Hemispheres

• Released October 1978 by Mercury Records
• Went Platinum (1,000,000 copies) on December 1, 1993
• Purchase This Album

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1. Cygnus X-1 (Book II: Hemispheres) (Total Time 18:04)
   (I.) Prelude (4:29)
   (II.) Apollo: Bringer of Wisdom - (III). Dionysus: Bringer of Love (4:36)
   (IV.) Armageddon: The Battle of Heart and Mind (2:55)
   (V.) Cygnus: Bringer of Balance (5:02)
   (VI.) The Sphere: A Kind of Dream (1:06)
2. Circumstances 3:40
3. The Trees 4:42
4. La Villa Strangiato (An Exercise in Self-Indulgence) (Total Time 9:34)
   (I.)"Buenos Nochas, Mein Froinds!" 0:27
   (II.) "To sleep, perchance to dream ..." (1:33)
   (III.) "Strangiato theme" (1:16)
   (IV.) "A Lerxst in Wonderland" (2:27)
   (V.) "Monsters!" (0:26)
   (VI.) "The Ghost of the Aragon" (0:36)
   (VII.) "Danforth and Pape" (1:41)
   (VIII.) "The Waltz of the Shreves" (0:26)
   (IX.) "Never turn your back on a Monster!" (0:11)
   (X.) "Monsters! (Reprise)" (0:14)
   (XI.) "Strangiato theme (Reprise)" (1:04)
   (XII.) "A Farewell to Things" (0:15)

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Lyrics

• Cygnus X-1 (Book Two: Hemispheres) (Lee, Lifeson, Peart)
  
  I. PRELUDE
  
  When our weary world was young
  The struggle of the ancients first began.
  The gods of Love and Reason
  Sought alone to rule the fate of Man.
  
  They battled through the ages,
  But still neither force would yield.
  The people were divided,
  Every soul a battlefield.
  
  II. APOLLO: BRINGER OF WISDOM
  
  "I bring truth and understanding,
  I bring wit and wisdom fair,
  Precious gifts beyond compare.
  We can build a world of wonder,
  I can make you all aware.
  
  I will find you food and shelter,
  Show you fire to keep you warm
  Through the endless winter storm.
  You can live in grace and comfort
  In the world that you transform."
  
  The people were delighted
  Coming forth to claim their prize
  They ran to build their cities
  And converse among the wise.
  
  But one day the streets fell silent,
  Yet they knew not what was wrong.
  The urge to build these fine things
  Seemed not to be so strong.
  
  The wise men were consulted,
  And the Bridge of Death was crossed
  In quest of Dionysus,
  To find out what they had lost.
  
  III. DIONYSUS: BRINGER OF LOVE
  
  "I bring love to give you solace,
  In the darkness of the night,
  In the Heart's eternal light.
  You need only trust your feelings;
  Only love can steer you right.
  
  I bring laughter, I bring music,
  I bring joy and I bring tears.
  I will soothe your primal fears.
  Throw off those chains of reason
  And your prison disappears."
  
  The cities were abandoned,
  And the forests echoed song.
  They danced and lived as brothers;
  They knew love could not be wrong.
  
  Food and wine they had aplenty
  And they slept beneath the stars.
  The people were contented
  And the Gods watched from afar.
  
  But the winter fell upon them
  And it caught them unprepared,
  Bringing wolves and cold starvation,
  And the hearts of men despaired.
  
  IV. ARMAGEDDON: THE BATTLE OF HEART AND MIND
  
  The Universe divided
  As the Heart and Mind collided,
  With the people left unguided
  For so many troubled years.
  In a cloud of doubts and fears,
  Their world was torn asunder into hollow Hemispheres.
  
  Some fought themselves, some fought each other.
  Most just followed one another,
  Lost and aimless like their brothers,
  For their hearts were so unclear,
  And the truth could not appear.
  Their spirits were divided into blinded Hemispheres.
  
  Some who did not fight
  Brought tales of old to light.
  My Rocinante' sailed by night
  On her final flight.
  
  To the heart of Cygnus' fearsome force
  We set our course.
  Spiralled through that timeless space
  To this immortal place.
  
  V. CYGNUS: BRINGER OF BALANCE
  
  I have memory and awareness,
  But I have no shape or form.
  As a disembodied spirit,
  I am dead and yet unborn.
  
  I have passed into Olympus
  As was told in tales of old,
  To the city of Immortals,
  Marble white and purest gold.
  
  I see the gods in battle rage on high,
  Thunderbolts across the sky.
  I cannot move, I cannot hide,
  I feel a silent scream begin inside.
  
  Then all at once the chaos ceased.
  A stillness fell, a sudden peace.
  The warriors felt my silent cry
  And stayed their struggle, mystified.
  
  Apollo was atonished;
  Dionysus thought me mad.
  But they heard my story further,
  And they wondered, and were sad.
  
  Looking down from Olympus
  On a world of doubt and fear,
  Its surface splintered
  Into sorry Hemispheres.
  
  They sat a while in silence,
  Then they turned at last to me.
  "We will call you Cygnus,
  The god of Balance you shall be."
  
  VI. THE SPHERE: A KIND OF DREAM
  
  We can walk our road together
  If our goals are all the same.
  We can run alone and free
  If we pursue a different aim.
  
  Let the truth of love be lighted,
  Let the love of truth shine clear.
  Sensibility, armed with sense and liberty,
  With the Heart and Mind united in a single perfect Sphere.
  
  
• Circumstances (Lee, Lifeson, Peart)
  
  A boy alone, so far from home,
  Endless rooftops from my window.
  I felt the gloom of empty rooms
  On rainy afternoons.
  
  Sometimes, in confusion,
  I felt so lost and disillusioned,
  Innocence gave me confidence
  To go up against reality.
  
  All the same, we take our chances,
  Laughed at by Time,
  Tricked by Circumstances.
  Plus ça change,
  Plus c'est la même chose,
  The more that things change,
  The more they stay the same.
  
  Now I've gained some understanding
  Of the only world that we see.
  Things that I once dreamed of
  Have become reality.
  
  These walls that still surround me
  Still contain the same old me,
  Just one more who's searching for
  The world that ought to be
  
  
• The Trees (Lee, Lifeson, Peart)
  
  There is unrest in the forest,
  There is trouble with the trees,
  For the maples want more sunlight
  And the oaks ignore their pleas.
  
  The trouble with the maples,
  (And they're quite convinced the're right)
  They say the oaks are just too lofty
  And they grab up all the light.
  But the oaks can't help their feelings
  If they like the way they're made.
  And they wonder why the maples
  Can't be happy in their shade.
  
  There is trouble in the forest,
  And the creatures all have fled,
  As the maples scream `Oppression`
  And the oaks, just shake their heads
  
  So the maples formed a union
  And demanded equal rights.
  "The oaks are just too greedy;
  We will make them give us light."
  Now there's no more oak oppression,
  For they passed a noble law,
  And the trees are all kept equal
  By hatchet, axe, and saw.
  
  
• La Villa Strangiato (Lee, Lifeson, Peart)
  
  (Instrumental)