Phish.net > Charts > Narration Chart: "Mockingbird", 1992-04-16

TREY: Ok now, this is our first time in Southern California. So, thank you. Very exciting. But right now what we want to do is bring it way down; we want to take you on a little journey back to where we come from, which is a long way away from here.

We’re happy to be here. We’re happy to be out near the beautiful ocean and everything. Where we come from is far away from the ocean so if you watch right now and come with me while we just kind of open the roof up on top of this building. Let some of the air flow in here, and just imagine we’re lifting up off the ground and up into the sky. As you go up into the air, you look down, you can see the lining of the shore go away and the little oil pumps out there in the middle of the uh and all that and it’s kind of lifting up a. You can get up there in the clouds a little bit. We’re gonna take you with us now, back to where we come from, because we’re troubadours from a different place than around here.

So, you’re coming with us now, and the clouds are lifting apart. As we go off, you can start to see sort of the continental divide over there in Colorado and everything. The Midwest, Canada, Alaska, and just going up into the darkness ahead, flipping backwards, flipping backwards and spinning through the eons through time. Time and energy has no meaning anymore. Slowly start to come out and break through the blackness, and you can see us.

Now we’re floating over a different place with large fields. Stretching out in one direction you see a huge, green field. In the other direction, a huge forest that goes on as far as the eye can see. And out of the forest comes an enormous mountain. One huge, individual mountain. And what we’re doing right now is we’re coming in, we’re gonna come land down in the woods of Gamehendge.

We’re coming down into Gamehendge, down as we pass all the different people of Gamehendge. The Lizard people walking around, and they don’t look very happy right now; they don’t look very happy because they’re slaves. They’re slaves to the evil king Wilson, and we know that Gamehendge used to be a beautiful, serene place. Everyone living in peace and harmony with nature. The Lizards used to live in peace and harmony with nature, and they had a book that taught them the ways of life. It was called the Helping Friendly Book. They would read the book every day, and it would give them all the knowledge inherent in the universe.

Once a year they would go out to the field and they would climb out to this great black rhombus that floated in front of the field. They would climb on top of it and pray to their god and thank their god for the great beauty and serenity that they lived in. They looked over, and they saw their god on top of the mountain. None of them actually saw the god but they knew that, for thousands of years, this god had lived up on the mountain and taken care of them because this was the great and knowledgeable… Icculus.

[even though there was music throughout the Mockingbird narration (as is procedure) here is when we hear the walk-up that signifies a shift to Icculus]

TREY: The Great and Knowledgeable Icculus, atop the mountain. But then one day, a traveler came to the land of Gamehendge. And he didn’t know about the great and knowledgeable Icculus because... Icculus was a great man. Icculus had written the Helping Friendly Book years before.

[“Icculus” is followed by the return to “Mockingbird”]

TREY: So, there was Icculus on top of the mountain, looking down at the people, and what he saw was, he saw a traveler, a traveler walking through the woods. The traveler came one day and he walked, and he saw that the people were dependent on this book so he took the book and he stole it from them. He cut down all the trees in the middle of the beautiful forest, and he built a huge, ugly city. He put the book in the top of his castle in the highest tower. The lizard people didn’t know how to live anymore because they didn’t have this book.

So, they decided to form a revolution. They were going to overthrow the evil king Wilson so they got together, and they decided they would try everything they could. They had Rutherford the Brave and Tela, the beautiful Tela was there, and Errand Wolfe and all these other people getting together, trying to overthrow the [Wilson], but they’re failing miserably.

Suddenly one day another traveler came to Gamehendge. His name was Colonel Forbin. That’s who I was just singing about a minute ago. Colonel Forbin came and he saw the revolutionaries, and he said, “You guys, it’s hopeless, there’s only one thing left to do. I’m going to climb up the mountain in the distance. I’m going to climb to the top of the mountain and find the Great and Knowledgeable Icculus and ask him to save us from this predicament.”

So, nobody’s ever seen Icculus before. People believe in him but they don’t know if he really exists because nobody’s been up this mountain; it’s a huge mountain. Colonel Forbin starts climbing up this mountain. He’s climbing and climbing for days and getting hungrier and hungrier and tireder and tireder, but he knows he has to go on. Finally gets up to this one peak. He pulls himself up on top of the peak, and the whole mountain starts to vibrate, boulders tumbling around his head, rocks falling down. Trees! Rocks! Trees! Boulders! Rocks! Trees! Boulders! Rocks! Trees! Boulders! Rocks! Trees! Boulders! And he looks up and he sees the great and knowledgeable Icculus looking down at him. And, Icculus...

[Return to “Icculus”]

...looking down on him. And, Icculus looks down at him and says “Colonel Forbin, I am the Great and Knowledgeable Icculus, and I see how horrible the Evil King Wilson is. He’s enslaved your people. I’m going to give you one chance. I’m going to call on my friend, the Famous Mockingbird, to fly out of the sky...

[Return to “Mockingbird”]

...and land on my shoulder and I will tell the Famous Mockingbird to go to the castle of the evil king Wilson and steal the Helping Frook… Helping Friendly Book… Helking Bendly Frook. And bring it back to the people of Gamehendge; therefore, you’ll be able to know how to live in peace and harmony with nature.”

But he warns him that knowledge is not always good; if you have too much knowledge, it could be bad, so you better watch out when you get this book. At any rate, you’ll have to find that out in a different part of the story. But right now, off in the distance, there he is, the Famous Mockingbird…