When my friends experience times of crisis, one of my stronger inclinations is to go throw a mixed CD together, because who doesn't feel better with new music? Normally I resist this urge, understanding how juvenile this might seem to someone who is trying to grapple with, say, issues of life and death or extreme physical pain. I resist the urge for the most part, but there are a couple extreme cases when I have given in to this urge to make a cd to cure what ails you. Unfortunately, whether or not the recipient of the mix cd reads much into it, each mix cd becomes invested with excruciating meaning once I've given the cd away.
Last December, my boss of seven years suddenly became ill. He was having debilitating chest pains. He kept on working, but his color was so gray and he looked awful. He was a major mentor in my life and I was passionately loyal to him, so to see him struggle through this health issue was torture. What could I, small insignificant Shannon, do in a time when he suffered so? Make cds of course. He and I had often traded cds over the years, both of us being compulsive music collectors but having incredibly different tastes. It makes me laugh, but I almost never liked what he gave me,though he often came 'round to the albums I gave him which just proves my point that I have the best taste in music ever.
A few days of this illness wore on and he looked worse and worse. I started to feel frantic. I sensed what was going to happen, even though I wouldn't acknowledge it to myself. One day, after a particularly difficult day for him - I even think he snapped at me - I went home in a frenzy, agonizing over my beloved boss being so sick he snapped at me. I stayed up late into the night burning cds for him. I started writing letters to him, trying to tell him how much he meant to me and how making cds is my way of giving chicken soup to a sick friend. By the time I went to bed, I had burned six or seven albums and had six or seven drafts of this letter littering my living room floor. The next morning I woke up super early and finished burning more albums for him, using up every blank cd I had. I was so excited, I was like - he may be sick, but this will be a little perk for him, because I knew he LOVED borrowing albums from people and listening to new music. Sometimes I think it was less about whether he liked the music or not, but about being able to say he'd heard this or that in any conversation. I think he really truly wanted to be as well versed and knowledgeable about all types of music as possible - to him, it was the ultimate cool, which I totally understood because I felt the same way.
That morning I had an early off site meeting, but I was hopping with excitement to give my boss twelve new albums and I was really excited about some of them and I just wanted him to have them so badly. I got back to the office around ten or eleven, and when I pulled up his car was in the parking lot. I practically ran inside so that I could give him the cds, because he often left at that time in the day. I got to his cubicle, but it was empty. I ran back to the window and his car was gone. We must have passed in the elevator. I left the cds on his chair and thought expectantly, excitedly, of him finding them the next morning.
That afternoon I left early. I don't remember why, now. I just did. My good friend called me around 4pm. When I answered the phone I shouted 'holla!' Silence met my greeting and I knew something was wrong. I have some bad news, she said. And I knew what it was before she even said. "Neil Callahan passed away around 3pm this afternoon", which was around the time I was driving home from work. For the next few days I couldn't go into work. And I kept picturing those cds on his chair, just sitting. Never listened to. Unacknowledged.
Fast forward to last month, which is when I received the news that my friend had had triple bypass heart surgery. Yes, the friend that I talked about in the last post. I went into frantic frenzy mode, because here was somebody else, somebody closely connected to Neil even, that was so deathly sick. I had to make him a cd. It was an emotional imperative.
ryan
1. 'All Your Way' Morphine
2. 'You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As Your Told)' The White Stripes
3. 'Letter From An Occupant' The New Pornographers
4. 'Train In Vain' The Clash
5. 'Whistling In the Dark' Firewater
6. 'Portland Oregon' Loretta Lynn
7. 'That's It, I Quit, I'm Movin' On' Sam Cooke
8. 'Game, Set & Match' The Herbiliser (featuring More or Les)
9. 'Go Tell the Women' Grinderman
10. 'Paper Planes' M.I.A.
11. 'Hang Me Up To Dry' Cold War Kids
12. 'Angry' The Bug (featuring Tippa Irie)
13. 'Shake and Pop' Nick Lowe
14. 'Boney Fingers' Hoyt Axton
15. 'Traveling Man' Dolly Parton
16. 'Monkey Gone to Heaven' Pixies
17. 'Ring the Bells' James
18. 'Whole Wide World' Wreckless Eric
19. 'My Year In Lists' Los Campesinos!
