We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Armed & Dangerous

from Signmaker (remastered) by Dark Company

/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      €1 EUR  or more

     

about

Armed & Dangerous by Dark Company.
Album: Signmaker

Fun Facts:
* This song is very closely related to The Joker as they both share the same tune in the verses.
* George considered this tune-sharing conundrum a challenge and set about making this song and The Joker appear to not be all that similar after all.
* The original guitar parts came from a groove that George wrote whilst living in Plymouth.
* Verses, intros and instrumentals are largely D7sus4-C7sus4 played around the 5th and 3rd frets respectively.
* The “It’s so dangerous” parts are largely Gm-F-Bb-C.
* Choruses are largely Am7-D add4/A-Am7-Gmaj7.
* The rundown to the chorus is simply Bm-Bbm.
* The tempo is 150BPM.
* When Sammi first heard this song, she sat and thought for a moment, then suddenly said: “I think here it should go like this,” and played the instrumental flute parts.
* She was clearly right!
* During this recording we discovered that giggling and playing the flute are reasonably incompatible activities due to one’s inability to form the correct shape with one’s lips to blow anything resembling music from the silvery pipe of love.
* It took three or four weeks of visits and prolonged outbreaks of the giggles all round before Sammi finally nailed the parts.
* This was the most joyously memorable aspect of the entire recording of the Signmaker album.
* The 12-string was made by Melody.
* George acquired it by swapping a pair of jeans with ripped knees for it, a deal with which he was most chuffed.
* Some years later the guitar was willfully destroyed by the stamping boot of a drunken Satan’s Slave at an Ug Brothers after-show party (harumph).
* Jeff borrowed the soprano sax from the legend who is Chrissie Burnett, and recorded his parts before becoming a more permanent Dark Company member.
* The bass for Armed & Dangerous had already been recorded when he arrived.
* The guitars were plugged straight into the desk.
* George used the lyrics for this song in a rather fiendishly difficult English lesson when working as a TEFL teacher.
* When he ran seminars for other TEFL teachers on The Use of Music in the Classroom he would set the lesson’s tasks to groups of teachers, and even they would struggle with it.
* Definitely a lesson for good Upper-Intermediate to Advanced students, especially those who feel like they know it all already.
* Pete wrote this song about the circus and the strains of enforced jolliness.
* George felt that it was about the unwanted and resented child whose role in life was to be its parent’s performing monkey, e.g. “aren’t I clever because isn’t my little Johnny clever”.
* This song would have become part of the Alien Heat set had the band lasted longer.
* To correctly spell the title of this song, an ampersand must be used.
* George and Jeff each produced a dub remix of this song, available as Signmaker bonus tracks.
* Thus it came about that the ampersand would be used for &co., the remixing arm of the Dark Company project.

lyrics

ARMED & DANGEROUS
In the circus there’s a uniform for fun
The love they got is fired from clownish guns
But it’s so dangerous
Armed laughter changing us
Warmed up with a yellow paper sun

Each act in line comes right in on cue
Bringing our emotions into view
And it’s so dangerous
Armed laughter changing us
Next time bring your mind along with you

There’s a pistol in my smile
It shoots grins for miles and miles
But look into my eyes
The reflection’s saying goodbye

Outside the ring we sit and blankly stare
Nobody but our own selves in the chair
But it’s so dangerous
Armed laughter changing us
Close your eyes and no-one knows you’re there

With animals such tricks are neatly made
They nod and wink in terminal parade
It’s oh so dangerous
Armed laughter changing us
Into their souls we think we can invade

There’s a pistol in my smile
It shoots grins for miles and miles
But look into my eyes
The reflection’s saying goodbye



Words by Peter Greatorex.
Copyright ℗ 1990 D & G Music.

credits

from Signmaker (remastered), released December 16, 2010
.

Lyrics by Peter Greatorex.
Music by George Davies/Peter Greatorex/Sammi Lock/Jeff Willmot.

Performers:
Peter Greatorex – vocals
George Davies – electric and acoustic guitars, bass, Boss DR220A drum machine
Sammi Lock – flute
Jeff Willmot – soprano sax
Rowena Parsons – tenor sax

Recorded, mixed and produced by George Davies at Silent Running Studios, Exeter, Autumn 1991.
Remastered at Wud Records Studios 2010.

Originally released 19th December 1991.
First re-release March 1992.
Second re-release June 2000.
Third re-release 16th December 2010.

Cover Art:
Arrows of the Sun by Peter Greatorex

Copyright ℗ 1990 D & G Music.
Copyright © 2010 Wud Records.

See also:
www.wudrecords.co.uk/artists/dark-company
www.explicitmusic.co.uk/lyrics-information/dark-company/signmaker/armed-dangerous
twitter.com/Dark_Company
www.facebook.com/Dark-Company-154909774522910/
www.instagram.com/wudrecords/
twitter.com/WudRecords

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Wud Records

Wud!
You have just been wudded. ;-)

EU/UK independent label founded 1984.

ROCK! Progressive, psychedelic, art, folk, hard, alternative, etc. Eclectic composition & musicianship.

contact / help

Contact Wud Records

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this track or account

Wud Records recommends:

If you like Wud Records, you may also like: