Procol Harum

Beyond
the Pale

Novum words competition

Win a signed album or a pair of VIP passes

Early info about Novum, 2017's new Procol Harum studio album, is in the BtP / Gary Brooker interview which broke the news

Now that the radio-edit of Sunday Morning has been broadcast, there’s excited speculation among fans about what the rest of the new album's song-words will be like.

So here’s a little bit of fun which might land you a signed copy of the album, or a meet-and-greet session with the band for two.

There are eleven songs on Novum.

BUSINESSMAN	CAN’T SAY THAT	DON’T GET CAUGHT
THE ONLY ONE	I TOLD ON YOU	IMAGE OF THE BEAST
LAST CHANCE MOTEL	NEIGHBOUR	SOLDIER
SOMEWHEN	SUNDAY MORNING

And here we offer you twelve sung lines (one each from a Novum song, and one from an unrelated song)

A	Who made you do your homework?	G	I’m never alone
B	The flowers in his garden laugh at me	H	I rest my defence
C	Slowly creeping up the rungs	I	I think of all the bad times
D	My life before her was some kind of hell	J	Every day another turn of the screw
E	If you blaspheme about my schemes	K	Eternal buildings turned to dust
F	I know I’m quite elusive	L	Creepy priests, iconic heroes

Your task:

To find the odd-one-out … in other words, find the line that belongs to a song whose title is not listed above.

How am I going to do that?

You could use your skill and judgment (trying to match the flavour of each line to the content suggested by one of the titles)

Or …

You could just have a shot in the dark, giving yourself a one-in-twelve chance of being right.
Get a ‘significant other’ to enter as well, and you’ll have a one-in-six chance.
Or a neighbour, if you’re a craver after more.

The prize?

A pair of VIP passes for one Procol Harum concert of your choice during the Novum tour (starts 6 May).
NB these VIP passes will entitle you to meet and greet the band after the show … but they won’t get you into the show … you’ll need to buy concert tickets in the regular way for that, of course

Or …

If you can’t make any live shows, a CD copy of Novum signed by the band.

How to play:

Just send one letter of the alphabet (from A to L inclusive) to ‘Beyond the Pale’ c/o webmaster@procolharum.com

For example, if you think ‘I’m never alone’ isn’t heard in any of the eleven songs listed above, send us a message saying ‘My single-letter answer is ‘G’’.

Simple!

The competition will close on St Patrick's day [17 March 2017] at 23:59 GMT, after which a glamorous assistant (subject to availability) will pluck the winner’s name from the BtP Homburg.

Thanks to Chris Cooke for the prizes here

Competition winner and answers