“tell me about a moment, a song
and what it meant to you”

Blog: SHEENA BEASTON Song: Blak Pudd’n Artist: SWV (It’s About Time, 1992) Context: Coming from a modest family, we didn’t purchase albums, rather, after having been given a stack of “found” blank cassette tapes, I resorted to positioning myself in front of an unneccesarily large dual tape head monster, for hours on end, recording songs from the radio. One instance sticks out like no other, and that was the initial radioplay of SWV’s Blak Pudd’n. After securing a scratchy yet embraceable recording of the beat and bass heavy jam, I immediately rushed for paper and pencil, to write the overtly and sexually suggestive lyrics down. After many hours of “pushing play, stop and rewind”, the complete vocals were logged. Result:  I played the song nonstop, rehearsing the cadence and flow with preteen precision. I got really good at it too. So good in fact, that in one moment of busting through the lyrics “cause women in the 90′s want more from a brother, than a part time lover, who’s wack under cover…”, my mom overheard and instantly extracted the tape from my tight grasp. I have no idea where that tape is now, but thank god for digital media, and it’s allowance of my frequent plays of this song. 17 years later, I still know every single word.

Blog: LOST AT SEA Song: Magic Doors Artist: Portishead (Third, 2008) Context: Third appeared in my music rotation thanks to a close friend, and I must admit that at the time I was not that excited about listening to it. I was a fan of Portishead’s Live in NYC disc, but not much else at that point. However, throughout the first spin the somber beauty of the record was evident, as every track seemed to build upon the emotional turmoil wrought throughout. “Magic Doors” fully hit me on a train journey from Bratislava to Berlin, as I desperately tried to break free of not only myself, but the world that appeared to be crumbling around me. Result: “Magic Doors” is both a tragedy and a triumph. If you’ve never felt the anguish that Beth Gibbons displays in this song then I both envy and loathe you, as you’ve probably had a reasonably pleasant life, yet haven’t truly experienced the full range of human emotion. You are missing an important piece of clarity regarding self, and an extremely critical component of who you are as a person. Throughout the track Gibbons’ trembling lyrics cut deep, as she questions who she has become in a world that doesn’t seem to care. The song also displays one of the most unorthodox but effective horn solos I’ve ever encountered. I didn’t know what to make of it at first, but now it’s obvious: the horn is trying to break free from thought, from reality, from itself. However, end the end it realizes this action is futile, and through some bitter and disturbing contemplation the horn finds itself once again. In a world where hegemonic confidence reigns supreme and those (from political leaders to corporate executives to Kanye West) don’t seem to question the idiotic decisions that they make on a daily basis, the fact that introspection and self-examination still exist in displaced areas of the musical world is reassuring. Maybe society would benefit from listening to a little more “Magic Doors” and little less “Stronger”.

Blog: THE BLUE WALRUS Song: Show Artist: Beth Gibbons & Rustin’ Man (Out of Season, 2003) Context: About midway through my first year at university, and having been suffering various symptoms that were preventing me from going out and socializing and doing a lot of the things that make that time in your life so exciting, I eventually found my way to the doctors surgery. Over the next few weeks I was given a battery of tests with none conclusive, meaning that they wanted to do some virology tests, but with the extraordinarily high white blood cell count and other symptoms the doctor felt the need to tell me to consider the possibility of how I may have contracted HIV and anyone I may have infected, but the tests would be back in a few day. My mind raced going over and over any possibilities, but being unable to bring myself to tell any of my new university friends that I had only known a few months or my parents for the stigma attached, increasingly isolating myself. I would listen to this as the simple, crawling piano and haunting vocals helped me to slow my thoughts,and open myself to the possibility of letting others in. Result: My friends could not have been more supportive and held my hand through the results process. Although the results were negative and my illness treatable for which I was elated, but strangely emotionally even more comforting was that I knew that they would be there whatever the news was and I realized how lucky that made me.This song reminds me of that comfort of close friends.

