Mark Myers is an American journalist who covers music, art and celebrities. He published the “Anatomy of a Song” section in the “Wall Street Journal”
The song “Year of the Cat” by the British singer-songwriter of Scottish origin Al Stewart was released in the USA at the end of 1976. It was a catchy but enigmatic song. The song, produced by the British music producer Alan Parsons, tells of a romantic-mystical encounter in Morocco. That year It reached the eighth place in the song charts and over time became a classic.
● How was one of the Beatles’ most famous songs born?
In 2021, to mark the 45th anniversary of its release, a new version of the album “Year of the Cat” was released. Stewart, who co-wrote the album’s biggest hit with the late British musician Peter Wood, spoke about his sources of inspiration. The text presented here was compiled from interviews with Stewart.
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Al Stewart: In England, in the 1960s, the comedian Tony Hancock was a television sensation. He was full of self-criticism and anxiety. He played the underdog character and that was part of his humor and charm.
When I was 21, in 1966, I went to see Hancock in Bournemouth, where he was performing. In a monologue that evening he presented himself as a loser, and wondered why he wouldn’t end it all tonight, here on stage. The audience roared with laughter.
But I had a strange feeling. What if he is serious? What if he is really depressed and discouraged? In ’68, during a concert tour in Australia, Hancock committed suicide.
Source of inspiration #1: Comedian and British princess
Hancock’s cry for help inspired me to write the poem “At the foot of the stage”: “His tears fell like rain / At the foot of the stage”. The song had the same melodic line that served me, a few years later, in “Year of the Cat”.
At the time I worked in a strange way. I would go into the studio and record the basic music of the song. Then I would write lyrics and add the vocals. My American record company, Janus Records, thought I was crazy. I played them what I had recorded and they would ask: “Where are the voices?”. I told them I was still working on it.
In 1974, when I played “At the Foot of the Stage” to the executives at Janus, they liked the music, but pointed out that no one in America knew who Tony Hancock was.
I kept the music but changed the words to “Horse of the Year”, inspired by Princess Anne, Queen Elizabeth’s daughter, who rode horses: “Princess Anne rode / Horse of the Year”. Again, with the same tune.
Because I’m a fan of Bob Dylan, I knew he liked lines like “trails of victory”, “lords of war”, “bells of freedom”. I liked juxtapositions because they gave strong headings.
“Horse of the Year” was a title with relevance, but it could not be taken seriously. I needed a new idea.
The lyrics of the song Year of the Cat
On a morning from a Bogart movie
In a country where they turn back time
You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre
Contemplating a crime
She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running
Like a watercolor in the rain
Don’t bother asking for explanations
She’ll just tell you that she came
In the year of the cat
She doesn’t give you time for questions
As she locks up your arm in hers
And you follow ’till your sense of which direction
Completely disappears
By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls
There’s a hidden door she leads you to
These days, she says, I feel my life
Just like a river running through
The year of the cat
While she looks at you so cooly
And her eyes shine like the moon in the sea
She comes in incense and patchouli
So you take her, to find what’s waiting inside
The year of the cat
Well morning comes and you’re still with her
And the bus and the tourists are gone
And you’ve thrown away your choice you’ve lost your ticket
So you have to stay on
But the drum-beat strains of the night remain
In the rhythm of the newborn day
You know sometime you’re bound to leave her
But for now you’re going to stay
In the year of the cat
Year of the cat
Source of inspiration #2: Astrology book and the movie “Casablanca”
In ’75, I went out with a girl named Marion. One day, in my flat in London, Marion left a book of Vietnamese astrology on the table.
The book was open at the beginning of a chapter called “The Year of the Cat” – the name in the Vietnamese zodiac of 1975.
I looked at my title “Horse of the Year” and the title in the book “Year of the Cat”. The first sounds stupid and the second sounds good. But now I had to make up a story.
Later that morning, we were showing “Casablanca” with Humphrey Bogart on TV. I decided that the song would be about something exotic that happened in the year of the cat:
“In the morning from a Bogart film / in a country where time has turned backwards / you walk in the crowd like Peter Laura / and think about crime”.
I liked what I wrote, then I continued:
“She comes out of the sun running in a silk dress / like watercolor in the rain / don’t bother asking for explanations / she’ll just tell you she came / in the cat’s sleep.”
Source of inspiration #3: Bob Dylan
The woman in the song is not a specific person. It’s an abstract fantasy. And I’ve never been to Morocco, where the story takes place.
The story of the song is influenced by the British writer Somerset Maugham: the idea of going to exotic places, letting interesting things happen to you and flowing with them.
Dylan had a wonderful phrase: “I accept the chaos, but I’m not sure if it accepts me.”
That’s the idea: things come out of nowhere, change your life, and then disappear again.
Also repeating the words “cat year” at the end of each stanza was inspired by Dylan. In many of his songs he does this, for example in “Desolation Row” from 1965. He uses this phrase at the end of each long stanza as a stylistic device.
The band that played the song
Songs have a strange way of becoming hits. I first met Alan Parsons in ’74, while he was working with the band “Cockney Rebel” on the song “Make Me Smile”, which was a #1 hit in Britain.
I was just about to start work on my sixth album, “Modern Times”, the one before “Year of the Cat”. I didn’t have a producer yet.
At this point I realized that I had made five albums that didn’t sound very good. I asked Allen if he would be willing to produce Modern Times. He agreed. If he hadn’t produced “Year of the Cat”, the song would have sounded very different.
It took me a year to write the lyrics. I wrote several versions of the song. By then, I had already recorded most of the music, the birth of which is a story in itself.
My bandmates were members of two successful English bands. Keyboardist Peter Wood and guitarist Tim Renwick were members of The Sutherland Brothers. Bassist George Ford and drummer Stuart Elliott were members of the band Cockney Rebel.
In 1975, we served as the opening act for singer Linda Ronstadt’s tour. During the sound checks, Peter Wood used to play the riff of the song. I heard it, every time, in each of our 19 performances. When I talked to Peter about using that riff in the song, he wanted it to be an instrumental. I wanted to add words.
So I left Peter’s riff as is, as the intro to the song, and wrote lyrics for the rest. That way we both, as writers, were satisfied. The riff and chords of the song came from Peter.
Recordings of the song at “Abby Road”
We recorded the basic tracks for the song at “Abby Road” studios in London in January ’76.
In the middle part of the song we added some solos. First there were the strings, arranged by Andrew Powell. These give the song a cinematic quality.
The acoustic guitar solo is by Tim Renwick, which gives a folk feel. Then he switched to electric guitar. And after that there’s Phil Kenzie’s sax solo.
I wasn’t crazy about the sound of the saxophone, but adding it to singer-songwriter records was very popular at that time. The band members liked Phil’s solo, so we kept him.
Then Peter Wood added an electric keyboard solo. The voices were added in Los Angeles, at Davlen Studios. At the same time Alan Parsons was there, he was working on another musician’s album.
When Alan and I were mixing the song, I said to him: “Let me try something”, and I turned up the bass so that it stood out more. By amplifying George Ford’s bass, you hear the power in the song.
I have no idea if Marion heard the song and if she included it in her astrology book. By the time the record came out, we had already broken up. She married a Frenchman and they moved to Bordeaux. I was left with a song.