Love Spreads

Love spreads her arms
Waits there for the nails
I forgive you boy, I will prevail
Too much to take, some cross to bear
I'm hiding in the trees with a picnic
She's over there, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah

She didn't scream
She didn't make a sound
I forgive you boy, but don't leave town
Coal black skin, naked in the rain
Hammer flash in the lightning
They're hurting her again

Let me put you in the picture
Let me show you what I mean
The Messiah is my sister
Ain't no king man, she's my queen

Let me put you in the picture
Let me show you what I mean
The Messiah is my sister
Ain't no king man, she's my queen

I had a dream, I've seen the light
Don't put it out, yeah she's all right
Yeah she's my sister

She didn't scream
She didn't make a sound
I forgive you boy, but don't leave town
Coal black skin, naked in the rain
Hammer flash in the lightning
They're hurting her again
Yeah, yeah, yeah

Let me put you in the picture
Let me show you what I mean
The Messiah is my sister
Ain't no king man, she's my queen
(x8)

I had a dream, I've seen the light
Don't put it out, yeah she's alright
Yeah, she's my sister

Lyrics by:
Squire

Music by:
Squire

Written:
1992

Personnel:
John Squire (guitar)
Ian Brown (vocals)
Gary Mounfield (bass)
Alan Wren (drums, backing vocals)
Simon Dawson (Yamaha acoustic piano)
Nick (tambourine)

Producer:
Simon Dawson

Engineer:
Simon Dawson

Format:
Released November 1994:
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine (Geffen, GFS 84, 7" Jukebox release)
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine / Breakout (Geffen, GFSTD 84, CD)
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine (Geffen, GFSTD 84, cassette)
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine (Geffen, GFS 84, 7")
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine / Breakout / Groove Harder (Geffen, GFST 84, 12")
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine / Breakout (Geffen, GEFDM-21885, Australian CD in cardboard sleeve)
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine (Geffen, GEFCS-19210, Australian cassette)
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine / Breakout (Geffen, GED 21885, German CD)

Released December 1994:
Love Spreads / Your Star Will Shine / Breakout (Geffen, MVCG-13012, Japanese CD)

Released 2nd July 1995:
Love Spreads ('Version 2') (Geffen, No catalogue number, US promo video)

Released September 1995:
Help! LP (feat. specially recorded studio version of Love Spreads) (Go! Discs, 828 682-1, LP)
Help! CD (feat. specially recorded studio version of Love Spreads) (Go! Discs, 828 682-2, CD)

UK chart details:
Love Spreads entered the charts on 3rd December 1994, spending 8 weeks in the charts and reaching a highest position of 2.

Also available on:
Second Coming (5.46)
The Very Best Of The Stone Roses (5.48)

First live performance:
Oslo Rockefeller Music Hall (19 April 1995)

Artwork details:
The Love Spreads artwork is from 'Love Spreads' (1993).

Details:
Love Spreads was The Stone Roses' comeback single and the last of four singles to reach the Top Ten. It was their highest chart position, peaking at Number 2. Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream called it "one of the greatest comeback records ever" (Melody Maker, 12 / 07 / 97). Like I Am The Resurrection, the traditional image of Jesus Christ is being challenged on this track; on this occasion, colour and gender ("Coal black skin....They're hurting her again"). None of the Gospels give any account of Jesus' physical description. Gnosticism, some branches of which believe the Spirit of God to be a feminine creative force known as Sophia, is one of the strongest threads running through The Stone Roses' work. On this song, it is the most overt. We are told many times that the Messiah "ain't no king" but instead is a "queen". Many Gnostics taught that from God emanated other Aeons, pairs of lesser beings in sequence. The Aeons together made up the fullness of God. The lowest of these pairs were Jesus Christ and Sophia. Hence, Jesus Christ and Sophia are brother and sister respectively in the context of this song. The narrator for the majority of the lyrics is Jesus ("The Messiah is my sister. Ain't no king man, she's my queen") and in some lines of the narration, tells the story of how a female figure was on the cross for the crucifixion. The song was described by Squire as a "hijacking of religion" and certainly creates confusion in the mind of the listener as to the 'true' identity of Christ. We learn from the opening two lines that the figure on the cross is female; by the third line, the narrator is speaking in personal ("I" = male as I have explained above) terms. This pattern is repeated in the second verse ("She" in the first two lines; "I" in the third). In the Gnostic creation myth, Sophia (see Sophia) sought the unknowable One, being so distant from her. In one account, she saw a distant light ("I had a dream, I've seen the light" - Sophia is speaking these lines) which was in fact a mirror image, and thus drifted even farther away from the pleroma. Sophia's fears and anguish of losing her life, just as she lost the light of the One, caused confusion and longing to return to it. Jesus later returns and lets her see the light again ("Don't put it - the light - out, yeah she's all right" - Jesus is speaking these lines), bringing her knowledge of the spirit.

