Icario era campesino en el Ática y tuvo la mala suerte de caerle bien a Dioniso, que le regaló el secreto del vino. Icario compartió la bebida con unos pastores, que nunca habían probado nada así en su vida. Se pusieron hasta atrás, y al día siguiente despertaron con el peor crudón de la historia: no sabían qué era una resaca, así que pensaron que Icario los había envenenado. Lo mataron a golpes y lo enterraron sin más.
Dioniso, furioso por lo que le hicieron a su amigo, lo subió al cielo. Ahí sigue Icario, convertido en Boótes, el Boyero, arreando a las Osas por toda la noche.
Letra
Down in ancient Attica, Icarius opened up the cask,
A gift from Dionysus, no dark or twisted task.
The vineyard workers cheered, their laughter filling all the air,
They sang along the hillside without a single sorrow there. (dancing in the grove!)
They held their cups together, they danced until the embers died,
Shared brotherhood and music, washed in the crimson tide.
A night of easy joy beneath the canopy of trees,
Where music rode the branches and swayed upon the breeze.
Then dawn broke on the hillside, a heavy sickness in their breath,
Blind panic in the morning mist, convinced they drank of death!
They mistook the dizzy sunrise for a poison in their blood,
And turned their drunken rage into a violent, blind flood! (blind flood!)
Arcturus burns in the frozen night,
Boötes herds the celestial flight!
Driving the oxen, steering the plow,
Tracking the bears round the northern brow!
(They threw the master down the well…)
Turned harmless joy into living hell!
(Follow the arc across the sky…)
Where honest plowmen never die!
They threw him in the shadows, buried beneath the mountain clay,
Until his faithful daughter found where her murdered father lay.
Sweet Erígone weeping, broken in the olive shade,
She tied the cord and hung herself beside the hollow blade. (hanging from the bough!)
Then madness swept the valley like an airborne plague of dread:
Young maidens took the rope until the village wept and bled!
The murderers repented, praying on their bloody knees,
To lift the wicked curse among the weeping olive trees! (wrath divine!)
Then dawn broke on the hillside, a heavy sickness in their breath,
Blind panic in the morning mist, convinced they drank of death!
They mistook the dizzy sunrise for a poison in their blood,
And turned their drunken rage into a violent, blind flood! (blind flood!)
Arcturus burns in the frozen night,
Boötes herds the celestial flight!
Driving the oxen, steering the plow,
Tracking the bears round the northern brow!
(They threw the master down the well…)
Turned harmless joy into living hell!
(Follow the arc across the sky…)
Where honest plowmen never die!
Dionysus took the shepherd and he set him in the stars,
Far beyond the madness, beyond the mortal scars!
Look north along the great bear’s tail: follow the golden arc!
Arcturus guides the farmer’s eyes across the velvet dark! (follow the arc!)
With Izar and with Muphrid carved in timeless diamond stone,
The Herdsman walks forever by the frozen cosmic throne!
(Driving the plow!)
(Chasing the bears!)
Arcturus burns in the frozen night,
Boötes herds the celestial flight!
Driving the oxen, steering the plow,
Tracking the bears round the northern brow!
(They threw the master down the well…)
Turned harmless joy into living hell!
(Follow the arc across the sky…)
Where honest plowmen never die!
Follow the arc to Arcturus…
The boyero drives the sky.
Behind the Great Bear,
Behind the Little Bear.
(Never dying…)
Boötes herds the dark.
Como en cada canción de Astronomika Beats, aquí hay más de un guiño astronómico escondido. Si ya los cazaste, cuéntanos en los comentarios qué encontraste. Si no, dale otra escuchada con atención.