The Little Records: Babes in Toyland (Part 2)
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Album:The Grunge Years
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December is the month of the phonograph record. I made that up. But it is. I'll be observing it all month at my mog and I encourage you to observe it with me. For the original post declaring December the month of the phonograph record, click here. Join the conversation!
Babes in Toyland had a song called 'House.' Best I can tell, it was only released as a little record - a record measuring seven inches in diameter - in 1990. On one side of that record (the A side) was 'House.'About that song I am about to make what some might consider to be a bold declaration:There is no more honest love-destroyed song on any record - big or little - period.Sure, it may be matched, I'll gladly concede that, but nowhere is it bested (best I can tell).It's a hard song to listen to. It's harsh (this is part of its honesty). The bass is harsh, the guitar is harsh, the drums are harsh, the singing is really harsh. The lyrics are not profound:Stubbed my toes running to your house.Broke my legs running to your house.Lost my head running to your house.All of that doesn't make any sense without the next two lines:Oh my god, is this what it feels like?To be in love, is this what it feels like?I called it a love-destroyed song...maybe I would do better to call it an is-that-all-there-is song. When Peggy Lee sang 'Is that all there is?' she was too cool about it - so nonplussed. Kat Bjelland is plussed. She's really plussed. It's the way she screams HOUSE...Stubbed my toes running to your HOUSE!The house is a bitter subject by the time Bjelland is singing about it. I remember vividly the houses of the women with whom I fell into - either partially or wholly - and then out of love. One was far away. One was across the river (on the river's bank), and one was just a few doors down.I remember bathrooms, living rooms, bedrooms and closets. I remember sinks and tables. I remember stairways and creaky floors. These were - for short but intense bursts - mystical places. Eventually, however, when relationships imploded or just fizzled out, these same houses were graveyards. 
There is this delicate sculpture by Giacometti called 'The Palace at 4 A.M.' and whenever I see it (it's here in NYC at MoMA) I think of 'House.' Giacometti apparently related his 'Palace' sculpture to a woman he had been in love with. With her, he once said, he had built a "fantastic palace at night...a very fragile place of matchsticks." He associated the spinal column and the skeletal bird with her.The "fantastic palace" is the mystical place I was talking about - it's a place you run to. It's a place of fantasy and wonder. You might even run to it stumbling and desperate. And running stumbling and desperate you might stub a toe or break a leg. But palaces are magical places where you are not a stumbler and you are not desperate.Bjelland's 'House' is the graveyard part...the shattered fantasy...the temporary defeat of wonder...the igniting of the "fragile place of matchsticks." This is what I love about the song and what I find so honest about it: 'House' makes clear - screamingly clear - the fragility of all things. Is there any higher truth? You can listen to Babes in Toyland's 'House' at my Multiply page. Click here.
Babes in Toyland had a song called 'House.' Best I can tell, it was only released as a little record - a record measuring seven inches in diameter - in 1990. On one side of that record (the A side) was 'House.'About that song I am about to make what some might consider to be a bold declaration:There is no more honest love-destroyed song on any record - big or little - period.Sure, it may be matched, I'll gladly concede that, but nowhere is it bested (best I can tell).It's a hard song to listen to. It's harsh (this is part of its honesty). The bass is harsh, the guitar is harsh, the drums are harsh, the singing is really harsh. The lyrics are not profound:Stubbed my toes running to your house.Broke my legs running to your house.Lost my head running to your house.All of that doesn't make any sense without the next two lines:Oh my god, is this what it feels like?To be in love, is this what it feels like?I called it a love-destroyed song...maybe I would do better to call it an is-that-all-there-is song. When Peggy Lee sang 'Is that all there is?' she was too cool about it - so nonplussed. Kat Bjelland is plussed. She's really plussed. It's the way she screams HOUSE...Stubbed my toes running to your HOUSE!The house is a bitter subject by the time Bjelland is singing about it. I remember vividly the houses of the women with whom I fell into - either partially or wholly - and then out of love. One was far away. One was across the river (on the river's bank), and one was just a few doors down.I remember bathrooms, living rooms, bedrooms and closets. I remember sinks and tables. I remember stairways and creaky floors. These were - for short but intense bursts - mystical places. Eventually, however, when relationships imploded or just fizzled out, these same houses were graveyards. There is this delicate sculpture by Giacometti called 'The Palace at 4 A.M.' and whenever I see it (it's here in NYC at MoMA) I think of 'House.' Giacometti apparently related his 'Palace' sculpture to a woman he had been in love with. With her, he once said, he had built a "fantastic palace at night...a very fragile place of matchsticks." He associated the spinal column and the skeletal bird with her.The "fantastic palace" is the mystical place I was talking about - it's a place you run to. It's a place of fantasy and wonder. You might even run to it stumbling and desperate. And running stumbling and desperate you might stub a toe or break a leg. But palaces are magical places where you are not a stumbler and you are not desperate.Bjelland's 'House' is the graveyard part...the shattered fantasy...the temporary defeat of wonder...the igniting of the "fragile place of matchsticks." This is what I love about the song and what I find so honest about it: 'House' makes clear - screamingly clear - the fragility of all things. Is there any higher truth? You can listen to Babes in Toyland's 'House' at my Multiply page. Click here.
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