Although there are certainly many downsides, I am fortunate enough to have a job where I can listen to music fairly freely. I have access to a stereo for the majority of the day, whether I am driving or in the warehouse, and I am definitely happy about this. When a big delivery arrives and I will be spending at least a couple of hours wandering back and forth carrying sacks, it is a lot more bearable when I can have some music playing. In fact, almost any task - no matter how mundane - can be improved with a little bit of music. The only decision really is whether I listen to my iPod, or put the radio on.
There is plenty of music on my iPod that I haven't even listened to yet, and obviously a whole bunch that I love and play very often. So there's certainly a great deal to choose from. All those familiar favourites, all those classics, all those songs I own but have yet to hear. Great! So I choose my iPod and shuffle my way through the random selections, or cycle through my 'Most Played'. And that'll be my choice for the next few days.
But...
As a week passes, a nagging thought begins to irritate me. All this time I've been listening to my iPod, I have completely neglected the radio which, in turn, means that I am missing out on any newly released music. There could be some fantastic new songs that, due to my abandonment of the airwaves, I am completely unaware of. I'm losing out! What if there's something truly astonishing that has only just been created, something which I will connect with, and adore, and obsess over? If I continue to prefer my iPod, I might miss it and perhaps never learn of it.
And so, in a mild panic, I'll switch to radio. And, phew, I can begin to take in all the new stuff. And that's how things will remain for a few weeks.
Until...
What about the older music that my preferred radio station is unlikely to play? All those tracks I have already bought and paid for, yet haven't really discovered yet? What about those songs that I know I will enjoy?
And so the cycle continues.
The battle between new stuff and old stuff is constant, and I only wish I had the self-control and organisational skills to say to myself, "Right. I'm going to listen to my iPod on THESE days, or at THESE times. And the radio at the other times. Therefore I get a good mix of the two, and all is well."
But no. Instead I start a long-term relationship with one, then suddenly abandon it to flirt with the other.
Okay, so... just had a big surprise. My intention was to write about this song with reference to certain moments it reminds me of. Yep, just a little nostalgia-spree again. In the moments before writing the first words, I took a look at the Wikipedia page for it just to check the date it was released. Had a little surprise from the first paragraph.
This is a COVER VERSION?!
In all the years that I have loved this song, I assumed that it was written by (or, at the very least, for) Annie Lennox. Turns out that it was originally written and sung by a group from the 1980's called The Lover Speaks, who gained a recording contract with a little help from Lennox's Eurythmics band mate Dave Stewart. The group also toured with The Eurythmics. I can only assume that Annie Lennox heard it enough times to decide she wanted a go at it.
The original version is very mid-80's in all the ways I love and adore in so many songs. I hear similarities to Simple Minds, as well as power-ballad groups like Cutting Crew and Mister Mister. If it had been on one of the Weetabix cassettes that I mentioned in a previous post, and therefore I'd have spent my early years listening to it repeatedly, I'm sure I would have been eagerly spouting facts about the original when Annie Lennox released her cover.
But it wasn't. And I'm not.
I prefer Lennox's version by miles. I always struggle to answer the question, "What's your favourite song?" but this is certainly somewhere on the long list. The introduction alone (a single synth chord before the 'Do be do be's) makes me feel excited for the rest of the song and, as a whole, the song feels a little darker and honest in her version. The mid-section features talk of monsters and sounds of laughing (giving me those 'moment shivers' I talked about in a previous post) . It's... weird, yes, somewhat ethereal, but entirely fitting with the rest of the song.
"I used to have demons, in my room at night. Desire, despair, desire, so many monsters."
And, oh!, one of Annie's final calls of 'You' that hits that higher note: it completes the song for me, somehow.
How on earth do you describe what makes you love a song so much? Lyrically, I have never found it particularly easy to translate and understand yet I've always managed to feel like there's some kind of story going on. The feeling the song gives me is that of fallen relationships, and a difficulty in finding a way to move on.
The original version, personally, just doesn't sound quite so heartfelt. The passion and audible pain that exists in Lennox's cover just isn't present when I hear The Lover Speaks. I apologise to all the fans of the original, and I'm sure they would scream in protest at my disregard for it. Sorry.
