Awoken

Featured in Sane Inside Insanity

Written as a poem at sixteen and recorded at Faraday Studios, London, in 2005.

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About the Song

Awoken began life as a poem written by Michael Doyle at the age of sixteen. Drawing upon memories of primary school in Manchester during the 1970s, its words recall a world of convent education and stern discipline, but also childhood loneliness and a yearning for love, understanding and belonging.

The lyric remained untouched for many years until work began on the Doyle recording project. During sessions at Faraday Studios in London in 2005, producer Paul Castle suggested taking what had been a quiet, reflective poem in an altogether different musical direction — a blues-rock arrangement driven by harmonica. The transformation gave the teenage words an unexpectedly raw and distinctive setting while preserving their original vulnerability.

The song explores themes that would much later reappear throughout Sane Inside Insanity: childhood, loneliness, faith, the search for meaning and the enduring influence of early religious experience. Nuns, convent schooling and Jesus Christ all inhabit the lyric, reflecting both Michael’s upbringing and a spiritual awareness already beginning to emerge in adolescence.

Although the recording was completed and subsequently released, both Michael and Castle initially regarded Awoken as unfinished. There remained a sense that further production might one day improve it. Michael eventually decided otherwise: the recording would remain as it was, its simplicity and imperfections forming part of its character and authenticity.

Featured in the Doyle Documentary

Awoken appears twice in the Doyle Documentary, accompanying two separate sections of the film.

First appearance — 1:59 →

Second appearance — 13:30 →

Selected Lyrics

The lyrics of Awoken preserve fragments of childhood memory with a mixture of sadness, humour and the peculiar logic of a young boy trying to make sense of the adult world. The journey to school becomes a “solemn walk, so lonely and miserable”, while the reassurance of home survives in the simple instruction: “2p in your pocket, your mama knows best — so be a real good boy now, just do your best.” Elsewhere, the recollection of “stern nuns, hard and dangerous” captures the fear and bewilderment of convent schooling through the eyes of a child.

One of the more unusual phrases is “neglected of ptyalin”. Ptyalin is an enzyme present in saliva that begins the digestion of starch while food is being chewed. The lyric plays with the old association between appetite, enjoyment and salivation: food eaten reluctantly, without enthusiasm or pleasure, becomes food “neglected of ptyalin”. It is an oddly scientific phrase for a childhood recollection, but that incongruity is part of the character of Awoken — a poem written at sixteen looking backwards at loneliness, discipline, family and the small details of growing up.

Recording History

c. 1984 — Manchester

• Original poem written by Michael Doyle at the age of sixteen.
• Inspired by memories of childhood and convent primary schooling in Manchester.
• The words remained substantially untouched for more than twenty years.

2005 — London

• Poem developed into a song during the Doyle recording project.
• Recorded at Faraday Studios.
• Produced and arranged with Paul Castle.
• Blues-rock arrangement developed around the original words.
• Harmonica introduced as a defining feature.
• Paul Castle contributed backing vocals and to the musical arrangement.

Awoken has an unusual recording history because the words existed long before the music. Written as a poem when Michael was sixteen, it looked back upon his much younger self: the lonely walk to school, stern convent discipline, his mother’s encouragement and the strange details of childhood that had remained embedded in memory.

More than twenty years later, the poem resurfaced during recording sessions at Faraday Studios in London. Rather than rewrite the youthful lyric, Michael and producer Paul Castle worked around it. Castle helped develop the blues-rock treatment, with harmonica and backing harmonies giving the piece a musical character quite removed from the quiet, reflective poem from which it began.

Both regarded the resulting recording as something that might eventually receive further production. That never happened. Michael ultimately chose to leave Awoken as it stood. Its slightly raw and unfinished quality became part of its identity: a sixteen-year-old’s words carried forward into an adult recording without polishing away the childhood voice that had created them.

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Book References

Awoken forms part of the wider Sane Inside Insanity story, with its origins, recording and the childhood experiences behind the song explored within the books.

Detailed chapter and page references will be added as the companion archive develops.

• Book I – Before Judgment (references coming soon)
• Book II – The Trial (references coming soon)
• Book III – Captivity and Return (references coming soon)

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