20. 'The Worst Day Since Yesterday' Flogging Molly
21. 'Midnight Rider' Willie Nelson
22. 'Long Way Home' Tom Waits
23. 'extraordinary machine' Fiona Apple
I put this together thinking about how cool the music was. I ignored the lyrics of the songs, for the most part (except for maybe the first and last songs, were are signature songs of mine and explain Shannon better than any other songs I've ever heard) so I gave it to him (I wrote in huge red letters on the front THIS CD IS GUARANTEED 100% AWESOME) and after he had it, it occurred to me to think about WHAT the songs were saying. Why is this so important? Because this particular guy is the unrequited love of my life and though I do try my part to be over him, I wasn't really at the time and had some residual uncertainties about something that happened between us earlier in the year that never panned out. I listened to this CD in horror, after I gave it to him, thinking about our past history and the fact that the guy just had heart surgery. Hear are some choice lyrics:
You just keep on repeating/all those empty "I love you's/until you say you deserve better/I'm gonna lay right into you/you don't know what love is/you just do as you're told/just as a child of ten might act/but you're far too old/you're not hopeless or helpless/and I hate to sound cold/but you don't know what love is/you just do as your told
That's It, I quit, I'm movin' on
You didn't stand by me/no not at all/you didn't stand by me/no way
It's been the worst day since yesterday
Portland Oregan and slow gin fizz if that ain't love then tell me what is, uh huh
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Faded Pink Blankie
I saw my friend the day before the night of the soccer game. I don't know whether it's the large issues like the economy that make his health problems so hard for me to process, or if its the hurt of watching someone you love in pain and knowing they won't let you - don't want you - to help that makes hurricanes seem more tragic and bank failures so terrifying. Whatever the reasons, I felt myself collapse under an alarming avalanche of sudden depression when I heard the Wamu news. My body felt as flat as an old birthday balloon as I ran sweatily through the beautiful night. Healthy, despite my friends illness; prosperous, despite the stock market - with a ball to chase after, cool night air to do it in and no hurricanes anywhere near my state. It felt like these simple pleasures weren't enough, because of Wamu, because of hurricanes, because of my friend. Wamu no longer exists, is that a larger sign that even friendships I determined to be eternal are too fragile to depend on? Why isn't caring and love enough to keep the gel of a friendship strong so that I could be there when he was sick? How can a bank, one in which probably half of my Seattle acquaintances belong to, just collapse? Why buy a house when I might have no job in a year? What's the point of a 401K and nest eggs, what with unscrupulous bankers and investors far removed from anything I've ever been able to control?Who can feel safe at home anymore if we are at constant threat of natural disaster, orange alerts and foreclosure? What if our next president is as bad as our current one, no matter who wins? What if he can’t fix any of it? Thoughts were starting to spin out of control. Familiar? I can't be the only one having silent hysterics lately.
I lost hope during this soccer game. Actually, I had lost hope while looking in the bleak eyes of my friend at lunch the day before, but hearing the news about Wamu brought it home, made my friend's distance and inaccessibility inescapable. And the hurricanes? They were the reason I tried (unsuccesfully) to turn the radio off in the first place. I don't normally try to hide from the news, but isn't there a point where there is too much bad news? Why can't I declare that a line has been crossed, I am officially no longer obligated to listen to the suffering and fear of others? Is there a point where I can let my friend go through his trials without me, because he doesn't need or want me, and I am absolved of responsibility even though I love him with all my heart? What if loyalty, compassion and worry for him radiates off me like a heat wave and I can't sleep because I am so hot? The economy is collapsing, the world is heating up and the unrequited love of my life just had triple bypass surgery - so what's the point? I never told him I love him. I can't, because you don't say that to someone who isn't likely to say it back. He said, 'no regrets' and I looked at the table, at my disgusting salad, at the floor and muttered unconvincingly "I know, right?" It's hard to sell that when your biggest regret is sitting three feet away from you. What does it say about me that I just want peace to chase after a ball, humming whatever tune is on my brain under my breath, shouting encouragements to my team (while shooting dirty looks at the enemy team...of course) and ignore relationships that are so important - but difficult and painful. My relationship with him is not the only one in my life that I struggle because they are in pain, but I've been hurt and I want to ignore the pain even as I can feel how much I care. Ignore the banks, I can't change their course, ignore the pain of the difficult people I love, I can't change them. The burden of loving someone that doesn't love me back is beyond my control and best ignored and gotten over, right? Even if 'the getting over' hasn't ever quite worked, not in seven - no, eight - years. Even if I am worried that he needs to know people care at this time in his life? Even if 'people' is little humble ole me? Isn't it better to nurse my hurt even though the rest of me tells me, he needs to know you care even if he can't respond to it the way you wish he would. And there go the silent hysterics again. If I don't bury my head in the sand, I am followed around by that little black rain cloud of anxiety. If I do bury my head, then I am beseiged by feelings of guilt and disloyalty...and regret.
As usual, it's music that can change even these black moods. I dug deep into my most beloved songs to make this playlist for ultimate comfort. Only songs were allowed that not only made me feel good but also have a positive message. I named it after the most comforting object in my life. (Designed to fit on an eighty minute CD of course).
