Used For Glue

Used for glue – Rival Schools

I couldn’t even remember who this song was by, if ever i learned so in the first place, but i could play the whole thing through, note for note, mentally. I ran through every major post-hardcore band i could think of, watching their videos on youtube, until i found it. And i found it and it’s Used For Glue by Rival Schools. A good song. I sometimes wonder where i’d be in life if i weren’t such a prude and relented to bands like Rival Schools, Sparta, At the Drive-In, Far, Thursday, Minus the Bear, Coheed and Cambria, and other bands i lump in my “everybody listens to these bands, so why bother actively listening to them – someone will expose me to them eventually” group. I wonder… At parties, well dressed, leading a lifestyle like that exhibited in this song’s video, with all the cultural touchstones needed ingrained allowing me to participate and move freely in that strange world. Maybe a tattoo as well.

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If Not You

If not you – Baryshnikov

Best band. Seeing Baryshnikov last night was an unashamedly fun time. I don’t know what everyone’s problem is, if anyone even has a problem and it’s not simply myself unable to disclose in company things i like, but i put my leave in for work a month and a half ago just so i could have this weekend free to see this band who very much excite me. There is nothing i do not love about them, there’s just a way i can preserve my rectitude by being non-commital when cross examined. They were amazingly good last night, i danced as much as these heavy feet would allow, and i have this song in my head this morning as i head back to the city to see them twice more today.

I feel like a goof at shows, none more so than last night. If it were the music and music only, without pause between, before, or after songs to draw there the time to be familiar with others i would be fine. But no, it’s social, and everybody knows each other and everybody’s infinitely more charismatic than i am, so i spend my time sitting down trying to look busy, or have the luck to land myself on the perimeter of a group conversation, remaining there as one by one everyone leaves, leaving me. I helped pack in and out a whole bunch of equipment last night to a show i wasn’t even playing just to avoid standing around awkwardly. What a dork. And i talked to Christina of Baryshnikov, whose nice animations occupied the time between Thinking and the Thaw’s sets, about the weather of all things. What a dork. I miss going to shows anonymously, and i miss going to shows anonymously with Peter even more. Twice more today.

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One Step Away

One step away – Trial

It’s thanks to Selfish Pete (does he even go by that now? I don’t know. Distance through internet handles) that i got into Trial. Without his advocacy and certificate of approval i probably would have overlooked them, being really neither into Equal Vision or crimethinc level hardcore and those camps. For some reason i have payed some overdue attention to bands more on the EVR end of that spectrum recently. I have no idea why, maybe growing up, maybe it’s time. Maybe no one will catch me out. There is something about Trial though that have always distanced them and put them on a level i could appreciate.

It’s with some disrepute that i report i have the lyric sheet-less, Equal Vision records, “our band has never seen a dime!” release of this record. The band, understandably, and thankfully, want complete accessibility to their lyrics, so as per their wish, uh… here you go. Now i feel i have to to that with every song. I should probably read them, seeing as still after all this time i have no idea what most of the words are. Great record. It seems entirely appropriate and befitting the views and wishes of so many that they were dicked around by Equal Vision. I could probably do without Mechwarrior/Command and Conquer string sections though.

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Babies

Babies – Pulp

My girlfriend is definitely on to me. Again, a song on repeat at volume to wake me up today. This one. Although this morning she actually ventured from this one song to others (Pulp being her favourite band and all), through saturation, this thing is becoming more a compilation of her favourite songs than mine.

I really like that she has a favourite band. There’s something… i don’t know… reassuring and satisying about it. That she has something to herself that gives her so much joy. That mine isn’t the only music heard in this house. That boys like Jarvis Cocker and other foppish indie boys catch her eye and cause her heart to flutter….

Dreamy. I can’t compete with this. It’s a loathsome circumstance that she ended up with this charmless do-nothing whose looks are fading exponentially fast, if ever i had them to begin with. At least once there may have been potential, but now with everyday comes the irreversible slide down through less and less looks and i have no capacity to change it and it’s depressing the fuck out of me. Hey.

