Translation: The Woman in the Dunes (Shigeru Suzuki)

Shigeru returned to California to record Band Wagon, with a case of mild guilt about turning away from Caramel Mama, who had been working on his new songs alongside Hosono's Tropical Dandy and assorted other projects; but Shigeru felt the band's new exotica leanings were straying too far from what he needed, which was to make up for all the songs he didn't write as a member of Happy End.

He was in town when George Harrison and his gloomy Dark Horse tour came through. Shigeru went to see them, was besotted (and no surprise; look up the grainy AUDs that survive, they're awesome), got back to his hotel room, picked up his guitar, started playing around with the opening chords to My Sweet Lord, and came up with The Woman in the Dunes (Suzuki/Matsumoto).

Takashi borrowed the song's title from a Kobo Abe novel. In an interview a few years back, he called this set of lyrics his favorite of everything he's written. I can't see why — I think they're good, but not extraordinary — which probably means that I didn't understand the song and, by extension, that this translation isn't up to scratch.

:::

Snow is gliding

on the wind.

Waves are thundering

as they crash

like bolts of lightning

on the shore.

"Your kind of landscape,

right?" you murmur

and turn your eyes 

desolately away.

Come on,

quit joking around.

Your reckless gaze

draws the irritated lines

of a whirlpool of heat

on the water.

"Just say something

already, anything," you mutter,

your cheeks

frozen solid.

Come on,

quit joking around!

The grains of sand here

are as sharp as needles.

I hold you to me

as if to keep you safe.

Come on,

let's go back to town already.

Come on,

let's go back to town...

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