The Queen of the City of Ice

Song infobox
Name = The Queen of the City of Ice


Caption =
Type = Song
Artist = Shadow Gallery
alt Artist =
Album = Shadow Gallery
Published =
Released = 1992
track_no = 7
Recorded =
Genre = Progressive metal
Length = 17:08
Writer =
Composer =
Label =
Producer = Carl Cadden-James and Shadow Gallery
Chart position =
Tracks =
prev = Say Goodbye to the Morning
prev_no = 6
next =
next_no =
Misc =

"The Queen of the City of Ice" is the seventh and last song of the album Shadow Gallery from the band of the same name. It differs from the previous tracks as to musical composition, focusing on the vocal arrangements, made by Mike Baker, Brendt Allman and Carl Cadden-James, and on the story told on the song. This track is divided into five chapters (they don't have name) and one instrumental on the fifth chapter. The story is told sometimes by a person and sometimes by a people.

ong analysis

Chapter One

Here we are introduced to a world (or place) where the skies are grey and the sun is gone. People has only known misery. But one rainy day a Queen appears, crowned with gold, and gathers all the people by her side. One Man has fallen in love with the Queen, he needs her, and he'll never let her go.

Chapter Two

As the Queen decides to make a City of Ice, we learn that the Man has been "lost", only to be "awakened" by the Queen. The Man now dreams with the Queen, dreams full of love. Soon the Man realizes (or believes) tha a 'frozen love' is still in the Queen's eyes.

Chapter Three

The Man reflects about the Queen's arrival. Somehow he always knew this day would come. Then he points that the days would come, and go, and melt, away from their home (this means that the Man still has hopes with the Queen). Then, one day, the Queen sings, and the Man can read in her eyes, and begins to have feelings 'so hard to describe, like marching armies from the South, and all the way she is blind'. Now the Man notes that the Queen is falling.

Chapter Four

The City of Ice is soon invaded by other people, who begins to build around the City. Eventually the City is melted by the 'mighty fires'. The people of the City runs to the hills, but the Queen couldn't escape the melting and she sinks beneath the sea produced by the melting. Nobody know the fate of the Queen.

The people of the City, safe but homeless, returns to the place that once was their City of Ice, but now there is a sea. So, in the shore, they kneel and grieve. But suddenly someone shouts "Look... the water is freezing over into a sea of ice". The Man now remembers how hard and cold was life before the Queen's coming. But once the Queen had arrived, he never thought she would ever leave him.

Chapter Five

Now the Man stands alone, looking to the sea of ice, wondering if she is waiting him, but how can he finds it out, he asks himself. The once people of the City of Ice leaves the frozen sea, looking for a new beginning, but the Man stays behind. At first he thinks of abandoning this place, but now he knows that the Queen has passed away, he will stay with her. He knows she is dead, but the water is frozen ("For She is dead, but she is here").

Personnel

* Brendt Allman - Acoustic and Electric guitars, vocals
* Mike Baker - Lead Vocals
* Carl Cadden-James - Bass guitar, vocals, Flute, Fretless bass
* Chris Ingles - Piano and Keyboards

Additional musicians

* Ben Timely - Drums and percussion (Ben Timely is a name that the band gave to the Alesis HR-16 drum machine).