This dialogue from a Dave Simpson interview with The Stone Roses for Melody Maker (13 / 05 / 95) demonstrates the views of the band on religious matters:

Simpson: One thing I particularly liked about Love Spreads were the lyrics "The Messiah is my sister", which sound really innocuous when you hear them on the radio but in fact you're questioning thousands of years of Christianity by saying that. It's a casually controversial thing to have in a pop song.

Brown: "I don't see it as controversial."

Simspon: Tell that to the Pope !

Brown: "Well, if you read the Dead Sea scrolls, they tell you that Mary Magdalene gave Him his power."

Maddix: "Do you know what The Bible calls the church ? 'She'. It's like what The Bible calls the earth, 'Mother Earth'."

Simpson: Maybe, but it's always been written that God / Jesus was a Him. You could be on the brink of a major religious and political storm here, with people - in Italy or Ireland say - burning records in the street like they did with The Beatles !

Squire: "The idea of the song is, 'Why couldn't Jesus have been a black woman ?' It's just an attack on the white guy with a beard sittin' on a cross, cos that reinforces the patriarchal society."

Led Zeppelin are a heavy musical influence: listen to Love Spreads where John fades out his guitar (3.16 - 3.20) (3.59 - 4.03). Then listen to ‘For Your Life’ (0.09 - 0.12) (1.14 - 1.17) from the 'Presence' album. The Love Spreads riff has parallels with the section of Led Zeppelin's 'Whole Lotta Love' where it goes quiet. Other Led Zeppelin songs of influence are 'In My Time Of Dying' from 'Physical Graffiti', and 'Moby Dick' from 'Led Zeppelin II'. Like Love Is The Law, the song appears to be an amalgamation of Page's work. 'Voodoo Child (Slight Return)' by Jimi Hendrix may also have been an influence (Steve Adge once told me that Squire would ring him and leave snippets of Voodoo Child (Slight Return) on his answer machine !).

Beck makes a cameo appearance in the U.S. video for Love Spreads as a gold-prospector. He is on the right of your screens when you first see the two prospectors together, and also the person who gets thrown out of the bar.

"A friend of mine was directing it and I came down to visit. They had a shot where they needed someone sitting in the river with a big beard trying to pan for gold so I did that. I had to wear a three-foot long beard."
(Beck speaking to Uncut magazine, October 2006)

This is Simon Dawson speaking to Sound On Sound magazine in May 1995:

"They did this in pre-production with John Leckie, and when it came to Rockfield it was completely different -- quite thin-sounding. We decided to redo it with Paul Schroeder, before he left, and spent quite a lot of time trying to get it right. John added some guitar, and I didn't think the riff was right for it. After Paul Schroeder had gone, we ended up scrapping it completely. We started from scratch again, and just had the band play in the studio until Reni came up with something that sounded quite groovy with Mani. John detuned his guitar and came up with the riff that goes through the verse, which I thought was great. We worked from there.

