If there is such a thing as a “perfect” song, my vote goes to Tim Buckley’s Song to the Siren as the most likely candidate. Ever since it first entered my life in 1984, it has been a go-to piece of music whenever I’ve been gripped in the melancholy of romance. It’s the song you want to put on whenever you’re feeling alone or when that special someone you thought was your soulmate turns out to be another lost leader. It’s the perfect “poor me” tune or the ideal song to sink into when you’re adrift in that sea of forlorn love-sickness. Most people who know the song are familiar with the 1983 version by This Mortal Coil, but there are a lot of other splendid versions out there too and it has something of a fascinating history, which starts with that oddball “pre-fab four”, The Monkees.
By the beginning of 1968, The Monkees had reached a point in their career where they were able to have a bit of a say in not only their own artistic direction, but in helping the careers of other artists whom they admired. This manifested in ways like using the set on their TV show to display the work of various upcoming visual artists, bringing Jimi Hendrix to tour with them as an opening act and featuring performers on their TV show like Frank Zappa. On what would turn out to be the final episode of the series, The Frodis Caper, director Micky Dolenz booked upcoming singer/songwriter Tim Buckley to perform on the show in his first network television appearance.
For the performance, which was recorded live and not lip-synced, as was normally done for such shows, Buckley insisted on playing a song he and his songwriting partner, Larry Beckett, had written sometime in late 1967, but hadn’t released yet. This wasn’t a popular decision for the show’s producers because such opportunities were generally used to promote new releases or some physical product the public could go out and buy, but Tim insisted and the appearance was recorded with him debuting Song to the Siren for the world. The episode first aired on March 25, 1968. Not long after this, spurred by the disastrous box-office of their debut feature film, HEAD, NBC pulled the plug on the Monkees TV show and set the band adrift.
On March 4 & 5, 1968, Buckley went into the studio and recorded a version of Song to the Siren using the same basic arrangement he’d use for the Monkees TV show. The only addition to his 12 string accompaniment was a bit of minimal electric guitar and bass. This version, however, would never be released in Buckley’s lifetime. It got shelved and would only ever come out years later, first in 1999 as part of an interment only collection of rarities, and then in 2001 as part of a CD retrospective collection.
It was two years after the Monkees appearance that he re-recorded the song with a very different, more psychedelic arrangement featuring electric guitar accompaniment instead of the 12 string acoustic. This was the version released on Buckley’s 1970 LP, Starsailor. In addition to the updated arrangement, the lyrics were modified slightly as the line “I’m as puzzled as the oyster” didn’t sit right with Buckley and was changed to “newborn child” on the 1970 recording. At the time of its release, Starsailor represented something of an abrupt shift in style for Buckley, veering off the “folk” trail and into more jazz & experimental territory. As a result, the album would require some distance from its release before people would retroactively begin to appreciate his bold adventurism. Because of that, Song to the Siren probably lost a lot of potential fans at first. This, however, wasn’t the first version of the song to be released.
The first ever official release of the song was by Pat Boone on his 1969 album, Departure. Boone’s interpretation completely misses the nuances of the work by treating it as if it were some kind of novelty sea shanty. He even crudely grafted on this ridiculous “Yo-ho-ho” pirate refrain as an intro before proceeding to bluster his way through an entirely unsympathetic rendition. As such, it was up to the original Monkees performance to buoy the song along in syndicated reruns for the next 2 decades. The song wouldn't find its full flower until 1983. This was when Elizabeth Fraser & Robin Guthrie of Cocteau Twins would record a version for the 4AD label’s “super-group” collaboration/compilation project, This Mortal Coil.
Fraser and Guthrie managed to finally grasp the song’s ethereal essence and translate it into a recording which immediately captures the imagination of anyone who hears it. Fraser’s angelic voice was the perfect vehicle for the song’s mythical lyrical threads and she became the very embodiment of the “siren” from the Greek legends which inspired the song. Her voice sounded enchanting enough to lure any number of sailors to their doom along those rocky shores. Along with a suitably intimate and beguiling promotional video, tailor-made for the emerging MTV generation of the era, the ingredients were at last right for the song to become enshrined as a pop music touchstone.
Since then, it has continued to build momentum as a popular standard with a multitude of cover versions snowballing with each new generation of music makers. Since it’s re-emergence in 1983, it has received some very respectable treatments from the likes of Sheila Chandra (2001), Robert Plant (2002), Bryan Ferry (2010), Sinéad O'Connor (2010) and Dead Can Dance (2013), to mention only a few of the more notable renditions. It’s a song that has also proven to be relatively bulletproof in terms of interpretation, at least since its butchery by Pat Boone. It’s a song that lends itself well to a variety of vocal styles and arrangements while maintaining its ethereal beauty.
In its essence, the song comes to life thanks to the emotional resonance it generates. It’s a kind of tension between longing and loss and a contrasting sense of hopelessness and optimism. Thematically, the foundational concept of it is the myth of the Greek sirens, the enchanting creatures of the sea who vex sailors with a song so alluring that they are inescapably drawn to the shores where their vessels are smashed against it’s craggy rocks. It uses this myth to weave a braid of the feelings of helplessness, anticipation and sorrow which one is possessed by when experiencing the deep passions of romance, particularly the tragic kind. There’s a sense that love is a doomed adventure, but that it’s so beautiful that it’s worth the price of one’s own demise. There’s a kind of surrender to the inevitable in the lyrics. “Should I stand amid the breakers or should I lie with death my bride?” Should I try to resist or should I give in to my doom? “Swim to me, let me enfold you” is the act of surrender and sublimation into the inescapable nature of it all. It’s a kind of melancholy that washes over you like the tide.
Structurally, the song has been referred to as the perfect marriage of melody and lyric and for good reason. There’s a flow to it all that makes every movement as natural as rolling waves on the shore. Each line and verse flows together so seamlessly that you can’t resist the current of it as it carries you along. There’s not a wasted meter or measure in it as it has that ideal economy of an ecosystem in immaculate balance. The tune swells and subsides as automatically as breathing. It’s no wonder that it has become such a favorite standard for contemporary vocalists.
For me, and for many others, the definitive rendition remains the one by This Mortal Coil as it was the one which breathed new life into the song after languishing, mostly forgotten for over two decades. This was the first version I can recall, which is odd because I have been a huge fan of the Monkees ever since I was a toddler when the show debuted. Yet I don’t recall Buckley’s performance from my youth and it was only when the show was revived by MTV in 1986 when I saw The Frodis Caper episode again and had to pick my jaw up off the floor when I realized where the song had originated. I have found myself returning again and again to that Monkees show performance since then. There, in the simplicity of Tim's heartfelt rendering, with nothing but his voice and guitar, that you feel like you're witnessing the birth of an angel. That it would end up being the “swan song” for the TV series is somehow appropriate as The Monkees became victims of their own tragic love story, lured into their own rocky shore. But we can be thankful that this rendition has survived in these reruns for future generations to be able to witness this remarkably intimate revelation as it occurred all those years ago.