Faded Pink Blankie
I lost hope during this soccer game. Actually, I had lost hope while looking in the bleak eyes of my friend at lunch the day before, but hearing the news about Wamu brought it home, made my friend's distance and inaccessibility inescapable. And the hurricanes? They were the reason I tried (unsuccesfully) to turn the radio off in the first place. I don't normally try to hide from the news, but isn't there a point where there is too much bad news? Why can't I declare that a line has been crossed, I am officially no longer obligated to listen to the suffering and fear of others? Is there a point where I can let my friend go through his trials without me, because he doesn't need or want me, and I am absolved of responsibility even though I love him with all my heart? What if loyalty, compassion and worry for him radiates off me like a heat wave and I can't sleep because I am so hot? The economy is collapsing, the world is heating up and the unrequited love of my life just had triple bypass surgery - so what's the point? I never told him I love him. I can't, because you don't say that to someone who isn't likely to say it back. He said, 'no regrets' and I looked at the table, at my disgusting salad, at the floor and muttered unconvincingly "I know, right?" It's hard to sell that when your biggest regret is sitting three feet away from you. What does it say about me that I just want peace to chase after a ball, humming whatever tune is on my brain under my breath, shouting encouragements to my team (while shooting dirty looks at the enemy team...of course) and ignore relationships that are so important - but difficult and painful. My relationship with him is not the only one in my life that I struggle because they are in pain, but I've been hurt and I want to ignore the pain even as I can feel how much I care. Ignore the banks, I can't change their course, ignore the pain of the difficult people I love, I can't change them. The burden of loving someone that doesn't love me back is beyond my control and best ignored and gotten over, right? Even if 'the getting over' hasn't ever quite worked, not in seven - no, eight - years. Even if I am worried that he needs to know people care at this time in his life? Even if 'people' is little humble ole me? Isn't it better to nurse my hurt even though the rest of me tells me, he needs to know you care even if he can't respond to it the way you wish he would. And there go the silent hysterics again. If I don't bury my head in the sand, I am followed around by that little black rain cloud of anxiety. If I do bury my head, then I am beseiged by feelings of guilt and disloyalty...and regret.
As usual, it's music that can change even these black moods. I dug deep into my most beloved songs to make this playlist for ultimate comfort. Only songs were allowed that not only made me feel good but also have a positive message. I named it after the most comforting object in my life. (Designed to fit on an eighty minute CD of course).
Faded Pink Blankie
- It's All Good - Sinead O'Connor and Damien Dempsey 'Collaborations'
- Three Little Birds - Bob Marley & the Wailers 'Legend'
- Seems I'm Never Tired Lovin' You - Nina Simone 'The Essential Nina Simone'
- Fidelity - Regina Spektor 'Begin to Hope'
- Always a Friend - Alejandro Escovedo 'Real Animal'
- Sunshine on my Shoulders - John Denver
- Safe From Harm - Massive Attack 'Blue Lines'
- Carry Me Home - Hem 'Rabbitsongs'
- who is it (carry my joy on the left, and my pain on the right) - Bjork 'Medulla'
- This Is The Way - Devendra Banhart 'Rejoicing in the Hands'
- Clint Eastwood (Ed Case Remix) – Gorillaz 'Gorillaz'
- Almost Rosey – Tori Amos ‘American Doll Posse’
- Satisfied Mind - Jeff Buckley 'Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk'
- Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive - Willie Nelson 'Stardust'
- Could We - Cat Power 'The Greatest'
- Less of Me - Loretta Lynn ‘Coal Miner’s Daughter’
- Shine - Dolly Parton 'Little Sparrow'
- You Are My Joy – Reindeer Section ‘Son of Evil Reindeer’
- Your Arms Around Me - Jens Lekman
And like these songs, I know that I need to close with a good message. Well, I've decided that I’m choosing to hope again, even though it's more of a concept than reality at the moment. I choose to hope that things will get better. I think it's more than just hoping, I choose to believe that things will get better. And if it is really hard to ignite that first little flare of hope? Well, I'll go play number 1 and 2 on Blankie one more time.
What does it mean to choose to hope? Well, I'm going to keep putting my money in their respective -and yes, decreasing - investments. It's a sign of my faith in our country. I'm going to keep on voting. I accept that even the rudimentary, and some would claim pointless, gesture of voting is a small sign that I'm still paying attention and I'm still trying to tell the government what I think is right. I'm going to play soccer, rain or shine. I'm going to call my friend in a few weeks just to say 'how are ya, I care and I want to know that you are okay' - even if I can't fix his heart, physically or emotionally. And I'm going to try and call the few the other people who I struggle with, because I know that I do care and I want to be the sort of person who can forget her own hurts long enough to make a simple phone call of support. I'm going to clean a little bit every day. I'm not going to be afraid to turn on the news, but I won't be afraid to turn it off either when I need to reclaim my peace of mind. I'm going to create and consume art, music, books and everything wonderful. I'm going to believe that it will get better, and try to believe it body and soul. I'll try to choose the actions that prove that I believe that things will get better. And I'm going to find as many Faded Pink Blankies as I can to quiet the silent hysterics on those days they ram their foot in the door and I'm having trouble kicking them out.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Martha Wainwright - I Know You're Married, But I've Got Feelings Too (or an obsessed diatribe about female singer songwriters)
I was sitting at my computer, bored by my music collection...scrolling and scrolling through I-tunes and not discovering what it was I wanted, not knowing for a while what it was I did want. Eventually it dawned on me that I was hankering after a female singer and then, fatally, I realized that none of the female singer/songwriters in my music collection was quite the ticket. I wanted a new fiery chanteuse with a healthy dose of feminism, wit and industrial pipes.
