This Be The Verse

“Baby’s on fire | Better throw her in the water

Look at her laughing | Like a heifer to the slaughter”

“Baby’s On Fire” comes off of Eno’s 1973 debut album Here Come the Warm Jets — if you can think of a greater album name, please email me. The title prompts images of some freshly middle-aged product of glam-rock wading in his infinity pool with two model types declaring the phrase as if to offer comfort. And that’s kind of how “Baby’s On Fire” plays out: slightly tense with a false sense of ease. The guitars are agitated and percussive, the drums are mechanical… but over top of it all is this warm boomy bass and nasal voice.

In a sense the song doesn’t really go anywhere after Eno’s voice enters the picture — the hi-hat counts away the sixteenth-notes till the track abruptly cuts off at 5:19. That being said, the most striking component of the song is the guitar solo: the meat in the burger, the icing in the Oreo. What you didn’t know was that the guitar stylings are brought to you by the letter F for Fripp (see Suite No. 1). I guess once you’re told that the King Crimson guitarist was recruited for “Baby’s On Fire” you recognize his tendencies: the staccato minimalism, the spastic picking, the Frippian way. If you can stomach it, stick around for “Cindy Tells Me.”

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