Happy New Year! It’s another New Year’s Eve. I don’t know about you, but I’m counting on a definite change of fortunes for 2008. Because we’ve had a run of quite frankly rough years, and we want a good one for a change.
We’re going over to visit with friends this evening — nothing fancy, just hanging out and relaxing. We’re not big partiers, so we like a quiet evening — good food, good conversation, some wine… Although right now I am so sleepy I could just as easily go to bed early and not mind one bit.
And since it’s New Year’s Eve, I’ve been singing this song to myself all morning. Have a listen to the perfect Ella Fitzgerald (there’s no video, really, only audio) and enjoy!
I love playing “spot the pop star” while watching this — and laughing at the bad ’80s styles. (But they were so COOL back then!) And I love that it features the great and beautiful Paul Young, one of the pop heroes of my youth.
This song is just a small part of my deep and abiding love and admiration for Bob Geldof and Midge Ure.
I’m out today visiting with my new little nephew. So to keep you all amused until I return…
Quite possibly my all-time favourite Christmas song, “Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues, and featuring the late, great Kirsty MacColl. If you know the song, you know how lovely it is. And if you don’t… well, let’s just say it’s a bit colourful there in the middle, so beware if there are little ears listening.
It’s a beautiful song that makes me a bit welly each time I hear it. And shame, SHAME on the BBC for censoring it this year.
While listening to music and doing a super-micro-clean of the kitchen yesterday, I bring you moments that are best left unwitnessed.
A strange duckwalk across the kitchen, completely lacking in any sort of bluesy-ness, as though undergoing some kind of seizure, in time with “Baby Please Don’t Go”.
The moment of realization, as your back feels a bit of a twinge, your air guitar playing needs work. Or possibly, a switch to air harmonica.
The sheer, unbridled joy, and not just a little tunelessness, with which “Born to Run” can be sung while scrubbing the sink. Accompanied, of course, by the periodic shrieking of “OH WOOOOOAAAAH!” along with Bruce, and mad gesticulation along to the lyrics, like some bad karaoke nightmare.
Telling the cat, without a smidge of sarcasm, that yes, Cinnamon, the Bee Gees DID have way more talent than anyone every gave them credit for. Because you know she can keep your dirty little secret.
Feeling somehow that “slinky” is not a word that describes you. Even if you’re doing your best Shirley Manson, purring “You can touch me if you want”, while cleaning the stove and cupboard with Lysol.
Sometimes looking back into the past can be a strange thing.
On my laptop, I have thousands of songs. Literally. I have something like 4500 songs on my laptop, of all different genres and eras and of massively uneven quality. Many of them I have for a reason. Possibly not a good reason, but there’s something that twigs a memory or reminds me of something, and no matter how bad a song may be, I have reason to keep it. Many of the songs are wonderful. A lot are cringe-worthy.
So today, as I am puttering around the kitchen doing… well, STUFF, really… I am listening to music on my laptop. And as I go through the songs, I am updating the files, cleaning things up. And if there’s no redeeming quality to a song, I am deleting it altogether.
Just a few moments ago, with the random-y shuffle-y feature on in iTunes, a song from the 70s came up. “Don’t Pull Your Love” by a (presumably) one-hit wonder group called Hamilton, Joe Frank, & Reynolds. Many of you will have no idea what that song is or who the band is. Probably just as well. But some of you will know the song. (Tena, I bet you know this one!) And some of you are either humming right now, or fighting the retch.
Anyway.
I have a few songs from the early 70s in my collection. I was just beginning to discover music back then, with 2 older sisters who were becoming teenagers. There was always music in my house. And many of the songs from the very early 70s I remember from long car trips with my family. We’d often times drive places and then camp along the way, because it was cheaper for a family of 5. But during those long, hot drives in the Rambler from point A to point B (I had to sit in the middle back, on the hump) there was always a radio playing. And we’d sing along.
“Clap for the Wolfman”. “Beach Baby”. “I Shot the Sherriff”. And, yes, “Don’t Pull Your Love”. Cheeseball songs all. But I loved those times, driving with my family, usually out west to visit my mom’s family, aunties and uncles and cousins.
The car trips stopped after Mom died, pretty much.
But I hear the songs, and they take me back to those days of childhood. And I sing along, cheese or no.