Blog: RACHEL AND THE CITY Song: So Much Pain (ft Luther Dickingson) Artist: Star & Micey (S/T, 2009) Context: This past year has been extremely hard for me as I have had to watch someone very close to me struggle with a very serious drug addiction. If you have ever had to go through this then I am sure you know how incredibly stressful it is. Over the last few months as I have gotten ready for the release of the new Star & Micey album, one song in particular has resonated with me. It’s actually written about someone close to singer Josh Crosby that had a drug problem and ended up going to jail. The song, /So Much Pain/, has been very comforting to me. Result: When I shared the song with the person in my life with the drug problem – it really affected him and I am happy to say that at the beginning of this month he entered into a 60 day treatment program and is doing really well. Who knows what the future may hold, but it is always amazing to me how much music can make a difference in our lives.

Blog: BLENDETTA Song: Retreat Artist: The Rakes (Capture/Release, 2005) Context: It was four years ago. I had graduated from college two years prior and was dealing with the ramifications of a useless degree and a life that wasn’t turning out quite the way I pictured. I was working in a record store, which was simultaneously the most fun job I could’ve hoped for, and a daily reminder that my hopes and dreams were becoming something of a lost cause. But the fact that I was making no money, working crap hours, and dealing with more high school drama than the set of a VH1 reality show, seemed relatively normal when all my friends were similarly dissatisfied. Life was commiserating about bad jobs and confusing relationships and going out dancing as much as possible. Getting off work at 10:00pm didn’t seem so bad when life didn’t even start until midnight. The music that accompanied those nights usually belonged to the mid 2000s Britpop revival scene. This was the era of Arctic Monkeys’ “I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor” and Hard-Fi’s “Living For the Weekend” – songs that seemed to celebrate the life I was living. It all had a tendency to blur together into one big musical sentiment of “Work sucks, romance is hard, but a great night out can fix everything.” And while I think that was the glamorous ideal, the one that got you through the day and turned the night six shades of neon, it wasn’t necessarily the reality. The reality was, of course, a lot messier and a lot harder to find in a song that was meant to get asses shaking on the dancefloor. Which is why I was so taken aback the first time I heard The Rakes’ “Retreat” on some random NME comp. The song was fairly simple, but perfectly conveyed happiness mixed with despair, glamour interspersed with a complete lack thereof — the knowledge that at some point, this will all change and being deeply fearful of what that really means. “Walk home, come down, retreat to sleep. Wake up, go out again, repeat.” The idea couldn’t be more simply put, but this is exactly where I was during that portion of my life. “I don’t want to miss out on anything, at the same time I feel the need to retreat…Everything is temporary these days, might as well go out for the third night in a row.” Perhaps it isn’t the most poetic line ever written, but nothing could’ve summed it up quite so accurately. Result: My life changed a lot over the past few years. I suppose I did what most people do – gave up on the things that weren’t working out, got a much better job (or at least a job that pays much better), did quite a bit of growing up. There’s a part of me that deeply misses the years I spent racing from retail hell to indie club bliss. The lack of responsibilities, the feeling that there was always something exciting going on – in a lot of ways, I was much happier then. It actually makes me a bit sad to listen to “Retreat” now, reminding me of a life I don’t lead anymore. But, at the same time, I realize there’s a tendency to romanticize those parts of our lives. Sure, the nights were a hell of a lot of fun, but the days were often kind of miserable. Which is essentially what “Retreat” is about. I was sad then too; I just didn’t admit it as much.

::Click here to read past song/context/result series::

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“tell me about a moment, a song
and what it meant to you”

Song: Out of Gas by Modest Mouse [Lonesome Crowded West, 2002]

Context: I got this song from a much cooler Californian exchange student in college who taped her entire Modest Mouse catalog for me on two 90 minute tapes the night before she moved out of the dorms. These tapes changed all my musical expectations and broadened my tastes into this whole new genre of “indie rock.” At the time I got the tapes I was going through a difficult emotional time, just coping with growing up and all that stuff.

Result: Playing this tape over and over, and this song especially, sent a shock through me that other people really knew how I was feeling and gave me something to emphatically sing along to when I was staying up by myself all night in my dorm room. I don’t know if the end result was positive, because I sure did wallow a lot in late-night self-pity, but it really did feel good at the time. I still get really into it every time I hear it and it remains one of my all-time favorites.

brooklyn’s au revoir simone are three ladies on three keyboards, harmonizing through flirtatious pop melodies and vintage drum machines, creating soft music together. their two intimate albums may be found in the usa on their own private label our secret record company and in the uk on moshi moshi records.

listen:

stay golden
fallen snow {the teenagers remix}

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brooklyn’s jeremy haines and sammy rubin are known as the collaboration project jenny, project jan. together with a computer and vocals, they have created their own eclectic style of music called “electro-kareoke” by mixing colorful and animated vocals over pure funk and hip hop samples. these two talented gentlemen recently just got back from touring with fujiya & miyagi and were instantly adored as they entertained the audience with their vivacious energy and special visual art films that displayed in the background.  at the end of summer 2007, they released their first full-length album, XOXOXOXOX, that may be found on might records.  

l i s t e n

train track
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junior hyness of project jenny, project jan kindly shared his own moment about a song and memory. 

