Informative Oddities

The most nifty Caroline of the now defunct but unparalleled Spacehog site keephoggin.com just gave me permission to post the unofficial song back-stories she collected from interviews and discussions with the band. Here they are in their entirety as they were originally posted on keephoggin.com:

In The Meantime (Royston Landgon)
The band wrote this song to make their mark as positive lyricists, and so made it the debut album’s first track. The video, however, depicts bored transvestites watching the band in concert.

Starside (Royton Langdon)
In the song Starside, Royston mentions the TV detective series Starsky and Hutch, which all band members grew up watching.

Space Is The Place (Antony Langdon)
Antony was inspired to write this song by a memory of watching his mother put on make up, and then trying it on himself in curiousity. (“Do what you want; be what you want to be…”).

Mungo City (Royston Langdon)
Mungo City is mentioned here in reference to the science-fiction film, Flash Gordon where the character Ming the Merciless ruled. Lucille Ball states about the film, “The set design looked like a nightmare you have after eating too much Chinese food.”

Skylark (Antony Langdon)
In this song, Jonny makes his first lead vocals debut, however his voice can also be heard introducing Space is the Place on Resident Alien.

2nd Avenue (Royston Langdon & N. Chassler)
2nd Avenue in East Village, NY was once the home for the four band members, before “hitting it big” in the music world. To this day, they are still amazed at how far they’ve come, and take a look back in this song.

This Is America (Royston Langdon, Antony Langdon & Christian Langdon)
In This is America Roy admires his first experience being in New York City, while also writing about the hypocritical lifestyles he saw. It is said that a second consumer warning was made exclusively for Canada because of this song’s lyrics.

I Want To Live (Royston Langdon)
The first single, “I Want to Live”, is an empowering tale of a girl on a path to self-discovery, in the vein of Roxy Music during the ever-great Eno days.

Earthquake (Royston Langdon)
While traveling in New Zealand one summer, Roy was caught in an earthquake and wrote a song about it. This song is one out of several that Roy wrote during his trip. The last two lines are a joke between the band members and stand for an English delicacy.

A Real Waste Of Food (Royston Langdon)
Here, Royston takes some swipes at Antony, and we are given a Roy’s-eye-view of the two brother’s sibling rivalry.

At Least I Got Laid (Royston Langdon & Antony Langdon)
Here, Antony writes a good-humored song about getting laid when all else fails. As a running joke, Ant claims to have written the song in a different city for every time the song is played.

The Horror (Royston Langdon)
The Horror, originally a b-side on “The Craft” Soundtrack, was re-recorded especially for “The Hogyssey” because the band felt it matched the album’s emotional theme.

Thank you Caroline!