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You’re Wife Don’t Understand You

You’re wife don’t understand you – Lurleen Lumpkin

Thinking about it, if i were to be completely honest about what song i’ve heard most in my life, it would be the theme song to The Simpsons. And if i were to be completely honest about what runs through my mind the most, it would be scenes, sometimes whole episodes, of The Simpsons. Where would we be without this show? What would fill the void? How much ice has been broken, laughter and joy produced, or people’s character affirmed by relating through Simpsons? There aren’t many awkward moments i’ve not settled or had settled with “So… do you like… stuff?” or some other relevant quote. It’s so easy, but so universally congenial. And how much has it given us? An indispensable commodity. Where would we be? It is The single greatest creative product of our time.

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I Think We’re Alone Now

I think we’re alone now – Tiffany

Ugh. Here i go pretending i have a somewhat sophisticated and obscure taste in music and my subconscious betrays me again. Actually this is probably the paradigm of my music taste right here. It doesn’t get much better than this. And, with no trace of irony, it doesn’t get much better than this song. Ok maybe it does, it’s not first tier, but there is something special in the way Tiffany pronounces the “can” in “running just as fast as we can.” Hail, the pioneer of the mall tour.

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Crash

Crash – The Primitives

I like how the Primitives refer to themselves as “yes, we’re the band who sang Crash.” It is a perfect song, but it must be horrible to be remembered for one song and one song only, especially when those other songs you happened to write are themselves really good and worth someone’s attention. Like with The La’s and There She Goes, Men Without Hats and The Safety Dance, Blueline Medic and Making the Nouveau Riche, Altered Images and Happy Birthday, and others: You’ve written a song that managed to be your introduction to a wider world and infiltrated people’s earspace enough through radio, through use and re-use through movie soundtracks, through “greatest hits of the 80s!” compilations, through saturation, that it becomes the only song you will ever be remembered for, the only thing you need have ever done. Your ingress was welcome as far as that one song. Your history will not be traced, your future already forgotten.

There is so much good music out there to ever relegate a band to a one hit wonder, and it’s horrible for the Primitives and others to be remembered as such. This is how real fans of the Vapors, or the Knack, or the Buggles must feel, screaming at us all to give the rest of their catalogue the chance it deserves.

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[#1]

[#1] – Franklin

It’s for Greg, it’s for Brian, it’s for Ralph, it’s for Roy, it’s for Josh, it’s for Franklin.

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Confide In Me

Confide in me – Kylie Minogue

Because she often has something to prompt her out of bed, be it university or, today, work and i work these terrible evening/night shifts, my girlfriend always gets up earlier than i do. I did have some 7-4 shifts there for a while and was keeping admirable hours, but now i’m back to this “in bed by 3, up at 10” routine that i hate. We live this kind of Ladyhawke situation most days – she home when it’s time for me to go to work, she in bed or asleep on the couch by the time i get home, i wake up with her gone to her day already. There is this twilight where our routines allow us some time together, but time enough for little.

I am not sure how she spends her time alone, what she does in the morning, but whatever she was doing this morning she was playing this song on repeat, loudly. Perhaps i’ve never beheld someone’s listening habits as much as i have hers so i don’t know if other people do this, but she has this annoying trick where she’ll listen to one song, and one song only, over and over again for the entire time she wants to spend listening to music. Driving with her, when her CD player worked, she’d always push the back button on a song and we would listen to a song maybe eight times in a row. I cannot deal with that. It’s not that i didn’t like what she was playing, but any more than twice and i am ready to move on to another song. We eventually applied a “three times is enough” rule. And then her CD player broke.

So is this cheating? To have a song placed in my head subliminally by repetition, to wake up with it, and have it kept with me as i lie awake in bed hoping this will be the last time. And then it is the last time. And she comes in and tells me she’s late and has to go. It’s getting to me. We go away together soon after the university semester.

Maybe she has found out about this thing i have here and is doing her best to manipulate the phenomenon of song choice. It worked today. And it’s not like this song is not great. It’s probably my favourite Kylie song. She has recorded some great songs over the years – Better the Devil You Know, I Should Be So Lucky, Step Back In Time, On a Night Like This, etc. I hear she puts on one heck of a show as well.

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Lovesick

Lovesick – The Arrogants

When we first started going out, as per custom i guess, i made a CD for Rebekah to listen to in her car. This song was on it. It was a very much more refined mix CD than i normally hear of people giving/receiving (please, someone? me?), with a mix of songs i was pretty sure she would like. The lack of risk payed off and she liked it very much. Success. That was four years ago. Success.

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