By Uncleben
From Ovid to Kafka, Shakespeare to Eric Carle, Homer to Lewis Carroll, writers have had an abiding fascination with metamorphosis, whether in physical shapeshifting or behavioural transformation. Last week, the Song Bar community were asked to think of musical riffs on this theme - and these are the 10 A-listers and 10 B-listers that made me reach for the bottle labelled 'Drink Me'.
Philip Glass - Metamorphosis: One
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous vermin. This did not bode well for his job as a travelling salesman or his relationship with his father, mother or sister. Kafka's tale of Gregor's forlorn attempt to adapt to his new existence whilst holding on to some fragment of his human past inspired Glass's solo piano piece Metamorphosis, of which this is the first of five movements.
Jacques Dutronc - Les Métamorphoses
Sounds like Dutronc has been at the absinthe again. As the clock strikes midnight, he enters a feverish state and mutates into a werewolf. As the clock strikes two, four and six, he metamorphoses in turn into a vampire, Frankenstein (I think he means the monster) and Dr Jeckyll (I think he means Mr Hyde). From his second album, a masterpiece of late 60s psychedelic rock.
Steeleye Span - Two Magicians
A traditional English folk ballad of shape-shifting wizardry, drawing from centuries of Euro-Asiatic tales in which women try to evade men's clutches by assuming new physical forms, usually (as happens here) spurring on their pursuers to try and outwit them by taking on rival forms. In this version, it doesn't end well for either the young maiden or the blacksmith that's out to get her.
Viagra Boys - Pyramid of Health
My social media have been bombarding me since the New Year with advice on how to live a healthier lifestyle. Viagra Boys have similarly been promised seven easy steps to health and happiness, but I don't think they're impressed by the results. Lead singer Sebastian Murphy describes standing on a mountain and being turned to dust, before a little green worm gives him a sludgy liquid from a nearby tree that turns him into a bag of meat.
Cat Power - Werewolf
A fine cover of a Michael Hurley song that invites us to have sympathy for the plight of the werewolf, because he's someone just like you and me. In the Middle Ages, the ones who came off worst were the supposed werewolves, who got persecuted in the same way as alleged witches. They must have wished they were the genuine article so they'd have a better chance of getting back at their persecutors.
Material Issue - Something's Happened to Catherine
Our next two selections move us on to the transformations that can occur in our late adolescence or early adulthood, as our hormones tell us it's time to rebel against our upbringing and give our parents a jolly hard time. In Catherine's case, this involves cutting off all her hair and getting a tattoo. Stellar power-pop from a Chicago band of the 80s/90s that were entirely new to me.
The Hold Steady - One for the Cutters
Girl goes away to university and starts partying with a rough group of townies (the "cutters" of the title). Witnessing a boy die in a knife-fight and lying in court to provide an alibi for one of the suspects is not the outcome her parents were hoping for when they sent her to a cute little town with boutiques and cafes. A typically gutsy narrative from Craig Finn, a man described as the Kerouac of American rock.
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Jubilee Street
A harrowing track that is quite hard to decipher but seems to be about a man killing a prostitute because she's blackmailing him, with the pressure building slowly and inexorably to an intense finale in which the murderous narrator declares: "I'm transforming, I'm vibrating, I'm glowing. I'm flying, look at me now." I'm not so sure about giving transcendent moments to murderers, but it's an extraordinary ending to one of Cave's finest songs.
Gillian Welch & Alison Krauss - I'll Fly Away
A more positive take on spiritual transcendence, courtesy of what is apparently the most recorded gospel song of all time. Though not a personal believer in God's celestial shore and the transformation that will await us there, I'm very much a believer in listening to Gillian Welch and Alison Krauss, whose version appeared on the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack (though it was a 1950s version by the Kossoy Sisters that featured in the film itself).
Susanne Sundfør - Reincarnation
We finish our A-list with perhaps the ultimate form of transformation, the rebirth or transmigration of our soul or consciousness into a new physical body. Sundfør's narrator thinks she maybe sees her former partner's soul flashing and dancing on the horizon, which an annotator on one lyrics website earnestly assures us is a veiled reference to the 80s film Flashdance. Sundfør herself said of the song that, when the world looks bleak and things get rough, we need to sing soothing ballads instead of screaming at each other. I'll drink to that for 2026.
The Amazing Alteration A-list Playlist:
Philip Glass - Metamorphosis: One
Jacques Dutronc - Les Métamorphoses
Steeleye Span - Two Magicians
Viagra Boys - Pyramid of Health
Cat Power - Werewolf
Material Issue - Something's Happened to Catherine
The Hold Steady - One for the Cutters
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Jubilee Street
Gillian Welch & Alison Krauss - I'll Fly Away
Susanne Sundfør - Reincarnation
The Beautiful Butterfly B-list Playlist
Nona Hendryx - Transformation
A nailed-on A-lister until I realised it had been listed for a previous topic (songs with or about ambiguity).
Richard Hell & The Voidoids - The Kid with the Replaceable Head
He can choose from the heads on his shelf. Like Mr Benn choosing what costume he's going to wear that day.
The Triffids - Butterflies into Worms
The hungry caterpillar in reverse.
Screaming Trees - Transfiguration
Jesus' transfiguration involved bursting out in bright rays of light. It's not clear what type of transfiguration Screaming Trees have in mind, but it's a scorching tune.
Big Black - L Dopa
Steve Albini's take on Oliver Sacks's book 'Awakenings', specifically the story of a woman who entered a coma at the age of 21, was 'awakened' over 40 years later with the help of the drug levodopa, and not surprisingly was unable to cope with her transformation into a much older woman.
Bill Frisell - White Fang
Cracking instrumental track, inspired by Jack London's story of a wolf-dog's journey from wild savagery to happy domestication, which was possibly in part an allegory for London's own transformation from teenage hoodlum to respectable author.
Grateful Dead - Jack-a-Roe
An 18th century ballad about a young woman who, in fine folk song tradition, disguises herself as a man so she can go to sea and save her true love, Jack the sailor.
Yes - Turn of the Century
A sculptor brings his wife back to life by carving her form in stone and, in turn, transforms himself.
Horace Silver Quintet - Metamorphosis
Silver on fine form with horn section Art Farmer and Hank Mobley.
Richard Strauss - Metamorphosen for 23 Strings
Surrounded by the devastation wrought on Germany by the Second World War, Strauss found solace in Goethe's writings about the continuous metamorphosis of living beings and how the essential core of our being survives these constant changes. A mesmerising performance here by the Norwegian Symphony Orchestra.
Guru’s Wildcard Pick:
Helen Reddy - Angie Baby
Creepy tale of an outsider girl who stays in her room listening to the radio, a boy from the local neighbourhood who breaks into her room with malign intentions, and the transformative power of a volume button.
These playlists were inspired by readers' song nominations in response to last week's topic: Music and metamorphosis: songs about transformation. The next topic will launch on Thursday after 1pm UK time.
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