Only today, it was a little different. Sometimes, things trigger memories and feelings and you don’t know why. Today, as I was singing along, I suddenly got this feeling in the pit of my stomach. Kind of a hard, tightening, panicky kind of feeling. Kind of a fear.
Abandonment. Alone.
It doesn’t come often. It hits for a second, a visceral reaction, and then it passes. But it’s as if I am transported instantly to a time when my world got rocked. Changed forever.
I was singing along, and this song was almost done, and suddenly, I felt the panic, like a car screeching to a halt (always in my mind I picture the car on the same highway, in the Black Hills in South Dakota. I love South Dakota, so maybe driving there is the best time I had on those car trips). The feeling that my life would never, ever be the same. Those happy memories would be shut off like a faucet. I felt sick inside for a second.
I had to shut the song off. Maybe another time, Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds.
It’s so weird. It passes just like that. And then I move on.
There’s nothing specific, nothing bad connected to that song in particular. It could be any song. Another song on another day. Just something trips a mental wire and…
Another day, maybe, I’ll listen to that song again, and have absolutely no reaction other than a cheesy grin and singing loudly and badly.
Last night, in our newly-spanking-clean (well, mostly) living room, we unwound a little bit.
BDH was at his computer, doing some work. He had iTunes running, going through all the thousands of songs we have, and cleaning up the ones that we don’t want that are just taking up space. And he had one of those desk lamps on that throws off a warm glow.
The rest of the room was dark. I sat flopped on the big comfy chair, in the dark, listening to the music. I love that.
There’s nothing that relaxes me more in the world than to listen to music in the dark. I just unwind completely, and feel so much more positive. I’ve always done it.
When I was a little girl, I’d sneak out of bed and go downstairs to the den where my dad would be playing records. And even though it was past my bedtime, I’d sit on the couch cuddled up next to my dad and listen to the music. I think I even remember a few times when my mom would be there, too.
When I was a teenager I’d fall asleep listening to my walkman in the dark.
When I lived on my own, I’d sit at the window and watch the world and listen to the live to air broadcasts on the weekends. With Bubby, of course.
When we got a house of our own, and BDH was working late or out with friends, the girls and I would listen to music in the dark. Sometimes we’d have a dance party.
I don’t do it very much anymore. But these days, I’m stressed. So it was a welcome break.
I think I’m going to need a few more of these evenings before the adoption process is complete.
It’s 4 am, and I am still awake. Since sleep seems to be not an option — lying down just leads to coughing — I figured I may as well pass the time until morning doing something useful. (And quiet, so as not to wake the rest of the house.)
When I have trouble getting to sleep, which is rare because sleeping is what I do best in life, I have a couple of strategies I try to help me fall asleep. And then, when they all fail abysmally and I am just frantic with exhaustion and pleading PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF DOG JUST LET ME SLEEP, that’s when sleep usually jumps up and clobbers me over the head. (Tonight, I am so pumped full of various medications, the frantic part just never came. I was pretty mellow and just resigned myself to the fact that, meh, if I’m awake, I might as well get up.)
So, while I was lying there, shifting into wonderfully warm, comfortable positions, just SO, only to be rudely discomfited by hacking up a lung, I was listening to my iPod. I will sometimes listen to music as a means to distract myself, and also to drown out any a) excessive noise or 2) excessive quiet. I started doing this in high school, and let me tell you, an iPod is way better than a big old tape player and clunky headphones. I have the Shuffle model, which is nice and compact. Also? The batteries last much longer. Hurray for progress!
There’s something that has always appealed to me about listening to music in the dark late at night. I have always enjoyed it. I tend to actively listen more than I do in the daytime, so I catch more lyrics and more layers of music. And I daydream more, which is I suppose why I find it to be such a good distraction when trying to fall asleep. When I was younger, my favourite album to fall asleep to was Avalon by Roxy Music. I made a tape (remember those?) with that on one side, and Rio by Duran Duran on the other, and I would usually be asleep before the tape flipped to Duran Duran.
But my iPod holds so many different songs. I load it up with a variety of songs from the 4000+ that I have on my hard drive, and I am all set for working out or walking or sleeping or whatever. It’s often a fairly eclectic mix. I have 2 iPods, actually — one for working out and one for sleep. Lately, the one for sleep has been loaded with mellower stuff, not my usual retro alternative favourites, but still an interesting mix.