Song: Back to Black
by Amy Winehouse [Back to Black, 2007]

Context: Me and Rubin had just played a show in Dartmouth the night before and hadn’t really slept much. We were driving back to NYC through the autumnal countryside bullshitting and listening to tunes, drastically hung over. This song came on and we both shut up and listened. About halfway through we both said outloud, “This song is fucking amazing.” We then listened to it again, back to back.

Result: I think the song reminded us that being in love with someone is really cool until you are confronted with the fact that this person is leaving you and then you think about the dark places that you will be going to (and the bad things you will, in turn be doing to yourself) if this person is no longer in your life. Thats a pretty strong emotion and the song seems to capture it perfectly.

images by project jenny, project jan

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Covert Curiosity
Song: The Iraq War
by The Black Angels [Passover, 2006]

Context: I was late in picking up the Black Angels’ latest album Passover, even though they are local and I try to hear any new local production as soon as possible. I listened through most of it in the car on my way home from the record store, and left it in the cd player for a few days to give it a closer inspection as time allowed.

Result: Around the same time I received the horrible news that a close friend had been killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq. He was another casualty of the war that had already taken the life of thousands of American soldiers and countless Iraqi citizens. I was angry. I wanted this war to be over, right that second. The Black Angels disc was still in the cd player, but it had gone silent. Not long after I realized this, a hidden track at the end of the album called “The Iraq War” started playing, and it summed up my thoughts on the war right then and there. The words “Somebody please stop that war” are as heavy today as they were over 12 months ago. Is anyone listening?

The Modern Music
Song:The Invisible Worm
by Cul de Sac [Ecim, 1992]

Context: It was a cold winter, I cried and cried, because I was in a very hard situation where I made a terrible mistake and there’s no going back, then this was the song that got my attention during a heavy experimental playlist. The song was crying like me, it was like a brainstorm to fuck all the difficulties in this life.

Result: I used to walk with music in my ears, but I can’t stand to with a random music mix. There is nothing better than a well adjusted emotional playlist. And music, it really is my best friend. The other day I was feeling good because of this song and its old memory. The Invisible Worm sounds like a great and terrible beauty, and makes you know that you are not the only one!

———-

The AlternaKids
Song: T.O.J.
by EL-P [Fantastic Damage, 2002]

Context: After listening to this song hundreds of times before, I finally truly heard it for the first time.

Result: Not a condemnation as much as a sigh of relief for further tragedies avoided… I came to terms and no longer lamented the love that fell apart, but genuinely believed it was better to have loved and lost, and even more so to have learned from the experience and do some long hard thinking about what I want out of future relationships.

Vinyl Mine
Song: Institutionalized
by Suicidal Tendencies [Suicidal Tendencies, 1983]

Context: A crowded loft, all kinds of mayhem up front, the singer with a bandanna pulled over his face, jeans hanging low, skateboard rattling on top of the speakers, the familiar swinging of guitars like those metallic oil mines you see when driving through Texas,  water pouring out of his face, and off of everyone around me adding only to the humid decrepitude that was Baltimore in the one nine eighters. The 1-hit wonder song everyone on the East coast knew first from that soundtrack, I guess I sure did, turned the already maddened crowd into a full out combat zone, clodhoppers flying, dust singing along with the refrain “I’m not crazy / your driving me crazy“, arms swinging like helicopters, sweat rising like bullets into the shadows of the ceiling, pushing, yelling and screaming. The band, only a few months from being outed and condemned by the faithless faithful (metal sellouts, what else?), seeing the sheer power that just one song can have, played it cool like bands did, pushing stage divers off the stage with their boots, guitars and elbows. That night, we were prostrate in front of the band – who cares if we were calling them metal sellouts the next year and boycotting their shows.