I wanted to experience something like back in high school, when I was discovering Tori. How my angsty soul thrilled to her. I wept and sang and obsessed over her music. She doesn't get through that little crack any more, the one that leads to all those dark and painful depths that like to plague me to death, and I wish someone would.
Then there was the first time Bjork's Joga made me feel like the only person in the world who knew how lost I felt and how much I needed to be seen? How come she doesn't make music that hurts like that anymore?
What about the Dolly Fucking Parton period, when I realized she rocked the world?
How about Ani before she seemed trite and cutesy or boringly maternal or just too embarrassingly, blatantly about....womyn issues?
Regina Spektor came out and it seemed like a new voice going places, good places, then I heard Fidelity on Gray's Anatomy and wondered...
And then there's the one that touched me deepest of all - my beloved Sinead O'Connor. If you never bothered, I recommend that you immediately pick up Lion and The Cobra and I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got (and not for the Prince song, for the rest of the album....for the SINEAD songs...if you like those two albums, then Gospel Oak e.p. and Collaborations should be next on your Sinead to do...) Alas, I know her truly great catalogue backwards and forward.
Joanna Newsom is great, no, Ys is more than great, it is transcendant, but it's a committed listening to gain catharsis - I don't feel soothed unless I read along with the lyrics, and those songs are looooooooong...plus she has the regettable knack of seeming very very smart and making me feel very very...average.
Jane Siberry's "Calling All Angels" and "It Can't Rain All The Time"? Break my heart, they do, but I've heard them a million times...and she only gets me with some of her songs. The rest (that I've heard) border on pretensious or overly contrived. Maybe those two things are the same thing...whatever.
There's nobody in the world like Siouxsie, and I picked up her new album without Budgie, but I haven't gotten around to it yet because 1. I'm absolutely certain it's going to be a Siouxsie/Creatures type album and 2. I miss Budgie already and I haven't even heard her world without him yet. That's not a very feminist sentiment is it? But I can attest, I've seen The Creatures live and Budgie was so kick ass he's as much the attraction for me as Siouxsie is.
Neko Case is awesome, yes, but again those albums are some of the most worn in my collection.
I can't stomach Cat Power anymore. I don't know why. Probably heard it all one too many times.
Loretta Lynn wailed with Jack's guitar and it was like finding God. When that album came out years ago I found it worth it to check out her back catalogue, particularly her work from the seventies, and Loretta's another kick ass country chick, but those depths have now been done plumbed, for the time being. She's got a lot of back of catalogue to get through - just like Dolly.
I NEED SOMETHING NEW.
I bought Martha Wainwright's new CD yesterday, "I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too." If you combined the vocal talents of Bjork, Sinead, Ani, Cyndi Lauper and Neko and threw in a bit of later Tori you'd have a wierd amalgam of a voice that approximates Martha's - but she is more than just the sum of those parts. It was an album I had a feeling I was going to like, based on the review I read for it, but I didn't know she would become my new girl. The album opens with "Bleeding All Over You". The chorus 'my heart was made for bleeding all over you/and I know you're married but I've got feelings too/but I still love you'. Ahhhhh, there it is. A lyric as satisfying as 'I can feel the distance getting close/you're right next to me/but I need an airplane/I can feel the distance/as you breathe' (China/Tori Amos) or 'how come you never said you love me/in all the time you've known me/how come you never say you're sorry/and I do' (Sinead O'Connor). We need these songs, these lyrics, for all the times we feel yucky because of boys. THANKYOU Martha.
"You Cheated Me", the second track, is insidiously catchy. I still can't quite put my finger on what this song makes me think of, it will come to me eventually but in the meantime I enjoy it. This is one of the best tracks on the album. (I finally pinpointed later that there is a part in there that reminds me vaguely of The Sundays. Remember them? It's been so long, but it feels right...)
The best track is "Comin' Tonight". It's got a great hook, but even more than that her voice sells the line 'but everything you say I oppose/I blame it on my hole/It's just my role'. Hee. Later on, she sings in a worn voice that wearily echoes the truth of the lines 'I spend my time trying to forget you with/Booze and smoke from cigarettes and dope/I only seem to forget myself/It's only you that is left'. This song inspires within me an emotion I'd honestly never thought I'd have. It makes me feel like leaning out over the bow of a huge and doomed ship in order to scream "I am the king of the world!" and I wouldn't even need Leo. Better yet, leave him out. Would that a song like this could be the anthem to an epic movie, but no, we get Celine. Stupid world.
'Tower Song' is a problematic piece for me, but I may end up liking it even more because of it's flaws. The strings are beautiful, and there is a wonderful old world French feel to the percussion. Her voice wails in and around the arrangements, at times sounding fussy but in the best parts of the song letting you in on her forlorn and heartbroken world. An orphan and a woman, the child and the adult, alone. Unfortunately, her voice also mars the song, sometimes sounding unfocused and more interested in testing it's range, this breaks the spell and keeps the haunting melody of the song from arresting me from the beginning to end.
