solid beats. 

Nick began his musical career in 1986, playing drums for Gloucester punk band Made In Britain. Just over a year later he joined the Cheltenham-based New Secular Religion. Influenced by The Cure and The Sisters of Mercy, the group changed their name to Black September and began playing gigs throughout the UK. One cassette single, She Wore Black b/w White Line was released before the band split in 1990… Only to reform in 2015 with all four original members. In 2023, they released a debut album “A New Religion”, which Nick recorded, engineered and produced - as well as playing drums, of course.

During Black September’s brief hiatus, Nick continued to play drums in several bands, working in various genres, including new wave (Glass Virgin), psychedelic (If April) and prog-punk (Razz Rezz). In the mid-2000s he switched his main instrument to guitar, having previously played occasional lead with an improvisational live act (Pigs In Space).

In 2007 Nick formed ‘Fusion with singer-songwriter Rob Powell. ‘Fusion gigged around Worcestershire and recorded two CD singles before becoming Vermillion Skies, who played numerous successful UK dates, recorded a self-titled album in 2009 and a CD single in 2010, Keep Hold b/w Whoever Laughs Last Thinks Slowest. This quirky last track features the tangled psychedelic guitar work that would come to characterise Nick’s solo work. Vermilion Skies split in 2012.

As well as being involved in the Black September reunion, Nick has recorded five solo albums: Tales from Under the Skin (2020), Organic Structures (2021), Closing All the Loops (2022), Love with a Knife (2023) and Wake (2024).

Closing All the Loops is a dance music album, ranging from pumped-up dystopian beats to a beautiful triptych of trip-hop instrumentals that makes up the mellow heart of the album. Rob Powell of Vermillion Skies appears on the album’s sole vocal track, “Sermon”, singing Nick’s thoughtful lyrics over a chilled hip-hop rhythm, swooning strings and barbed drone guitar. There is a sojourn into reggae and even a beatnik influence with bit of poetry. The closer is a dark-wave synth tune with samples of astronauts’ voices as they make vaguely religious exclamations while in orbit - a mood piece that leaves the listener with spine well and truly chilled.

Love With a Knife is a Post-Punk Dark Wave album with it's roots firmly in the Gothic Rock scene. The lyrics are intelligent and occasionally humorous in their exploration of the familiar theme of unrequited love, through the extended metaphor of military conflict. “Dream Break” simultaneously expresses the frustrations of a vacationing star-crossed couple, whose fantasy getaway turns into a nightmare relationship break-up, alongside a nervy outline of a well-intended peacekeeper intervention that loses its way, triggering insurgency that escalates to nuclear war!… The tone is brooding, but there is also sweet irony: “You looked to me quite out of sight, like bitter rumours or forgotten landmines.” There’s a sense of playfulness in the music too, with the overriding motorik style driven through with passages of mind-expanding psychedelia. Two hauntingly nocturnal instrumentals complement a pair of spoken-word tracks, lending the album a sense of narrative, and the closer, “Queen of Pain” leaves us wondering: “she is coming closer…”?

Nick J Taylor

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