Babylon and On

Babylon and On is the seventh album released in 1987 by the British new wave group Squeeze.

History

Eric "ET" Thorngren produced the album, along with Glenn Tilbrook. The group officially expanded to a sextet with the addition of former Soft Boys member Andy Metcalfe; a bassist in that group, here Metcalfe was used as a second keyboard player (behind Jools Holland). However, despite being pictured and billed as a full member of the band, the track-by-track musician listings included with this album reveal that Metcalfe only played on three songs: "Tough Love", "The Prisoner" and "Some Americans". Metcalfe left Squeeze before their next album was recorded, although he worked again with Glenn Tilbrook during his solo years. The album peaked at number 14 in the UK Albums Chart, the highest ranking there for a Squeeze album, aside from greatest hits compilations, until Cradle to the Grave (2015) reached number 12.

The album was released in September 1987 and gave them their biggest US hit single, "Hourglass." The song became an unexpected US hit for the band, reaching number 15 on the Billboard Hot 100, which Chris Difford attributed to the video for the song as much as the song itself: "I would think that the video has had a lot to do with it. It’s been played a lot, and everybody you speak to compliments you on it. When you meet fans after gigs, they say, “Your video’s great.” They don’t say, “Your album’s great.” So it’s the first thing they think of."

Footprints (poem)

"Footprints", also known as "Footprints in the Sand", is a popular allegorical text written in prose.

Content

This popular text describes an experience in which a person is walking on a beach with God. They leave two sets of footprints in the sand behind them. Looking back, the tracks represent various stages of their life. At various points, the two trails dwindle to one, especially at the lowest and most hopeless moments of the person's life. When questioning God, believing that the Lord must have abandoned His love during those times, God gives the explanation: "During your times of trial and suffering, when you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you."

Authorship and origins

The original authorship of the poem is disputed, with dozens of people claiming to have penned it. Rachel Aviv in a Poetry Foundation article discusses the various claims and suggests that the source of this poem is the opening paragraph of Charles Haddon Spurgeon's 1880 sermon "The Education of the Sons of God".

Sandra

Sandra may refer to:

People

Animals

Places

Film

Music

Acronyms

Other uses

See also

Sandra (film)

Vaghe stelle dell'Orsa is a 1965 Italian film directed by Luchino Visconti. It was released as Sandra (Of a Thousand Delights) in the USA and as Of These Thousand Pleasures in the UK.

Plot

Visconti's retelling of the Electra story starts with Sandra/Electra (Claudia Cardinale) returning to her ancestral home in Italy - and reviving an intimate involvement with her brother (Sorel) which troubles her naive husband (Michael Craig) - on the eve of an official ceremony commemorating the death of her Jewish father in a Nazi concentration camp. As ever with Visconti, he is ambivalently drawn to the decadent society he is ostensibly criticising; and Armando Nannuzzi's camera lovingly caresses the creaking old mansion, set in a landscape of crumbling ruins, where the incestuous siblings determine to wreak revenge on the mother (Bell) and stepfather (Ricci) who supposedly denounced their father.

The title, culled from the poem "Le ricordanze" by Giacomo Leopardi, could be translated as 'Glimmering stars of the Great Bear', and has a strong resonance with the movie's plot:

Sandra (Barry Manilow song)

Sandra is a song that was originally recorded by Barry Manilow on his album, Barry Manilow II in 1974. The song was also recorded by Dusty Springfield on her album It Begins Again.

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