Notes on Track 5:

Medb is a sovereignty goddess of Ireland, specifically of Connacht, the western province of Ireland. She rules from Cruachan (modern Rathcroghan, Co. Roscommon) as a warrior queen and is a principle instigator of the Irish epic, Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley).

Irish kingship was starkly dissimilar to British kingship: an Irish king could only rule as long as the Land itself accepted him. If the weather turned, or the crops failed, or misfortune befell the people, these events were seen as evidence that the Land had rejected his rule and a new king must be chosen. The sovereignty goddess (the Land personified) often approached a human male from the Otherworld and became his helpmate, his lover, the mother of his children, managed his household and increased his wealth exponentially, at least for as long as he pleased her.

I wrote another song quoting Medb from the Táin (“Drink Up” track 7 on The Wanderlings Volume One) but “Powerlust” was inspired largely by her rape by her former husband, the king of Ulster. As a metaphor for the struggle between humanity and the land we continually take from, Medb is uniquely equipped to address both traumas. Don’t relax when she falls to her knees, folks. Be wary; there’s magma in her veins.

Sources:

Medb as she appears in

The Tain, trans. by Thomas Kinsella from the Irish epic Táin Bó Cuailnge. (Oxford UP: Oxford, 1969, 1990).

Morgan Llywelyn, Red Branch. (Ivy Books: New York, 1989).
Rosalind Clark, The Great Queens: Irish Goddesses from the Morrígan to Cathleen Ní Houlihan. (Barnes & Noble: Savage MD, 1991).

Irish story of the rape of Medb by Conchobar Mac Nessa (her former husband & king of Ulster)*

* at the moment this source eludes me, but I’ll scour my university notes and update once I find it