Completely in the Dark

There’s this 12-year-old kid who’s got his own bedroom and he’s lying awake on a mid-winter night. It’s probably, oh, around 1971 and he’s got a clock-radio on a bedside desk, and oversized Sony headphones are cupping his young head.

“What’s he listening to?” you might be wondering.

Well, I can answer that.

It’s late night FM radio and the DJ is playing The Moody Blues’ song “Question” (the long version). It’s jazzing the beejeebers out of this kid, like having the top of his head popped off.

So much coming at him. So much thinking going out.

It’s driven by those insistent, thrumming guitars backed by soaring voices, a roving bassline and the lyrics: “Why do we never get an answer, when we’re knockin’ at the door?”

Immediately, images fly past: a burning world of persecution, yeah, just like the Vietnam War on the TV news every night