Aside from the pure beauty of the song itself when Lennox sings it, her version also reminds me of a couple of things. The first is going to a youth club as an eleven(ish)-year-old, and the song playing on a stereo in the main hall. Somebody went to skip it (probably preferring to find something a little more upbeat and party-appropriate), and asked if anybody minded. I piped up that, yes, I minded. In remembering this specific event, I also end up recalling other moments from spending time at that club: notably having a huge crush on a girl there, and all the silly little feelings that went with that.
Secondly, this song also reminds me of when my sister went and bought me a copy of Lennox's album Medusa. I had bought the single of No More "I Love You's" and played it incessantly, so my sister clearly thought I'd enjoy the rest of the album. So, yep, she bought it for me. And my response when she was about to hand it to me?
"Why did you buy me that? I didn't ask for it, did I?!"
Wow, I was a real brat :)
Needless to say, it was about a decade later when I actually bought the album for myself since, understandably, my sister decided not to give me the gift.
As a final note, this song has given me one extra pleasing surprise today. I was humming it whilst wandering the house and in walked my girlfriend, back from work. She heard me, and began to sing the 'Do be do be do do do... a-aaa' vocals. I very quickly learnt that she loves this song, and loves Annie Lennox. Musical connections like this are important to me, so it makes me very happy indeed.
"Ah, music! A magic beyond all we do here" -JK Rowling (Harry Potter & The Philosopher's Stone)
A friend of mine over at Reverberations and PlugInMusic reminded me of this song a week ago. Not that I'd forgotten about it as such, I just hadn't listened to it recently. The main reason for this is almost certainly because I've not been using my iPod lately - opting for the radio instead (a topic to write about later) - and I invariably end up listening to this song when I shuffle my way through my collection. I usually hit upon it by chance, or when noticing Pulp as I scroll down through the list of artists, and then end up playing it several times in a row (also a topic to write about later).
I don't know when I first heard Disco 2000. My guess is that I probably was aware of it when it first hit the airwaves because I don't feel as though I arrived at it particularly late, but I think I've embraced it a lot more in the last ten years. As with pretty much everything I've talked about in previous posts, there is a certain amount of nostalgia in this song. However, rather than it reminding me of a particular moment of my life, the song instead seems to make me long for something to be specifically nostalgic about. There's a lot in the song that I do connect with and/or remember connecting with (unrequited love and affection, teenage jealousy, lost friendship, etc.), but I cannot say that I've ever felt as though I will one day meet up with somebody I was once very close with and have some rekindling of desire. And that's not just because I'm happily with someone now, anyway. I just don't have that kind of personal history; at least not to the full extent that the song discusses.
"Let's all meet up in the year 2000 Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown Be there, 2'o'clock, by the fountain down the road."
I don't have a crush I've been clinging onto for years, waiting to see them once again. I never chuckled to myself how things might be so very different in the future. And, because I went to a single-sex school for most of my teenage years, there wasn't much opportunity for me to be enraged by my friends fooling around with the girl I longed for in school... there were no girls.
So how can I get nostalgic about something when it doesn't seem as though I can relate to it?
"Deborah do you recall? Your house was very small, with woodchip on the wall. When I came around to call, You never noticed me at all."
I guess it's... hmm... empathetic nostalgia, perhaps? I can understand what Jarvis Cocker is singing about, even if the specifics don't match my own past, and I can get wistful about 'Deborah' even though she doesn't exist to me.
Sure, it's not totally unrelated. There are some links. I've liked people that have thought nothing of me, and I've watched people become close to a girl I've desired. But I guess I feel as though Disco 2000 succeeds in getting me to remember things that, actually, never happened. I may as well have fallen for 'Deborah' when I was at school because I feel that angst as I sing along.
Incidentally, none of the above is why my friend mentioned the song. She just wanted to know what 'woodchip' was. In the process of explaining, she asked whether I had heard Nick Cave's version of the song. I hadn't, even though it turns out I own it.
It's quite a different sound. I'm a big fan of taking a fast-paced song and trying to slow it down (hence trying to do a couple myself), and that is what Cave has done with the song. It's a nice enough version in my opinion, and he's typically nonchalant in his vocals, but I guess I just don't get the same feeling from it - and I miss that. I don't really get any feeling at all from it. It is, as I say, "nice enough".
