It's a shame some of the old threads were lost in cyberspace when the Womb moved to EZ-board format.

I once worked with a friend who was also a bandmate at the time. We carpooled. When he drove, I had to listen to his music; when I drove, it was my music. So I endured scats of Dream Theatre and the like. I was constantly pushing the Church his way. He decided that the music and message of 'The Time Being' did not match. "The music is fluff..."
I did not agree naturally. A song doesn't have to be Pantera to have emphasis!

I will offer some of my views on the lyrics of this wonderful song.
'The Time Being'
Every day
As you notice the sun slips away
A strange turbulence fills the air
Gargoyles and the monkeys
Descend into the city
Teeth are bared, claws outstretched


The world is changing, something unsavory is brewing. Indeed becoming darker, if the 'sun slips away'. What could be more grotesque and horrific than an onslaught of monkeys and gargoyles. Nightmares may come from thinking about it too much. 'Teeth are bared, claws outstretched' Lock your doors.

Down in the pit
I sense the unforgiving night rain down on the overworld
And its souls' unrest
As the temptation fades out
You jump back into yourself
As if falling from a dream


Kilbey, as protagonist, is estranged from the general populous somehow, underground. Like the Morlocks in The Time Machine, night comes down on the people, timorous as cattle with lions on the prowl. Is SK tempted to go up there?
If so, he is jerked back to his senses.

Down comes the rain
Hot clear rain
Washing away our sins
Washing away the statues of Sharon Stone


Not a pleasant Spring shower, rather a cleansing Noah-esque deluge sent to cleanse the Earth of its scum. Very biblical, killing the infidels to erase their sins. I'm certain it's 'statues of Sharon Stone'. Who better represents glorified depravity? She's an accurate symbol of our modern disease of Hollywood worship and misplace faith in our Golden Calves of the media. She clearly stands for so much nastiness (don't all actors/actresses?).

Erosion of my solitude
Begins with snakes
And worms finally penetrating the warmth of my hiding place
Slithering in the blackness
Ah, their coldness repels me
I use a .45 to give them some stick/I was a fool to fight, to give them some stick


Kilbey's hiding place is found out. He is not spared from the apocalypse which is raging above him. Are the snakes (I'm holding firm on the snakes) and worms literal or figurative? At any rate, the madness and chaos have reached our protagonist. It is completely futile as he goes down fighting.
The literal image is powerful alone: SK in his subterranean place, hearing and sensing a cataclysm above, discovering worms and snakes, anathema to our human warmth, infiltrating his solace, indeed coming after him. A lone man struggling for his life against something so unhuman.

Lightning and thunder cause the walls to shake
Someone searching through the debris
For the photograph of his wife/life/hearth


The camera moves up from the scene of SK and the cold beasts in melee to a tremendous storm above. Storms represent a changing force or turning point. This segues into the aftermath of the song's events. Like Jason Robards in the film 'The Day After', portraying a doctor sifting through the rubble of his home, destroyed in a nuclear blast, the song paints a sad image of someone digging through the ruins for a token of what once was.

Oh I want life
I want it now and forever
I want to rise up out of this chamber and clamber into the sky


Don't we all?

Brilliant song. Thanks to the SK and MWP for this one. Cheers, Noel
no method, no guru, no teacher