Women pretending they're musos is as bad as women pretending to like football or cars. I always suspect them of pretending to be interested just to make boys like them more, when in fact most men only like women who listen to Westlife and watch showjumping. I went through a phase of pretending I listened to vinyl but got found out when the Object Of My Affections was lured back to my plush Brixton pied-a-terre and said: "so, where's your turntable?" I said it was at the Cornflake Shop being fixed, when in fact the real answer was: "In the cellar, with my enormous collection of vinyl, which stopped with the 12-inch of 'Blue Monday' and started with 'The Wombles' and 'Dougal and The Blue Cat', with 'For Your Eyes Only' by Sheena Easton and some Lloyd Cole in between". What a twat.As it happens, I'm not too bad. But only because I really do like it. Music, that is. My parents have good taste, if you discount Yes and Genesis (my father's Dark Years), and my brother is QUITE the hep-cat. Granted, I'm a complete knob in some respects; I've got an iPod and even make playlists (see what I mean?), but generally it's not too embarrassing.
The problem is when songs you don't really like GET to you. I've got a friend who cries if you even mention "Don't Give Up" by Gabriel 'n' Bush. I made her cry in a meeting once by just telling everyone about her problem. Brilliant.
Anyway, there I was driving down Tooting High Street from Wimbledon today, having completed an unmentionable cosmetic medical procedure that was surprisingly painless and in some ways quite amusing (two nurses poking a blindfolded me, going "cor look at THAT, it's BRILLIANT, we WISH you could see them just VAPOURISING"), and 'Chasing Cars' by Snow Patrol came on. They're alright, Snow Patrol, but I'm not that bothered. But every time I hear a tiny bit of one lyric (something like 'these three words'), I well up.
It is quite extraordinary. I've been testing myself. I made myself listen to it twice at home without crying (successful), and then made myself listen to it on the Stansted Express on Sunday night (not successful: tears just outside Harlow Town). I had to turn the telly over when the ad for their album came on (not successful: all they had to say was "current hit single 'Chasing Cars'", and I was sobbing), and I welled up when I read about it being the soundtrack to some film whose name I can't remember.
I don't know what to do. Wouldn't be as embarrassing if it was something good, like James Blunt.
14 comments:
Where to start. There is nothing wrong with Lloyd Cole & The Commotions. Hard to believe they were once on a par with the Smiths. Even his first solo effort was tolerable.
'Don't Give Up'. Christ. EVERYONE knows SOMEONE who cries when they hear that. Fuck knows why. It's shit.
Oh. OK. 'Can't Stand Me Now.' I HATE the Liberines and all they stand for. But it is an OK song. For reasons I cannot fathom it is on my mp3 player. And I cry every night on the way 'home' when I hear it. BRILLIANT!
Gah. I wish I knew enough about music to understand, but it all sounded very cool!
Shirley, believe me, there is nothing cool about any of this, at all. Also, please note: I said 'James Blunt'. That ain't cool. 'Blunt' rhymes with 'cunt', as I am not the first to point out.
TD: Try something light and amusing, like late Joy Division.
xx
I only cry at appropriately heart-rending music, like Schubert's "Death and the Maiden" or REM's "Nightswimming".
When it comes to film though, it's another story. To this day I avoid watching "Green Soylent", because the granpa's death scene turns my face into Niagara falls. How freakishly embarassing.
...tears just outside Harlow Town
Best place for tears, I think.
Dougal and the Blue Cat scared the bejeezus out of me when I was a kid. "At the factory..."
Crying tunes: "God Only Knows" by The Beach Boys
Oh and by the way, vinyl fans these days are only DJs or hipster wannabes - both categories made up of utter twats.
Hmm. I had a similar incident recently, though I was driving nearly 90mph at the time.
Cliff - exactly. The lady with the doors. literally terrifying. Even the front cover used to scare me.
Kav - what, same song? Awful isn't it. 'those three words/are said too much/they're not enough', etc. See, I know it BY HEART. Absolutely APPALLING if you've got a recently bruised heart. Appalling. Sob.
Think Hippie Festival, Matha 2007! Have found over 70 Genesis and Yes Tribute bands....Heaven!
You should be ASHAMED of yourself.
I am SO having that album.Next time I'm round and you are busy basting the chicken I'm off down the cellar.
Have you heard Camille - Ma douleur yet monkey? You will like. perhaps i feel a CD coming on.
Monkey friend xx
Anonymous (cough), you keep your thieving little spidermonkey hands off of my precious collection.
A-A, at least you GO on dates. The best jukebox in London is in the Sultan on Lyham Park Road. You know, bad-but-good pub with raucous regulars.
xx
nwm: No, it was worse. Coldplay's Fix You.
I wrote a long explanation about it over at mine, but I can't remember how to linkify on my work PC.
Jesus, man, I'm sorry. Coldplay get on my tits because even though I KNOW I'm being manipulated, and even though I really DO NOT LIKE THEM VERY MUCH, they do make me go a bit funny sometimes. Might be nausea.
I read a v. funny thing by the bloke who wrote 'the mysterious instance of the dog in the nighttime' or whatever it's called, and he said that he had wanted to be Radiohead, but had become Coldplay.
Fucking 'Chasing cars' is now a trailer for 'Gray's Anatomy' which plays endlessly over and over again on the television. Grrr.
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