Keane (a favourite band of mine) also did a cover of Disco 2000, and played it safe with a straight cover. I like Keane, their version sounds good, but still... I just don't feel the same way about it. Without Jarvis, I guess I just don't get the same kick out of the song.
So, Pulp all the way for Disco 2000.
Final thought: Apparently most of the song was based on true events except, according to Cocker, "The only bit that isn't true is the woodchip wallpaper".
"You are the music while the music lasts" -T.S.Eliot
This was a favourite song of my mother's, and I remember it being played on many Sunday mornings whilst she prepared a roast for lunch. She owned Crowded House's greatest hits album but, as far as I can remember, I think this was the only song that she really ever played with any great frequency. Although she liked the song as a whole, I think she especially liked it because of a particular moment in the song.
It is difficult to describe what the 'moment' is. I initially wrote it here as an "Mmmm-note". Then I thought, no, it's more of an "Ooooh-note" or an "Awwww-note". Labelling it with words is hard. For my mum, these particular moments in Don't Dream It's Over made her feel a little sad, a little happy, a little teary, and a little hopeful. It's a moment that can make the listener shiver a little, perhaps even make their voice crack just a bit as they sing along. There are at least a couple of songs that I can think which have this effect on me; this isn't one of them (although I do like the song), but is the only one I can remember that did it for my mother.
The moment itself is during the chorus as the word 'dream' is sung and held for the beat. Combining the note, the chord, and the word, gave my mum one of those moments.
"Hey now, hey now, don't dream it's over Hey now, hey now, when the world comes in They come, they come, to build a wall between us We know they won't win"
In memory of my mother, I have considered having the words, "Don't dream it's over..." tattooed somewhere upon me. I like the song, the lyric, the sentiment, and the memory. I don't know if I will ever have it done, or where, but I've thought about it.
So, after my previous post, I decided to listen to that Keane album again. It has been played almost constantly since. Sadly, as I now have a few more commitments and responsibilities in my life, I couldn't justify driving around randomly at 2am along the seafront the way I used to. However, in the fine weather we've been having recently, it still feels good to listen to Under The Iron Sea in the car, windows down, enjoying the sunshine.
I still cannot pinpoint which track particularly links itself to memories (it really is the album as a whole, I think), but Atlantic has been played the most over the last few days.
"I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to." -Elvis Presley
Once again, I am following on a little from the previous post. In it I mentioned that hearing particular songs will always remind me of specific moments in time that have some link to the music being played. This is more often a case of, "it was playing at the time," rather than any lyrical importance.
This evening, I experienced something similar which is almost the reverse. A feeling reminded me of a moment in time, which then reminded me of music.
After several weeks of rubbish weather (even for England) where it has been difficult to believe that the sky can be anything except full of grey clouds, this week has suddenly provided us with sunshine and warmth. At least where I live, anyway. Typically, I've had to spend the majority of it at work so far but - still - it is nice that things are substantially brighter and far more summery. As I left home this evening, my senses picked up a combination of things that brought on the nostalgia-ride.
Firstly, the sun was starting to drop ever so slightly out of sight, casting long shadows, and giving everything a nice warm glow in contrast to the harsh brightness that was present for most of the day.
Secondly, the arrival of the evening had made the roads just a little quieter and I could make out other sounds besides the usual roar of traffic.
Thirdly, the warmth of the sun was combining with a constant, cooling breeze. Not too fast or cold to make things chilly. Just steady enough to take away any burning heat.
Lastly, but most evocatively of all, I got a whiff of the seaside. Or... hmm... the sea at night. And it was also like smelling the weather, if that makes any sense at all? To give the specifics (and, for me, the smell was very specific), the air smelt like a late night in the summer spent driving my car along the road by the seafront at Clacton-on-Sea. A memory I'd not revisited very much recently.
A few years back, my sleep-patterns were a little messed up. This was partly deliberate, and partly because I was genuinely tired at odd times of the day. As a result, I would often come home from work and sleep through the evening. I'd then wake up and decide to take a little drive in the local area. More often than not, at some very stupid hour. This was usually done once I'd made sure I had some music to listen to. The memory I recalled today was essentially just of myself, driving by the sea in Clacton, my window down so I could receive a gentle cool breeze, the moon reflecting on the water, the smell of the beach in the air as well as the general smell 'of a summer night'...