Tonight, as I lay staring up into the darkness, I got the gorgeous Leonard Cohen song Song of Bernadette, done by Jennifer Warnes and her flawless voice. I listened to U2’s song for Aung San Suu Kyi, Walk On, which gives me goosebumps. I got the incomparable Stan Rogers, his beautiful Northwest Passage. Quite possibly one of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard. And I heard Fake Plastic Trees by Radiohead, quirky and lovely.
So, a perfect slumber mix, full of wonderful imagery and gorgeous voices. Not enough to help me sleep, however. Still, if you’re going to be up, listening to songs like that is a nice way to pass the time trying.
Bah. It’s 5 am. I guess it’s time to break out the big guns. Warm milk. With honey.
I am here to tell you that my love and adoration for a certain member of a certain online community knows NO BOUNDS! NONE!
I went to my mailbox today, as I do each day, and to my delight, someone had sent me a package! This member (let us call her “Giff”) sent me a CD that she made with her own two hands called “T-Shirt Weather: A Summer Mix” which was full of lovely, upbeat songs. I am ENCHANTED, I tell you truly. And also, she sent me a T-Shirt to go with said T-Shirt mix!
And so, I spent the afternoon dancing around to this wonderful CD, wearing my new t-shirt, and having a great time. One of my Best. Days. EVAH.
Thank you, Giff (even though you probably won’t see this). :mwah: You are magical to me. Magical, I say!
(Yes, I cross posted this. I am an ADMIN. I can DO THAT, you know.)
Another top 5 list. I was faffing around the house today and listening to music, and got to thinking about those songs that you listen to when you’re having A DAY and you want to clear your head. Usually it involves turning the music on REALLY LOUD and flopping down on the couch and playing a song over and over and over… and just getting outside whatever’s going on in your head for a little while.
I know, this is a VERY subjective list. Everyone has their own. These are some of mine.
1. The Weight — The Band
When I was at school in Indiana, and Coach was shitting all over me at practice, I’d go back to my room and put this on and just get away from it all for awhile. It was one of those songs that did that for me, all through university. When school was too stressful or men were asses or money was tight, I’d put this on the stereo and just vacate the premises mentally. Nowadays, it still has a calming effect on me.
2. The First Day of Spring — The Gandharvas
This is THE ONLY song to put on when the first warm weather comes at the end of winter. Open up all the windows, turn it up loud, and thank God the winter is over. Not that you can’t listen to it any time, but that is when I discovered this song. It was the first warm, spring-like day of the year, and I was listening to the All Request Breakfast back in the glory days of CFNY/The Edge. And this song came on, and I cranked it up, and sat at the window and soaked it all in. And it’s one of those songs that starts slowly, builds to this amazing crash of noise in the middle, and then chills back out again. I LOVE those.
3. Cubically Contained — The Headstones
Completely different mood to this one. This is a sitting-in-the-pitch-dark, exorcising-some- demons kind of a song. I love to listen to this song in the dark. It is a DARK song, there’s no two ways about it. But sometimes that is good. After a really bad day with the shitheads at Agfa, this became a ritual. Decompressing in the dark.
4. Uncertain Smile — The The
I love The The. I love the whole upbeat “Oh death, and grief, and sorrow, and murder” silly dance music thing they had going on. Smiling while the shit rains down. And I AM SORRY, but nowhere in the WORLD are you gonna find another piano solo like that, smack in the middle of an alternative dance tune about a bad day. This is one big, loud, lying-on-your-back-in-the-middle-of-the-floor fuck you to a bad day.
5. Caravan — Van Morrison
Okay, ending on a happy note. Maybe it’s the whole Johnny Fever, spinning around in your chair, pounding on your chest kind of happy, but this song, and the voice of the immortal Van Morrison, takes me to a better, sunnier place. Dancing around the room, singing at the top of your lungs happy. It takes you, for 5 minutes and 2 seconds, to a more peaceful, joyous place.
