I love music.
Often, when in a place I don't want to be (like all-staff meetings), I try to imagine every note and beat of a favorite song. It's great for passing the time, but I'm still a little fuzzy on some of the details of my health insurance.
Some people flip on music because they are afraid of silence. That's not me. (I'm a fan of true silence--sans yard equipment, yelling neighbors, helicopter-blade-whupting, mortar shell booming. No, I don't live in a war zone, just next door to a major Marine base.)
I listen to music for the same reason I read: it's soul food, and true conversation with someone's soul. Soul conversations don't have to be deep and depressing. I think some of the truest-to-the-soul songs out there are expressions of joy, contentment and excitement that aren't "deep" intellectually.
Here are some of those songs that just make you move. You may scoff at some of them (Yes, I mean the Neil Diamond, and I stick by the song) but I dare any of you to listen to one of these songs while sitting absolutely still.
Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show: Neil Diamond
Revival!: Me Phi Me
Let it Out (Let It All Hang Out): Los Hombres
Somebody's Baby: Andru Donalds
Rock 'N Me: Steven Miller Band
I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (With Flowers in my Hair): Sandi Thom (It's a three-chord song, but I don't care)
Drive South: John Hiatt
Hey Girl: OAR
What a Wonderful World: The Ramones
End of the World: REM
Get Up Jake: The Band
Money for Nothing: Dire Straits
Who Are You: The Who
Fire It Up: Modest Mouse
45: Elvis Costello
I think I just unintentionally made myself a new playlist for my MP3 player.
9 years ago
8 comments:
Okay, honey, I was with you on this until Neil Diamond and then that punk rocker song (shouldn't it be the subjonctive, "i wish i were a punk rocker?") That song irks me b/c she crams the 60's, 70's and 80's into one fuzzy nostalgia. Guess when you're old enough to remember each as a distinctive decade you are too old!! Any-hoo, i do so love the music too. Especially at staff meetings!!!! (la la la in my head)
Granted, the punk rocker song is my guilty pleasure on this list. I choose to look at her combining of decades as a way of connecting with people of various generations. :) Yes, it doesn't quite deserve to be on the list, but it made it anyway because it makes me dance in my chair. I'd sing along if I didn't work in cubicle-land.
For some reason this post reminds me of a line from that treacly rom-com with Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore, Music and Lyrics, which I passed some time over the Atlantic watching recently. Barrymore's character is a formerly literary type, and Grant's is a pop musician who chides her with a comment along the lines of:
"Think of all the great novels in the world, and not one of them has the power to make you as instantly happy as, [singing] 'I've got sunshine, on a cloudy day'"
I think I, grudgingly, have to concede his point!
p.s. It should be subjunctive, but it's not good form for Americans to correct British grammar. So let's not tell her. :) I've only ever heard this song on French radio. I don't think it was released on this side of the pond--although it was on itunes.
Oops! Jen, you posted while I wasn't looking. That p.s. goes back to the V.Q. :)
Right now, I'm proving Grant's character's point by happily humming "we've got to move these refrigerators; we've got to move these color tv's."
(I haven't seen the movie. Does "treacly" mean it doesn't serve its function as chick-flick escapism?)
In literature's defense, a good line from Shakespeare, or Tolkein, or Eliot can keep me going for quite a while, too.
"I am amazed, and know not what to say!" (context helps)
I'm not sure on the exact definition of "treacly" (unless it means something a middle-school kid could have written; basic trying to pass off as cute), but the movie was certainly forgettable for me, save for the very scene Jen described of the two characters having a conversation about music.
BTW, LOVE Neil Diamond. Not kidding.
Yeah! Dave and Dawn! Now my former-American-expat-circle-from-Central-Europe is complete! (OK, it's not nearly complete, but probably as close as it's going to get!)
Admitting a taste for Neil Diamond can be kinda scary, but it's amazing who will stand up with ya if you make the first move! :) The only song of his that I truly can't stand is, "You're so Sweet Horseflies Keep Hangin' Round Your Face." I mean, really! :)
ha ha ha - i think you still know more about him than i do but i do have a story...
in 7th grade, our youth group was having a big lock-in and i was soooooooooooooooo excited to go... it was the number one thing i was looking forward to that year!
until i found out it was scheduled for the same night as a neil diamond concert that my dad had already bought tickets for. i was going with him & my mom. i was excited about it, but crushed that i had to miss the lock-in. and i was 13 years old, old enough to know neil diamond was not cool for 13-year olds and old enough to feel plenty of kevin-arnold-style angst about the whole thing.
but i went to the concert and it was really fun. no regrets!
my favorite: "Holly Holy".
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