"The end was quite a problem for a while -- where it all breaks down and then builds back up again. I had the idea of building up a lot of backing vocals, lots of lines and harmonies, and it was difficult getting it all to sit. John had a guitar idea from one of the earlier versions which the band really liked, so he put that it in about three-quarters of the way through the build-up. But he wanted something similar to echo that at the start of the build-up. So that's how you got the piano coming in at the start of that build-up. For quite a while, the ending sounded quite messy, but it all came together in the end."
(Simon Dawson speaking to Sound On Sound magazine, May 1995)

The UK Love Spreads video featured super-eight footage of the band, with Mani in a devil outfit, John in a chicken suit and Ian dressed as 'Death'. MTV did not like this video and so the band made a second, more palatable to the American audience than the grainy first effort. In the U.S. version, the band perform in front of an oilrig, not unlike The Clash video, 'Rock The Casbah' (a Top Ten hit in America for The Clash). The scene in the first video where Ian, dressed as Death, pulls along a cart containing Mani may have its origins in a scene from the left-hand side of a Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525 - 1569) painting, 'The Triumph of Death' (c. 1562). In this specific scene, a skeleton representing Death, rides a knackered horse dragging along a cartload of human remains. This segment can be juxtaposed with a work from another Reformation Era artist, in order to find the source of Squire's inspiration, Albrecht Dürer's (1471 - 1528) 'The Knight, Death and The Devil' (1513 - 14). The lyric "I'm hiding in the trees with a picnic, She's over there, yeah" may be referring to Matthew the Tax Collector being up a tree (eating) while watching Jesus ("She's over there"). Perhaps this lyric is alternatively (or is polysemic in its incorporation of both meanings) alluding to Manet's 'Le Dejeuner Sur L'Herbe', where a male in the trees with a picnic ("I'm hiding in the trees with a picnic") is pointing towards a nude female ("She's over there"):

The song paints a graphic picture of the crucifixion. "Love Spreads her arms, waits there for the nails. I forgive you boy, I will prevail" highlight Jesus' willingness to give up His life and His assurance that He would rise again in three days. Jesus gives assurance throughout the Bible that He will prevail against evil. His forgiveness towards those who conspire against Him is evident even when crucified (Jesus forgives three times in the song, illustrative of how He was constantly forgiving throughout His life):

Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.
(Luke 23: 34)

He also was forgiving of the thief on the cross beside Him, an event touched upon on Fall. Regarding the lyric "I forgive you boy, but don't leave town", when Jesus healed people, it was tantamount to Him forgiving them of their sins. This line relates to when Jesus would heal a sick person but ask that they not go and spread news to other people of what had just taken place. Jesus, fearful that His reputation would spread too soon, wished to keep a low profile to begin with in His ministry, partly for His own personal safety from conspirators. "Coal black skin naked in the rain, hammer flash in the lightning, they're hurting her again" - for three of the six hours that Jesus was on the cross, the area was covered in darkness; the "hurting" refers to the injuries He sustained prior to His trial (whipping, beating etc) and the soldiers and onlookers who mocked and abused Him on the cross. The severity of Jesus' beating is not detailed in the Gospels. However, in the book of Isaiah, it says that:

Just as there were many who were appalled at him. His appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness.
(Isaiah 52: 14)

"She didn't scream, she didn't make a sound..." - at Jesus' trial, he never spoke and "was led like a lamb to the slaughter". During the crucifixion, He did not respond to the taunts of His persecutors:

He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.
(Isaiah 53: 7)

The song draws attention to the great suggering that Jesus went through, a retreat from the palatable image that one is otherwise presented with. The song conveys the suffering in a striking manner, like Matthias Grünewald's (c. 1475 - 1528) depiction, The Crucifixion (1515). Peter Paul Rubens (1577 - 1640) is also notable for breaking from traditional depictions in this depiction of the immediate aftermath of the event, Descent From The Cross (painted between 1611 and 1614). The Stone Roses stood apart from the other high-profile bands of the hedonistic 'Madchester' era, in their fusion of religion (specifically Gnosticism) and art. Other bands of the 'Madchester' era had elements of religion in their songs (for example, 'Hallelujah' by The Happy Mondays in 1989) but none drew upon religion as much as The Stone Roses (the Roses have more in common with U2 than with any Madchester act, in terms of the extent to which they drew upon the Bible in their work). The Stone Roses were not the only act of their time to be challenging 'traditional' religious viewpoints, however. Suede's 'My Dark Star', from their 'Stay Together' single (released in February 1994) is thematically comparable to Love Spreads, in its concept of a black female Messiah, and looking outside the musical sphere, 'Sincerity Forever', a play by Mac Wellman (which debuted in 1990), also portrayed Jesus as a black female.