Result: Did it make me feel, you ask?  No, it did the exact opposite. I felt even more out of it than before, not-feel was the feeling, my own-ly friends, that crowd of people I’ll never see again but okdokie with the timespacefeel of the song. That song despised now as being too OBVIOUS as a representative song of the era but even now remains as the little tiny LARGE raging encapsulation of what I and everyone in that room felt in that night long ago.  We pushed out from there, we went on and made money, committed suicides, got into our own bands, lived, married, had kids, murdered, joked, grew fat, and discovered great art in my own little misfit cusp-borne retread punk idiot generation.

artwork by robert carter

thankyou truly to those who have kindly collaborated
on song / context / result
[.i ii iii iv v vi.]

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Benzaiten Music
Song: Sound and Vision
by David Bowie [Sound & Vision, 1989]

Context: After 4 years of living in Los Angeles, I was in a rut. Feeling stuck, like I wasn’t moving forward, and wasn’t moving backwards. “Pale blinds drawn all day / Nothing to do, nothing to say / Blue, blue” I had just been laid off from what at the time I considered to be a dream job as an executive at a major record label. I needed something to push me forward in the direction I needed to go, but so many of my fears of failure and rejection due to the recent bout with my expendability in my career, kept me from seeing that direction. I had a friend who was an avid skydiver and had been trying to convince me to go, and me being terrified of heights(as well as everything else) laughed at her. A re-occurring nightmare of mine was me falling downwards through the sky.

One night, I was driving home from a weak interview for a job I really couldn’t get excited about, and this song came on. The beginning where it sounds like a descent and the lyrics “I will sit right down, waiting for the gift of sound and vision / And I will sing, waiting for the gift of sound and vision / Drifting into my solitude, over my head” changed my decision about skydiving. In right then and there, all of a sudden I could see myself happily free falling and I got the most intense feeling of freedom. I called my friend and told her to sign me up for the following weekend. And I did it. This song was a sign, a wake up call. I was “waiting for my gift of Sound and Vision” and there it was.

Result: I did the one thing that I feared most in life, falling, I jumped out of a plane from 13,000 feet in the air but this time I landed safely. It was the most intense feeling of freedom and strength. I proved to myself that I am capable of ANYTHING. The strength that I would never open up to before, emerged. The following week I landed what is ACTUALLY my dream job at an independent record label, helping musicians make a living and get the exposure they want for their music without getting screwed by corporate label executives. I was going against every job I had once held, but I took a chance and I, as well as the label, are creatively and passionately thriving now. I face everything that comes to me, and look for chances. I’m not afraid anymore because I’ve already done what scares me most and I survived. When I hear this song now I automatically flash back to not just the dive, but the moment that I realized that I needed to do it and that instant sense of strength and freedom that I have had ever since I made that one decision because of that song.

An Aquarium Drunkard
Song: A Horse With No Name
by America [America, 1972]

Context: Atlanta, GA: Imagine a sunny, hot, humid, July day in in the year 1992. I was barely 16, armed with a drivers license, and the sense of freedom (both literal and metaphorical) that comes with it. I had made a deal with my parents that if they would help me out financially with getting a car that I would, in turn, cut my hair. It was on the way back from getting this haircut that I (woops) ran a red light and crashed into a brand new BMW operated by a yuppie soccer mom. America’s “A Horse With No Name” was playing on the classic rock station as my brakes locked up and I skidded through the intersection awaiting impact.

Result: I can’t hear that song without a) cringing, and b) turning it off. Anyway, America were Neil Young rip offs, and I, obviously, had no business behind the wheel of a car.

——–

Bushwick is Beautiful
Song: Step Down
by Jessamine [Long Arm of Coincidence, 1996]

Context: Seattle 1997, 3am. Listening to community radio (KEXP) driving around in the rain. Right up the street where Kurt purchased the weapon that would end his life. That area always seemed to be surreal in itself, and that night was no exception. When the radio is turned on and all of us are immediately locked into the speakers with the opening drone “ahhh the ocean, I lost you“.

Result: We didn’t speak or move until the song let up. The DJ came on after the song and said that was a track from a great Northwest band called Jessamine. This song gave me the same sensation of what it was like to play music. I became hooked on what seemed like my own little secret band. The band has since broke up, but they will always be a personal favorite that I would like to share with anyone willing to listen.

