Day 95-- meaningful songs
Saturday, December 09, 2006
I think I've talked about something similar in the past, but not this exactly: what are the songs that mean a lot to you? They can be for personal reasons, lyrical content, a musical hook that sticks with you for decades and never leaves. Here are a few of mine:
-"Twin Falls/Some" by Built to Spill. I could've picked another BTS song, but these tandem songs won out. I'm a fan of the two tracks on the studio album There's Nothing Wrong With Love. But in a live setting, the band always segues from one into the other, and man...it's chilling. "Twin Falls" is fragile piece, awash in nostalgia and wistful thinking about a nearly forgotten childhood sweetheart. The lines are intertwined snapshots of games of 7-Up, playing underneath parachutes, and escaping small towns. The last part always gets me--"Last I heard she had twins, or maybe it was three. 'Though I've never seen, except for in my dreams" (the last line sentimental twist over the studio version's cynical "and that don't bother me"). And then the band launches into a screeching, instrumental version of "Some" with only a breath to seperate them. I sometimes think about the girls I liked growing up, wondering where they are, what they're doing. And I always have this song playing in the back of my mind when it happens.
-"I Am the Cosmos" by Chris Bell. The former Big Star founder recorded this single after he left the band, and died not too long after in an automobile accident. Someone famous (and I can't find the reference) called "I am the Cosmos" the most emotional pop song ever written. Bell was clinically depressed; I'm not, but the song always makes me tear up and relate in a few ways. The romantic longing and doubt and low self-esteem is wrong-headed without a doubt ("Every night I tell myself 'I am the cosmos, I am the wind,' but that don't get you back again"), but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. What makes it even more moving is that Bell's lyrics (which are undoubtedly autobiographical) make it seem like the narrator knows he's fooling himself and having even a hard time coming to grips with that. But hey, it's a messy, deceptively catchy song, and is one of those pop rock Holy Grails that record collecting nerds whisper about when everyone elses' backs are turned.
Yeah, I guess I picked two downers. Do you have any songs that fit this bill? What are they and why?
posted, with grace and poise, by Jason @ 12/09/2006 11:55:00 PM,
1 Comments:
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At 8:54 AM,
said...
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Songs that i pick are not so much surrounded with knowledge of the artist, etc. They are more because of the times and the events occurring.
First, "Miss You Love" by Silverchair. That was the beginning, really, to any sort of deep love/like for a song. Of course, when i was shown this song i made the retarded correction that it must be "Miss YouR Love". I was wrong and that's something to never forget.
I really can't even think of any other songs right now
