Portions for Foxes: Throwing Muses

"Portions for Foxes" is a series of weekly posts, each about one song by a woman or a band led by a woman. See the introduction for more.

You know how sometimes, your favorite song by a band is different from everyone else's in the world, but you just don't care?

That's where I am today.

My favorite Throwing Muses song is the obscure Sinkhole, and I just don't care who knows it. I find myself running the chorus in my head randomly, a decade-plus after I first heard it.

This is the version from the In a Doghouse rarities collection; I think it was originally a cassette release back in the '90s.

And it's the story of a sinkhole, as the title implies. It's being narrated in a florid, hyper-religious way by someone - I suspect a nut of some description - and sung in an exaggerated drawl at speed over a loose, jangling arrangement.

It's sundown in the sinkhole,
It's sunrise up on the hill.
The thieves are sleeping in Hades' palm,
And they're keeping very still.
It's summer in Winterhaven,
And the earth, she's caving in.
There's no water on the land,
And it's all because of sin.

I don't take it seriously. I don't think singer/bandleader/songwriter Kristin Hersh ever took it seriously. It's a kinda silly song. But it's got a vibe, and a propulsive energy, and it's the best damn song about a sinkhole ever written. I will die on that "hill."