The wording of 'Love' spreading 'her arms' upon a cross may have been influenced by a sonnet by Michelangelo (1475 - 1564):

At last my life's course, in its fragile barque
Has crossed the stormy seas to reach that port
Where all arrive and give due account
For every deed done ill or piously.
I see now how error-bound was that fond dream
That made my art an idol and a king,
A thing that men contrarily desire.
What will become of amorous dreams, so vain
And once so glad, now I approach two deaths ?
One is for sure: the other menaces.
No painting and no sculpture can now soothe
The soul which turns towards that divine love,
Arms spread upon the cross to take us in.

Squire would use Michelangelo's most famous sculpture (David) for the Ten Storey Love Song artwork. Jesus going on the cross was the perfect example of His love, the supreme commandment, acting as a sacrifice for the sins of the world:

Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question:

"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law ?" Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."
(Matthew 22: 34 - 40)

In the second Love Spreads video, John can be seen on a donkey, recreating the scene of Palm Sunday, which marks the beginning of Jesus's last week before crucifixion. From 'The Triumphal Entry':

The next day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting,

"Hosanna !"

"Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord !"

"Blessed is the King of Israel !"

Jesus found a young donkey and sat upon it, as it is written,

"Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion;
see, your king is coming,
seated on a donkey's colt."
(John 12: 12 - 15)

John Squire uses techniques of Andy Warhol (1928 - 1987) in the first Love Spreads video. The scene where an infinite number of Love Spreads cherub logos are seen filling the screen has strong parallels with Warhol's '100 Campbell's Soup Cans' (1962). The same scene is shown again later in the video, except on this occasion, the logos are shown in a distorted black and white colour. This technique can be seen in many of Warhol’s works, for example, 'Marilyn Diptych' (1962), in which he 'cheapens' an icon by distorting the appearance of several Marilyns, thus sabotaging her uniqueness. Squire follows Warhol's lead in transposing the labels 'high' culture and 'popular' culture. Warhol's painting of a Campbell's soup can is based on an image from popular culture but is now exhibited in an art gallery and is considered to be 'high' art, whilst at the same time being reproduced in various mediums which have mass circulation. Squire, is taking a piece of 'high' art (the sculpture of a cherub from Newport) and mass-producing it in order to bring it into popular culture. A badge using this emblem was an item of merchandise during the Second Coming tour (Noel Gallagher can be seen wearing this badge on the Jonathan Ross show appearance with Ian Brown, 10/09/04, to promote the release of Keep What Ya Got). A later piece by Squire, 'Ingredients 4' (2004), the ingredients for HP sauce on a two-by-three-metre canvas, has a strong influence of the art pop pioneer.

A scene in the first Love Spreads video uses a work of art by Andrew Wyeth (1917 - ), 'Winter, 1946'. Look out for a clip of Ian running along a beach. Imagine a view of the Wyeth painting from on top of the hill. In the video, Ian looks up at the person filming him (second shot below). He then runs along a beach for a few seconds. The filming of him ends at the exact point at which he looks right, almost as if the person filming wanted to have a freezeframe of that image to look like the above painting. The Love Spreads clip is shot in black and white and Ian is wearing all-dark clothing. The two scenes are very alike - the only difference is that they are shot from opposite ends of the respective main figures.

Also in the first Love Spreads video, note how when the main body of the song (and thus the crucifixion) is over and the coda is about to begin, we see the sky become completely dark. In his visual representation, Squire is faithful to the account of the Bible:

From the sixth hour until the ninth hour darkness came over all the land.
(Matthew 27: 45)

In the first Love Spreads video, John can be seen painting the CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) logo.

Love Spreads was used in a Red Cross advertisement and in a season 4 episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, entitled "Invisible Evidence". Oasis's 'Better Man', from their 'Heathen Chemistry' album, is influenced by Love Spreads.

November 1994 - First Love Spreads video stills:

January 1995 - Second Love Spreads video stills:

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