"Hearts Club Band" works the haunting angle better, and is another of the album's strongest tracks, as is "So Many Friends'. 'In The Middle of the Night' is PJ Harvey ala "Stories From The City, Stories From the Sea'. This is a strength of the song. This influence makes it unsurprisingly the darkest and most intense song of the album.
(I should have included PJ in my rambling introduction, as "Stories" is in my opinion one of the best albums of the first decade of the new millenium.)
Buy this album if you like a strong female voice, it belongs squarely within all my favorite female singer/songwriter albums (unless you're favorites are Alanis and Jewel - not because you wouldn't like the album but because you are dead to me and should look elsewhere for music advice).
I give this album a "Highly Recommended Particularly if you like more than one of the singers mentioned in my rambling intro to the review".
*****AND a postscript******
I want to give a mention to a Martha song not on the above album, but from her first, eponymous album, which I dutifully picked up after I Know You're Married totally blew me away. The song is 'Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole'. Yes, that is really the name of this brilliant song. On itunes it is listed as Bloddy Mother F*****g a*****e. In your face world! I think, maybe, I like this song even better than 'Coming Tonight'. This is the song to listen to when you are 'in your bedroom/and the mother of gloom/is hanging over your head/with her hand on your head' (Isn't it great when a song is the perfect listen during the exact activity it references? Jem's 'Just A Ride' comes to mind, or Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get It On'. But I digress.) I love it when a song uses the word fuck in exactly the right way, making it seem like the only possible expression of an emotion. The very best line of this crazy amazing song? 'I will not pretend/I will not put on a smile/I will not say I'm all right for you/when all I wanted was to be good/to do everything in truth'.
********And a postscript from a year and a half later**********
While I still really like Martha, and things have happened since I wrote this post, like Tori put out another lackluster album and Neko put out a pretty bad ass album and I've got Florence and the Machine to kick that strong female musician hankering's ass, I've also realized something else. I think of music differently than I used to. I don't treat music like my psychiatrist anymore. That NEED for a female singer songwriter for me to RELATE to at a GUT LEVEL doesn't exist in that way anymore. I still use music as a way to process and contextualize my life, but I don't immerse into it to find myself. I think that was reserved for my early teenage years and my twenties. It's all right. I'm going different places with listening than before, and I still look for those female singer songwriters, but I don't think there every will be another Sinead or Tori for me, because I'm not the same person I was back then. At least, not in the way I heard them when I was younger. I'm so much more myself now, that the strength of a musician doesn't imprint onto me the way that it used to, so in some ways I'm more removed, but I'm also more thoughtful about what I listen to, not to mention that I am actually a lot more open minded in my tastes and far more adventerous (hip hop didn't even really exist for me until after I turned thirty. Heh. Jazz used to be a dirty word. And World? God, I used to think it was so corny...). So I guess it's a new era for me, with music. And rather than regret what is no longer, I am glad to recognize it and sort of embrace where I'm at right now.
I wanted to experience something like back in high school, when I was discovering Tori. How my angsty soul thrilled to her. I wept and sang and obsessed over her music. She doesn't get through that little crack any more, the one that leads to all those dark and painful depths that like to plague me to death, and I wish someone would.
Then there was the first time Bjork's Joga made me feel like the only person in the world who knew how lost I felt and how much I needed to be seen? How come she doesn't make music that hurts like that anymore?
What about the Dolly Fucking Parton period, when I realized she rocked the world?
How about Ani before she seemed trite and cutesy or boringly maternal or just too embarrassingly, blatantly about....womyn issues?
Regina Spektor came out and it seemed like a new voice going places, good places, then I heard Fidelity on Gray's Anatomy and wondered...
And then there's the one that touched me deepest of all - my beloved Sinead O'Connor. If you never bothered, I recommend that you immediately pick up Lion and The Cobra and I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got (and not for the Prince song, for the rest of the album....for the SINEAD songs...if you like those two albums, then Gospel Oak e.p. and Collaborations should be next on your Sinead to do...) Alas, I know her truly great catalogue backwards and forward.
Joanna Newsom is great, no, Ys is more than great, it is transcendant, but it's a committed listening to gain catharsis - I don't feel soothed unless I read along with the lyrics, and those songs are looooooooong...plus she has the regettable knack of seeming very very smart and making me feel very very...average.
Jane Siberry's "Calling All Angels" and "It Can't Rain All The Time"? Break my heart, they do, but I've heard them a million times...and she only gets me with some of her songs. The rest (that I've heard) border on pretensious or overly contrived. Maybe those two things are the same thing...whatever.
There's nobody in the world like Siouxsie, and I picked up her new album without Budgie, but I haven't gotten around to it yet because 1. I'm absolutely certain it's going to be a Siouxsie/Creatures type album and 2. I miss Budgie already and I haven't even heard her world without him yet. That's not a very feminist sentiment is it? But I can attest, I've seen The Creatures live and Budgie was so kick ass he's as much the attraction for me as Siouxsie is.
Neko Case is awesome, yes, but again those albums are some of the most worn in my collection.
I can't stomach Cat Power anymore. I don't know why. Probably heard it all one too many times.