Okay, so I was watching High Fidelity last night, hence the “Top 5″ theme of this post. I love that movie. I have to admit I have not read the book and I probably should. I am sure it’s very good, but I love the movie so, with the hangdog, sloppy John Cusack’s Rob, and the brilliant Marvin Gaye turn by Jack Black, and even the uber-creepy Ian of Tim Robbins. I like it set in Chicago. I like Joannie coming in and shrieking “Asshole!” at her brother (which I am sure was like growing up, even though it is part of the script between Liz and Rob, it just seems like a fight in the Cusack household would be.) So I kinda don’t want it, well not SPOILED exactly, but certainly coloured differently by the novelist’s pen.
I also need to go seek out other versions of this movie. This one I got for Christmas from the Big Damn Hero, who nurtures my eternal love of Johnny Cu because, hey, he’s a guy’s guy who makes cool movies, and b) you gotta respect a guy who can kick your as soon as look at you. (Big Damn Hero LIKES that Cusack is a kickboxer. He thinks that is VERY cool. ) This version of the movie has some interviews with John Cusack and with Stephen Frears, the director, which are pretty good. But I want the version that has a bunch of — outtakes, maybe? — that have John Cusack and Jack Black and Todd Louiso sitting around doing top 5 lists. It’s pretty cool. It’s pretty funny.
I am a music fanatic. I admit it. Partly this comes from my father, and partly from a lifetime (well, 25 years) of watching John Cusack films. BDH laughed during the movie that I was NOT sitting around writing down every stinking song they mentioned to go and download.
So, yeah. The top 5 list. Okay, so in keeping with the High Fidelity theme, I decided to post a top five list. The movie’s full of them. And I have spent most of my life making top 5 lists of things so why the hell not? Also, because this is favourite songs, it is subject to change at any moment. There’s not some immutable criteria that these are judged by or anything. It’s subject to whim. Deal.
Top 5 Favourite Songs EVER, in no particular order
1. Roxanne – The Police
My love affair with The Police goes back to the very first notes I heard off Outlandos D’Amour. Brilliance. I was surprised my father could tolerate the endless playings of each and every song off each and every album throughout my teenage years. He also let me go to the Police Picnic, the original music festival road show, predating Lollapalooza and the others, in 1983. I begged to go to the first two, and finally when I was 15 he let me go. It was the closest I have ever come to screaming like the Beatles were coming. It was one of my Best. Days. Ever.
2. Rush — Big Audio Dynamite
What, choosing a song by a post-Clash band and not one of the originals, you say? Blashphemy. Well, I was a teenager when the Clash was big, and teenagers love to dance. It’s not that I did not have a deep and abiding love for the Clash. I did. I cried when Joe Strummer died. But this was something fun, something we could dance to, and it was everywhere during our bar-hopping days. It makes me grin to this day, makes me feel like saying “screw you all” and bolting for greener pastures. Situation no win, rush for a change of atmosphere….
3. Into Temptation — Crowded House
Sexy, sultry song of forbidden lust. Who knew the boys who brought us Six Months in a Leaky Boat (well, give or take a few years and members) would come up with something so gorgeous and hot? Neil Finn listed this song as his favourite among all he has written in an interview he did a few years back. I can see why.
4. Sometimes (Lester Piggott) — James
I don’t know what it is about this song — the jangly guitars, the fabulous imagery, Tim Booth’s voice of an angel — that appeals to me so much. Maybe it’s a combination of the three. I grow to love James more and more with each song I discover. This one is full of good memories for me — it was playing as I was driving to see my first niece on the day she was born. I just never fail to be buoyed by this song, every time I hear it.
5. Friday I’m in Love — The Cure
Oh, YEAH, like there wasn’t going to be a Cure song in this list. RIIIIIGHT. My love for Robert Smith’s turns of phrase, his catchy, beautiful melodies, the visual poetry created in my mind’s eye every time I hear a Cure song — it was tough to choose just one. And which one. Lovesong is gorgeous. The various, interesting remixes of Close to Me pulse with sex and danger. But this one, this one for me is one of the greatest pure “pop” songs ever written (and not “pop” as in the bastardization of modern music currently in the top forty — “pop” as in the brilliant combinations of melody and lyric that were practiced by the likes of Lennon and McCartney, Nick Lowe, Elvis Costello…) This is an upbeat, jangly, sunny piece of pop music at it’s finest.
Man. I love Top 5 lists. There are so many. Top 5 Best Love Songs. Top 5 Best Breeding Music. Top 5 Songs to Exorcise a Bad Day. Top 5 Most Danceable Tracks.
