Silence is Golden

The phrase “silence is golden” is an encouragement to silence, that comes from a Swiss inscription dating back to the early 1800s.  Keeping your mouth shut is a great virtue and saying nothing may be preferable to speaking.  There is an old proverb that says, “Speech is silver and silence is golden.”  The poet Thomas Carlyle translated the phrase from German in Sartor Resartus, in 1831, where a character expounds at length on the virtues of silence saying, “Silence is the element in which great things fashion themselves together; that at length they may emerge, full-formed and majestic, into the daylight of Life, which they are thenceforth to rule.  Not William the Silent only, but all the considerable men I have known, and the most undiplomatic and unstrategic of these, forbore to babble of what they were creating and projecting.  Nay, in thy own mean perplexities, do thou thyself but hold thy tongue for one day: on the morrow, how much clearer are thy purposes and duties; what wreck and rubbish have those mute workmen within thee swept away, when intrusive noises were shut out!  Speech is too often not, as the Frenchman defined it, the art of concealing Thought; but of quite stifling and suspending Thought, so that there is none to conceal.  Speech too is great, but not the greatest.”  If you have nothing of value to say, then just shut up!

The Tremeloes are an English rock and roll band, founded in 1958 in Dagenham, Essex.  They had fourteen UK and two U.S. Top 20 hit singles.  They first got together in 1958, when the original members were all in their teens and the original line-up consisted of Brian Poole (vocals, guitar), Alan Blakely (drums), Alan Howard (saxophone), and Graham Scott (guitar).  Blakley switched from drums to guitar (which Poole relinquished) after Dave Munden joined to play the drums and Howard switched to bass at this time.  In May of 1966 Howard was replaced by Mike Clark, but he only lasted a mere three months.  Chip Hawkes joined in 1965 as singer and bassist.

The band was originally known as the Tremilos, but thanks to a misspelling, they got a new name.  They made a recording of an old Four Seasons’ B-side to ‘Rag Doll’.  ‘Silence is Golden’ was written by Bob Crewe and Bob Gaudio and for the Tremeloes this went to #1 in the UK and reached #11 in the US.  It was released on their 1967 album Suddenly You Love Me.  All the group’s members shared vocals in this song, although most of their songs featured either ‘Chip’ Hawkes or drummer Dave Munden as the lead singer.

Oh don’t it hurt deep inside
To see someone do something to her
Oh don’t it pain to see someone cry
How especially if that someone is her
Silence is golden
But my eyes still see
Silence is golden, golden
But my eyes still see
Talking is cheap people follow like sheep
Even though there is no where to go
How could she tell he deceived her so well
Pity she’ll be the last one to know
Silence is golden
But my eyes still see
Silence is golden, golden
But my eyes still see
How many times will she fall for his lines
Should I tell her or should I be cool
And if I tried I know she’d say I lied
Mind your business don’t hurt her you fool
Silence is golden
But my eyes still see
Silence is golden, golden
But my eyes still see
But my eyes still see
But my eyes still see

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Sunday Writing Prompt “Shut Up” hosted by Yves.