Loretta Lynn wailed with Jack's guitar and it was like finding God. When that album came out years ago I found it worth it to check out her back catalogue, particularly her work from the seventies, and Loretta's another kick ass country chick, but those depths have now been done plumbed, for the time being. She's got a lot of back of catalogue to get through - just like Dolly.
I NEED SOMETHING NEW.
I bought Martha Wainwright's new CD yesterday, "I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too." If you combined the vocal talents of Bjork, Sinead, Ani, Cyndi Lauper and Neko and threw in a bit of later Tori you'd have a wierd amalgam of a voice that approximates Martha's - but she is more than just the sum of those parts. It was an album I had a feeling I was going to like, based on the review I read for it, but I didn't know she would become my new girl. The album opens with "Bleeding All Over You". The chorus 'my heart was made for bleeding all over you/and I know you're married but I've got feelings too/but I still love you'. Ahhhhh, there it is. A lyric as satisfying as 'I can feel the distance getting close/you're right next to me/but I need an airplane/I can feel the distance/as you breathe' (China/Tori Amos) or 'how come you never said you love me/in all the time you've known me/how come you never say you're sorry/and I do' (Sinead O'Connor). We need these songs, these lyrics, for all the times we feel yucky because of boys. THANKYOU Martha.
"You Cheated Me", the second track, is insidiously catchy. I still can't quite put my finger on what this song makes me think of, it will come to me eventually but in the meantime I enjoy it. This is one of the best tracks on the album. (I finally pinpointed later that there is a part in there that reminds me vaguely of The Sundays. Remember them? It's been so long, but it feels right...)
The best track is "Comin' Tonight". It's got a great hook, but even more than that her voice sells the line 'but everything you say I oppose/I blame it on my hole/It's just my role'. Hee. Later on, she sings in a worn voice that wearily echoes the truth of the lines 'I spend my time trying to forget you with/Booze and smoke from cigarettes and dope/I only seem to forget myself/It's only you that is left'. This song inspires within me an emotion I'd honestly never thought I'd have. It makes me feel like leaning out over the bow of a huge and doomed ship in order to scream "I am the king of the world!" and I wouldn't even need Leo. Better yet, leave him out. Would that a song like this could be the anthem to an epic movie, but no, we get Celine. Stupid world.
'Tower Song' is a problematic piece for me, but I may end up liking it even more because of it's flaws. The strings are beautiful, and there is a wonderful old world French feel to the percussion. Her voice wails in and around the arrangements, at times sounding fussy but in the best parts of the song letting you in on her forlorn and heartbroken world. An orphan and a woman, the child and the adult, alone. Unfortunately, her voice also mars the song, sometimes sounding unfocused and more interested in testing it's range, this breaks the spell and keeps the haunting melody of the song from arresting me from the beginning to end.
"Hearts Club Band" works the haunting angle better, and is another of the album's strongest tracks, as is "So Many Friends'. 'In The Middle of the Night' is PJ Harvey ala "Stories From The City, Stories From the Sea'. This is a strength of the song. This influence makes it unsurprisingly the darkest and most intense song of the album.
(I should have included PJ in my rambling introduction, as "Stories" is in my opinion one of the best albums of the first decade of the new millenium.)
Buy this album if you like a strong female voice, it belongs squarely within all my favorite female singer/songwriter albums (unless you're favorites are Alanis and Jewel - not because you wouldn't like the album but because you are dead to me and should look elsewhere for music advice).
I give this album a "Highly Recommended Particularly if you like more than one of the singers mentioned in my rambling intro to the review".
*****AND a postscript******
I want to give a mention to a Martha song not on the above album, but from her first, eponymous album, which I dutifully picked up after I Know You're Married totally blew me away. The song is 'Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole'. Yes, that is really the name of this brilliant song. On itunes it is listed as Bloddy Mother F*****g a*****e. In your face world! I think, maybe, I like this song even better than 'Coming Tonight'. This is the song to listen to when you are 'in your bedroom/and the mother of gloom/is hanging over your head/with her hand on your head' (Isn't it great when a song is the perfect listen during the exact activity it references? Jem's 'Just A Ride' comes to mind, or Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get It On'. But I digress.) I love it when a song uses the word fuck in exactly the right way, making it seem like the only possible expression of an emotion. The very best line of this crazy amazing song? 'I will not pretend/I will not put on a smile/I will not say I'm all right for you/when all I wanted was to be good/to do everything in truth'.
