We have recently commented in a special article on the 5 best songs by Labi Siffre, following the virality of some of them on social networks in recent years, especially ‘Bless the Telephone’. He is one of the great “lost” British singer-songwriters of the 70s who, although he scored some hits on the British charts during the 70s and 80s, seemed completely forgotten. In recent years, his music has resurfaced thanks to TikTok, although it had previously been sampled by artists like Jay-Z or Eminem.
Right in the middle of the revival of his career, Siffre has announced his first album in 28 years, a work titled ‘Unfinished Business’, which will go on sale at the end of the year.
Siffre, who made enemies in the industry during the 70s for refusing to publicly hide his homosexuality and has explained that in his career he has had a worse time “for being gay than for being black,” had said that in recent years he had managed to form the “family of his dreams” thanks to his polyamorous relationship with two men, Peter and Rudolf. The three-couple lived together for 16 years on a mountain in south Wales, with Siffre living the “perfect life” until both Peter and Rudolf died within two and a half years.
Labi, Siffre and Peter had lived together as a couple in a ménage à trois since the mid-1990s. Labi and Peter formalized their relationship as a civil couple in 2005 and were together until Peter’s death in 2013. In December 2014 Labi and Rufold were united in legal marriage, and lived together until Rudolf’s death in 2016.
Perhaps that is why ‘Far Away’, the first preview of ‘Unfinished Business’, is a desolate farewell song, based on a melancholic piano melody, in which Siffre admits not seeing a tomorrow after the death of his life partners. “They said we would be together until the end, but then you left and left me without my love, without a friend,” he sings in the lyrics. Although the text seems dedicated to a single person, it can be interpreted as intended for each of them separately.
The heavenly backing vocals that accompany Siffre’s vocal melody on ‘Far Away’ and its piano chords reinforce the song’s message of helplessness. Then, the entrance of a melancholic trumpet redoubles the emotion. Siffre, at 80 years old, remembers an innocent love in the lyrics, writing about two “children in the forest holding hands”, whose love makes them immune to the “monsters” that want to “catch” them, but in the end he appears lost and desolate: “Everyone tells me that I will be fine, but they don’t know that I died when you left that day. You see me standing here, but I’m far away.” Thanks to Jerome for the suggestion on the forums.
