Originally titled “Shelter of My Heart”, it is the 11th track off of The Wedding Album, and was reportedly written during a period of time when the band gathered at Warren Cuccurullo’s place in London to write and record.
Lyrics
Just come softly to me
In the shelter of my heart
I watch you from my window, working this vicious road
You shudder when the wind blows,
Girl you’re looking beat and cold
Don’t know your situation, but you look so alone to me
In my imagination this is how the message reads
(Reaching out for your love, for your love babe)
Just come softly to me,
(Reaching out.. Calling out for your love, for your love babe)
In the shelter of my heart
Trust my intuition you’re the one I’ve got to know
I give without condition wouldn’t try to save you’re soul
Money or reputation doesn’t mean a thing to me
Special communication it’s the only thing we need
Reaching out… Calling out
Just come softly to me
Calling out… Hear me now
In the shelter of my heart
(Reaching out.. calling out for your love, for your love babe)
Calling out… Hear me now
Just come softly to me
(Calling out.. Calling out for your love babe)
Hear me now… do you read me?
In the shelter of my heart.
Here is no hurt to feel
Here is safe for lips unsealed
In the shelter of my heart
Reaching out, for your love, for your love babe
(Just come softly to me)
Reaching out, calling out for your love, for your love babe
(In the shelter of my heart)
Reaching out… Calling out
Just come softly to me
Calling out… Hear me now
In the shelter of my heat
(Reaching out.. calling out for your love, for your love babe)
Calling out… Hear me now
Just come softly to me
(Calling out.. Calling out for your love babe)
Hear me now… do you read me?
In the shelter of my heart.
Audio Track
Rhonda
One good thing about these reviews is that they provide a sincere challenge. In my case, the challenge is to revisit some albums and tracks I may not have thought about it at least a few years, and Shelter is in that column.
I appreciate the accented notes that hit at the beginning of the track, as well as throughout the chorus. If you were falling asleep beforehand, you shouldn’t be after hearing those! I notice a few other things about the song to begin with, one of those being that the song really isn’t guitar-driven. I’m sure there is guitar buried down in the tracks that comes up for the occasional breath of air, but in this song, I’d call it rhythm guitar if anything. I hear more than a couple tracks of synthesizer that provide the melody, along with Simon’s vocals – sometimes drifting and dancing into a sort of “falsetto-esque” style that certainly works with the song.
I like the jazzy syncopated rhythm, and wonder briefly if this wouldn’t have been a great single – which is easy to say, except that back in 1993, would it really have worked? I’m not so sure. Things were so different at the time, it’s hard to make judgments for music recorded in the 1990s with ears stuck in 2020.
What I can say, is that the track fits well on The Wedding Album. As one of the final three songs on the album, the music gets your attention, and the words are meaningful. The song seems to be about creating trust and a safe place – definitely not a dated topic, even in 2020!
While the song feels more electronic than I might normally prefer, it is still one of the standout tracks on The Wedding Album. The song continues to broaden the band’s chops musically – stretching their reach well beyond the one-time New Wave “bucket” they’d been thrown in. I can appreciate the band moving past pop to deliver a sound that is far more mature than what many fans and critics might have expected, although in some ways I have to wonder if that hurt them going forward, as their relevance to youth seems to fade from this point – just as their most dedicated fans are entering adulthood. My point being that along with other tracks from this album, the band begins to sound more adult contemporary than anything else. Did the maturity of their sound hurt rather than help as their career charged ahead from this point? I’m not sure.
Amanda
This is one song that often gets skipped over in my mind even when thinking about the Wedding Album. I’m not sure why that is. It could be because it isn’t one of the two big hits or a song that grabbed my attention like Too Much Information or Breath After Breath. Maybe, it is due to where it is on the album and I don’t pay as much attention to songs towards the end. I’m not sure. Nonetheless, I appreciate the chance to revisit it for the purpose of this blog.
What is even more interesting about the fact that this song is often forgotten by me is how jarring the beginning is. You would think that I would remember it more because of that. This isn’t the only song that has a very noticeable beginning. For instance, All You Need Is Now starts out in a very unique fashion. In that case, I hated it at first and learned to love it. In this case, I’m not a fan. It feels very different than the rest of the track. I’m not sure why they chose those loud notes at the beginning. Did they worry that the track would get lost in the mix? Did they like those notes so much that they wanted to showcase them? I don’t know but that does not work for me. That said, there are other parts of the song that I really love.
To me, the best part of the song is the vocals. This song reminds me about how vocals can act as an additional instrument. In this case, I feel like you can practically see and hear Simon smile throughout both the verse and the chorus. Likewise, I love the lyrics of the chorus. As I think about it, I almost wonder if the song would have benefitted from a slightly slower tempo or a less electronic feel as the chorus seems so straight-forward, so open. There might be a disconnect between the mood of the lyrics and the instrumentation. It is interesting to note that there really isn’t much to the lyrics, though. Were they completely finished? Could they have added more? Maybe.
Overall, this song has elements that I think are really strong, including the vocals and the lyrics of the chorus. I wonder, though, if it would not have benefitted from different instrumentation, especially that opening.