********And a postscript from a year and a half later**********
While I still really like Martha, and things have happened since I wrote this post, like Tori put out another lackluster album and Neko put out a pretty bad ass album and I've got Florence and the Machine to kick that strong female musician hankering's ass, I've also realized something else. I think of music differently than I used to. I don't treat music like my psychiatrist anymore. That NEED for a female singer songwriter for me to RELATE to at a GUT LEVEL doesn't exist in that way anymore. I still use music as a way to process and contextualize my life, but I don't immerse into it to find myself. I think that was reserved for my early teenage years and my twenties. It's all right. I'm going different places with listening than before, and I still look for those female singer songwriters, but I don't think there every will be another Sinead or Tori for me, because I'm not the same person I was back then. At least, not in the way I heard them when I was younger. I'm so much more myself now, that the strength of a musician doesn't imprint onto me the way that it used to, so in some ways I'm more removed, but I'm also more thoughtful about what I listen to, not to mention that I am actually a lot more open minded in my tastes and far more adventerous (hip hop didn't even really exist for me until after I turned thirty. Heh. Jazz used to be a dirty word. And World? God, I used to think it was so corny...). So I guess it's a new era for me, with music. And rather than regret what is no longer, I am glad to recognize it and sort of embrace where I'm at right now.
Monday, February 18, 2008
3535 emails sent from work since 8/03 (that I haven't deleted): Selected Excerpts
I've had the same job for seven years, from age 22-29. Recently I was cleaning out my inbox and archives and now and then, some of my old emails made me laugh out loud. I just posted a few excerpts. What I learned about myself going through all those old emails is that in my early twenties I spent much time at work hungover and emailing people about it.
8/25/03 And being Monday I think it can be safety assumed that I am in a horrible shitty crappy flabby mood.
8/29/03
I slept and then I read and then I read and then I slept. I made myself a soy smoothie in between.
9/12/03
I will be down for Christmas most likely though. But thats not the same. I have to be sober for part of that.
9/15/03
I am trying not to think about how I don't want to be here today, because I don't want to be here every day.
9/22/03
I had fun with her family at the fair, I learned a bit (a fairly atom sized amount) of German. For instance I learned 'I am sitting on my butt' which is um, I forget the word for 'I' but then ah, fuck the only word I remember is hinde which is butt. oh well. At first I thought they were teaching me how to say chair so I thought that I was saying 'I am sitting on my chair' but when we got back to Sandra's place and we had a translater than it came out that I was actually saying 'I am sitting on my ass.'
10/03/07
I'm just squanderous with my money when I'm drinking and that is my own damn fault and if I decide to buy you guys dinner, drunk ass Shannon or no, then I guess that's all right.
10/28/03
Love you back, you sweet sweet pumpkin pie.
10/29/03
I helped my sister move last night. A pot house like mine. Hee hee. Of course its more beneficial for her.
12/04/03
Fabulous. I will gorge on taco meat and lettuce.
1/5/04
god help me January is always SO BORING
1/12/04
I have not eeezxpeeerienssed it, in the way you mean. In my heart and in my soul I have also not experienced it. I have, however, experienced it in no way whatsoever.
1/12/04
I don't know... alleys are kind of scary places where nefarious goings on are common and they are notoriously unclean... oh, but good luck!
1/13/04
HELLLLLLLOOOOOOOO. Did either one of you read this? DO YOU WANT ME TO HELP YOU? Please read the email below and respond in a timely manner. Like today.
Sincerely,
You Can Call Her Oh Bossy One
1/21/04
Yes I will be there though the thought of trying to run again after two months or even more fills me with unimaginable terror.
2/9/04
Oh what a glorious Monday which means oh what a glorious timesheet reminder
2/11/04
Your calendar appears clear but I know that doesn't mean much. Please respond (and if you haven't sent your timesheet yet, shaaaaaame)
2/19/04
Last night I went home and in the dark depths of a good mood I drank a bottle of wine. Needless to say, this morning I suffer.
3/9/04
(I keep on forgetting to refer to him by name so I am practicing in this email. I think it is because I see him as this nameless entity - like, there is a physical presence, a person and I recognize him and am getting to know him. And, in that recognition, I forget that he has a name. I can't explain it. Maybe its just because I don't like the name Bob)
3/12/04
mmmmmm, hmmmmuhhh...i do remember the incident in which the passing of the business card occurred. other things are blurry.
3/16/04
I felt like I had been a little bit of the spectacle last time... a little bit of the very tipsy sideshow and I don't know, I don't want people to be annoyed because of my excessively outgoing personality when I am drunk... opinions?
4/7/04
all this for my boss who - no matter how simple the request SEEMS - will always manage to find the one that will take up all afternoon
11/7/06 Thankyou...…for breakfast. My pounding head thanks you. My belly thanks you. My decidedly undaunted soul thanks you.
3/7/07
don’t think Sanjaya is actually male.
3/7/07
That note was for Meagan. Unless she wants to enlighten you, you shall remain baffled.Wahahahahaha.
6/26/07
I certainly didn't indicate that you were fishing for an invite, I just said you had brought it up with with a laugh sort of thing, telling me how it was legendary...
7/9/07
Heh. I got a lot of no answer at all from Tom. Apparently, there may or may not be remaining PCB containing units that may or may not have been part of your original contract that may or may not need to be removed this summer. He's looking into it. In the meantime, he wanted me to ask YOU what you knew about it. God I love efficiency.
7/11/07 I assume that with your wife in labor the project is temporarily put on hold
8/13/07
Ever feel like getting information out of me is like pulling teeth? Cuz I'm starting to feel like my teeth are being pulled
8/29/07
No, I can't find it and I'm scared to look for it. I didn't sleep at all the night before last but last night, I only woke up once looking for the spider.