Culture Bully
Song: Glory & Consequence
by Ben Harper [The Will to Live, 1997]

Context: Though his last few releases have been hit or miss Ben Harper’s 1997  album ‘The Will To Live’ carries itself as a strong set, one which introduced Harper to a wider audience as it was his first ever charting release. One of the most touching and inspiring songs on the album is “Glory & Consequence;” in it Harper battles his own insecurities and confronts his fears – something that I’ve found great solace in over the years.  One of the most difficult things that a person has to confront is losing love and without any reservation, I associate this song with those feelings. Mere months after graduating high school, I found myself in a new country, deep in a stranglehold of love. I look back, having recently found myself feeling those emotions again and again found reprieve in Harper’s words, “I would rather me be lonely and you have someone to hold / I’m not as scared of dying as I am of growing old.“

Result: Something deep beneath the surface of Harper’s lyrics is a sound that comforts me and that sentiment is no more truthful than with this song. “Glory and Consequence” is a song that I first heard driving around one night knowing that things were souring with my girlfriend and it consoled me, helping me understand that the feelings I had were normal and it was alright to let go. Now I find myself letting go again and the soundtrack, it seems, hasn’t changed.

Song, by Toad
Song: Fresh Feeling
by Eels [Souljacker, 2001]

Context: I met a girl a few years ago who was in a fairly dark place, having just emerged from the long, slow, tortuous demise of a five year relationship that had been finally put to death only a few weeks earlier. We met in London, although she was an Edinburgh girl, got completely plastered and ended up in bed together. Insisting that she just wanted a fling, we arranged to go out to my folks’ house in France for a long weekend (1p flights on Ryanair) in about a month’s time, but we were so excited we just couldn’t wait. A bank holiday happened to fall two weeks prior to our arranged date and, unable to restrain ourselves any more, I hopped on a train up to Edinburgh that Friday. We were both so nervous we drank ourselves silly and neither of us can really remember our first proper night together at all.

The following morning, after a long, slow, and deeply naughty few hours in bed we were sitting in the bath where we had been arguing about politics – classic first date stuff, of course. Anyhow, we both agreed on many things, but it was our mutual ability to argue our points on the things on which we disagreed and a disinclination to back down just to please the other that had us both rosy cheeked and grinning with satisfaction as the conversation quietened down. In that lull, on came Fresh Feeling with its perfectly appropriate lyrics: “Try, try to forget/ what’s in the past/ tomorrow is here./ Love, orange sky above/ lighting your way/ there’s nothing to fear” before breaking into the chorus: “Words can’t be that strong/ my heart is reeling/ this is that fresh/ that fresh feeling.” Having talked ourselves out we just sat there in the cooling bathwater unable to do anything but hold hands and grin at one another like fools.

Result: Well, maybe things could have turned out better.  But buggered if I know how!

Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before
Song: The Fool On The Hill
by The Beatles [Magical Mystery Tour, 1967]

Context: In preparation for a long coach journey on a college trip to Paris, I carefully taped a couple of my ‘Ministry Of Sound’ compilations onto cassettes (Everyone seemed to be listening to that kind of music at the time). Then as an after-thought I packed a cassette my dad had made of The Beatles’ Blue Album (I guess I was wondering what all the fuss was with that Liverpool band from the 60s). Halfway through the picturesque French countryside, the coach broke down and we were all confined in our painfully small seats for nearly four hours. So I took out my cassette player, put on The Beatles and soon became lost in the magical productions and psychedelic imagery.

I distinctly remember one song on the album that I played and played during my stay in Paris (I probably almost wore the tape out) and that was ‘The Fool On The Hill’. I spent hours trying in vain to fathom the meaning of the words. Was it about a real person, a religious figure, a politician, a pop-star? I never managed to put my finger on it and perhaps I never will, but it’s fun trying to work it out.

Result: After exploring the huge Beatles catalogue I inevitably went onto Oasis, then Led Zeppelin, Manic Street Preachers, The White Stripes, Morrissey etc. Now I’m totally hooked on music and addicted to finding new and exciting artists. It’s all thanks to ‘The Fool On The Hill’ for showing me how a song can completely capture your imagination. Incidentally those ‘Ministry Of Sound’ compilations never came out of the boxes and never have since.

artwork by kathleen lolley

thankyou truly to those who have kindly collaborated
on song / context / result
[.i ii iii iv v.]

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