pony apprehension
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the past month has been acutely out of focus.
last month, my grandma ended up in the ICU and with only two hours notice i flew down to california to be with her. after a while, she seemed to be getting better and i was out of time off at work. so i ended up coming back home. two days later she died.
through all of this, i was once again reminded of the power of music - and especially - the oddity of music that seems so inappropriate at the time.
for many, many days, while she was in the hospital, it was painful to see her. she was quite ill and i spent at least 15 hours a day just standing next to her bed holding her hand, looking at monitors, hearing her breathe, smelling that distinct hospital smell. it was so painful to see her suffering but i did not want to cry in front of her. she had always been such a very strong woman, i thought that it was the right time to show her that she had helped to make me a strong woman too.
and through all those days and hours of fending off the monster of all things sad there was a single song that would push the monster away and dry my eyes. and i don't even know the name of it. i don't even really know the lyrics either. and, in fact, i think i've only ever heard it two or three times. but i could easily recall how the melody went and since it's a decidedly un-sad song, it became my pillar of strength. it's a newish song by the cops, a local band that i love seeing live. so, with an almost scary kind of intensity, i would hum this incredibly catchy post-punk song and keep my shit together.
i'm going to see the cops live tomorrow and i'm fairly certain they'll play that song.
i can't help but wonder if i'll be the only person in the room hearing a sad song.
records i bought today [one of which i paid too much for but just couldn't pass up. it's okay to pay too much for a record as long as you know you're paying too much. right?]:
"the fat skier" by throwing muses. finally, the throwing muses vinyl collection is complete.
"new skin for the old ceremony" by leonard cohen nothing makes me happier... listening to him on the turntable with the lights down low.
"drinking from puddles" v/a [this is the one i paid too much for.] a late 90s double lp, from kbvr in studio recordings. highlights include come, kristen hersch, elliott smith, cat power, roger manning, crackerbash and lydia lunch.
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I just bought The Fat Skier on tape a month or so ago. It's pretty nice, man. And "Soul Soldier" is a strange one for sure.
i use lala dot com for trading/buying/selling cds. i just realized they have a radio feature as part of their website - which looks like people in the lala community (i use that term loosely) program each of the stations. using their horrible radio station interface, i started browsing around the stations. i listened to one for a couple of songs and then moved onto another. immediately, i recognized the second song on this station as being a sufjan stevens song. (disclaimer: don't yell at me. don't send me hate mail. no voodoo dolls. please, i beg you.) now, i know i'm probably one of only about three people who would say this, but, i don't like the guy's music. anytime i hear it on the radio, i switch the station or turn off the radio. it's not like i hate it violently or even have some music-related explanation as to why i don't like his music. the only way i can explain it is that my body has some sort of cellular reaction to his songs: all my cells get together and tell my feet to walk over to the stereo and then the cells tell my arm to get to work changing the music. it's all quite visceral. "boo!" shout my cells in chorus.
all of this got me thinking about those kind of innate responses we have to music. i'm sure lots (all?) of us have thought about the positive responses we have had to music. i have plenty of stories about songs that i could listen to forever because of the strong, happy, positive feelings they evoke. but what about the bad stuff? and i don't necessarily mean my reaction to hearing the latest beyonce song played today on npr. i'm talking about music that most likely has a leg to stand on. it's well written and performed by talented folks. it fits into one of your desired genre favorites. but you just can't listen. no matter how much cred the artist might have - your favorite songwriter on earth endorsing it couldn't change your mind. why?
a while back a heard a great story on "radio lab" (WNYC radio program) about what exactly music is (think electrons, the brain, etc), why it can move us (in both happy and violent ways), etc. the show was great, but it probably left me with more questions than i had before.
i'm still thinking about that show and i'm still changing the station when sufjan comes on and i'm still wondering why.
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Beyonce got played on NPR? Like, a real, full song? As part of the programming?
If so - weeeeeiiiird....
they only played part... it was on a story of how itunes sales aren't that great, etc etc. and they said that her song was the number one song downloaded this week or day or something to that effect. so i guess they felt compelled to share it. it actually made me happy b/c i discovered i had never heard it before - which made me feel safe and like i do an outstanding job protecting myself from the scary kinds of pop music out there!
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I'm sorry about your grandmother. I only have one grandparent left. Music that I associate with death is mainly Funeral by the Arcade Fire because they wrote it about death.