8/29/07
I know, but you forget that I get the Shannon's-so-fabulous discount.
2/19/08
Obviously I'mgoing to ask one of my favorite people in the whole world...but the pope was busy, so I'm asking you instead.
8/25/03 And being Monday I think it can be safety assumed that I am in a horrible shitty crappy flabby mood.
8/29/03
I slept and then I read and then I read and then I slept. I made myself a soy smoothie in between.
9/12/03
I will be down for Christmas most likely though. But thats not the same. I have to be sober for part of that.
9/15/03
I am trying not to think about how I don't want to be here today, because I don't want to be here every day.
9/22/03
I had fun with her family at the fair, I learned a bit (a fairly atom sized amount) of German. For instance I learned 'I am sitting on my butt' which is um, I forget the word for 'I' but then ah, fuck the only word I remember is hinde which is butt. oh well. At first I thought they were teaching me how to say chair so I thought that I was saying 'I am sitting on my chair' but when we got back to Sandra's place and we had a translater than it came out that I was actually saying 'I am sitting on my ass.'
10/03/07
I'm just squanderous with my money when I'm drinking and that is my own damn fault and if I decide to buy you guys dinner, drunk ass Shannon or no, then I guess that's all right.
10/28/03
Love you back, you sweet sweet pumpkin pie.
10/29/03
I helped my sister move last night. A pot house like mine. Hee hee. Of course its more beneficial for her.
12/04/03
Fabulous. I will gorge on taco meat and lettuce.
1/5/04
god help me January is always SO BORING
1/12/04
I have not eeezxpeeerienssed it, in the way you mean. In my heart and in my soul I have also not experienced it. I have, however, experienced it in no way whatsoever.
1/12/04
I don't know... alleys are kind of scary places where nefarious goings on are common and they are notoriously unclean... oh, but good luck!
1/13/04
HELLLLLLLOOOOOOOO. Did either one of you read this? DO YOU WANT ME TO HELP YOU? Please read the email below and respond in a timely manner. Like today.
Sincerely,
You Can Call Her Oh Bossy One
1/21/04
Yes I will be there though the thought of trying to run again after two months or even more fills me with unimaginable terror.
2/9/04
Oh what a glorious Monday which means oh what a glorious timesheet reminder
2/11/04
Your calendar appears clear but I know that doesn't mean much. Please respond (and if you haven't sent your timesheet yet, shaaaaaame)
2/19/04
Last night I went home and in the dark depths of a good mood I drank a bottle of wine. Needless to say, this morning I suffer.
3/9/04
(I keep on forgetting to refer to him by name so I am practicing in this email. I think it is because I see him as this nameless entity - like, there is a physical presence, a person and I recognize him and am getting to know him. And, in that recognition, I forget that he has a name. I can't explain it. Maybe its just because I don't like the name Bob)
3/12/04
mmmmmm, hmmmmuhhh...i do remember the incident in which the passing of the business card occurred. other things are blurry.
3/16/04
I felt like I had been a little bit of the spectacle last time... a little bit of the very tipsy sideshow and I don't know, I don't want people to be annoyed because of my excessively outgoing personality when I am drunk... opinions?
4/7/04
all this for my boss who - no matter how simple the request SEEMS - will always manage to find the one that will take up all afternoon
11/7/06 Thankyou...…for breakfast. My pounding head thanks you. My belly thanks you. My decidedly undaunted soul thanks you.
3/7/07
don’t think Sanjaya is actually male.
3/7/07
That note was for Meagan. Unless she wants to enlighten you, you shall remain baffled.Wahahahahaha.
6/26/07
I certainly didn't indicate that you were fishing for an invite, I just said you had brought it up with with a laugh sort of thing, telling me how it was legendary...
7/9/07
Heh. I got a lot of no answer at all from Tom. Apparently, there may or may not be remaining PCB containing units that may or may not have been part of your original contract that may or may not need to be removed this summer. He's looking into it. In the meantime, he wanted me to ask YOU what you knew about it. God I love efficiency.
7/11/07 I assume that with your wife in labor the project is temporarily put on hold
8/13/07
Ever feel like getting information out of me is like pulling teeth? Cuz I'm starting to feel like my teeth are being pulled
8/29/07
No, I can't find it and I'm scared to look for it. I didn't sleep at all the night before last but last night, I only woke up once looking for the spider.
8/29/07
I know, but you forget that I get the Shannon's-so-fabulous discount.
2/19/08
Obviously I'mgoing to ask one of my favorite people in the whole world...but the pope was busy, so I'm asking you instead.
Hee, first time, testing testing one two three
So, this is the blog. The blog that will be mine. Mine as in Shannon's. Shannon as in "the mysterious force with flax bread, peanut butter, apples, black beans and pomegranite tea" in her cubicle. Yeah. THAT Shannon.
Heh. I have a cubicle. It's square. No, YOU'RE SQUARE.
Heh. I have a cubicle. It's square. No, YOU'RE SQUARE.
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