And me singing along to Keane's second album: 'Under The Iron Sea'.
It is an album that I rather quickly grew to adore. Initially, I was disappointed that it didn't sound quite like their first. But I was being stupidly naive in forgetting that, sometimes, it is better to push away from the expectation. So I started to listen to it constantly, and very quickly I became obsessed with it. Every song, every verse, every minute. It was just perfect to me.
Today's flood of information to my senses took me right to a moment as I went around a corner in my car, faced out to sea a little, and sung along. I don't remember which track in particular was playing at that time. I think it might be 'Atlantic', the instrumental which has an obvious link to the sea, and I can certainly recall hearing the opening piano arpeggios as I drove. But I also know that I listened to 'Leaving So Soon' an awful lot; probably my favourite from the album. But then, if I consider any of the other tracks, the chances are that it could well have been any one of them.
There were both good and bad reasons for my late-night driving at that time which, in turn, give the album some positive and negative associations. I haven't listened to it for about six months, but getting that feeling today makes me want to revisit it. Actually, it makes me want to get in my car at stupid'o'clock and listen to it whilst driving along the seafront.
"Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music" - Sergei Rachmaninov
Following on from the previous post about general feelings of nostalgia in Stereophonics' Dakota, I thought I'd mention a song that does cause me to remember a specific moment in time whenever I hear it.
As a young child (i.e. about 8 years old), the majority of the music that I used to listen to was either what my sister was playing, or my mum. At some point during the eighties, Weetabix cereal gave away promotional cassette tapes called Top Trax. Each only had four songs on, and they were all relatively well-known 'hits' (or almost hits) by fairly-current popular bands. I think we collected about eight tapes, and so we'd be regularly swapping them in the cassette player in order to listen to some Tears for Fears, or Thomson Twins, or a bit of Bucks Fizz. The tape with Young At Heart on also included Candy Girl by New Edition, and Fantastic Day by Haircut 100... I forget what the fourth song was.
As far as I can remember, Young At Heart wasn't particularly the stand-out track for me: I don't recall listening to it more times than the others. I do know that I liked it though, particularly the violin interlude (which later became part of a court battle), and certain lines that I enjoyed shouting at the top of my lungs.
"They told us tales
They told us lies
Don't they know
They shouldn't have told us at all!
How come I love them now
How come I love them more
When all I wanted to do when I was old
Was to walk out the door!"
Those Weetabix tapes are definitely responsible for forging a lot of my musical taste, and any long car journeys would have them playing constantly. I also used to play them on my cassette radio whilst sitting in my bedroom. This particular song provides me with the memory of a very specific moment in time whenever I hear it. It's not a huge event, not a life-changing moment, not seemingly significant in any real way at all I suppose.
I think I must have been about eight or nine at the time. I remember the tape playing away in my portable twin-cassette radio which was sitting on the blue carpet of my bedroom floor. Even though it was far too narrow to actually be comfortable, I was sitting on the window sill; liking the idea of sitting there and gazing out the window, and ignoring how difficult it was to actually balance on the strip of wood. My neighbour - she was a year older than me, and very much my 'crush' in those early years - sat at the other end. My memory isn't good enough to inform me what time of year it was, but I like to guess that it was the Summer holidays, because I know we both looked out the window at my sun-lit garden and the blue sky, and I'm sure we both tried to sing along to the song (even though I've only just learnt some of the lyrics via Google).
And that's pretty much it. I wasn't lying when I said it wasn't "a huge event"...
There is some significance in that moment, for me, as it does represent those wonderful care-free days of childhood when the Summer holidays seemed to last forever, when the notion of love was far more simple and naive, when so many things were not yet a problem. So, for a time-specific nostalgic trip, Young At Heart does a good job.
Incidentally, as a little final piece of trivia, it is only during the process of writing this post that I discovered Young At Heart was originally by Bananarama (although Robert Hodgens of The Bluebells is a writing credit, and was dating Bananarama's Siobhan Fahey at the time). Their version is quite different, and I have to admit I prefer The Bluebells' reworking.
"There is geometry in the humming of the strings, there is music in the spacing of the spheres" - Pythagoras
