last sunday, while reading the paper & farting around the apartment, i listened to the entire back catalog of galaxie 500.  it was fucking awesome.

the other day, i went to a jeff mangum concert.  he had hadn’t played chicago in something like 15 years.  at some point that night, my bro-in-law said “if he would’ve come out and played one song for my $38 ticket, i would’ve been happy with that.”

every single time i go to a cat power show, i think to myself, “man, i could listen to that girl sing all day long.”  this thought occurs in various iterations: putting my cat power playlist on repeat; imagining a marathon concert that would put even bruce springsteen to shame; or chan marshall lounging around at our home, singing to me the words to clorox commercials or whatever else suits her fancy, all the livelong day (inbetween the times we’re making out, of course).

i may or may not have obsessive compulsive tendencies, especially w/r/t to music i like (ask any girl i’ve dated in the last 6 years what they think of the national after having dated me).

on tuesday, i created a new itunes playlist called “my ceremony” and loaded it on my ipod.  it features only four tracks.  they are different versions of the song “ceremony“—by the original band (joy division), the band formed from the ashes of joy division (new order), galaxie 500, and radiohead.  i’ve been listening to it a lot the last couple days.  because i really, really love that song.  it’s probably my latest all-time favorite.  but now i’m going to put that love to the test.

after mike doughty inspired me to quit facebook, i guess he’s also now sort of responsible for inspiring this (potentially asinine) experiment.  in an interview about a year ago, doughty talked about the things in music that might only be revealed to someone after repeated listens.  at the time, i felt like i knew what he was talking about because i’d recently developed a new appreciation for jeff buckley’s cover of “hallelujah” after hearing it for years.  today, i’m going to try to replicate that depth of relationship with a song, but over the course of a single day.

here’s the plan.  i’m writing all this introductory stuff on wednesday night.  i’m going to watch control before going to bed to try to learn a little something about ian curtis, the joy division singer who killed himself just weeks after recording “ceremony” with his band (if you’re not familiar with this particular song’s history, you can get a quick primer via wikipedia).  i’m going to put “ceremony” on repeat when i go to sleep.  and after waking up, i’m going to listen to “ceremony” non-stop, all day, occasionally checking in here with an update on my thoughts, re: the song (or my status, re: declining mental health).  i might reach some kind of transcendent moment, or i might just get really tired of this song yet keep listening anyway until i freak out, or maybe nothing interesting at all will happen and this post will just be shit.  but i’m gonna give it a go & see what happens.  stay tuned.  or not.

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After reading Ty’s post about narrative in song lyrics below, I got to thinking about how often, in general, I ignore lyrics in music. I consider the voice to be an instrument insomuch as it creates a sound, and I think a lot of the new, lo-fi, shoegaze-y bands, for whom Pitchfork’s boner throbs tremendously, have figured this out, too, as they tend to obscure their lyrics in reverb and fuzz. I was telling a friend the other day that the only time I listen to lyrics for the sake of listening to good song lyrics is when I’m listening to folk, and can focus more on the language, since there are usually fewer instruments to compete with the language. But the more I think about it, that’s bullshit, because whenever I have time to sit down and focus on anything that demands attention, I read. I’m not saying there is no such thing as brilliant song lyrics, which tell stories that have existed since the beginning of time, but I don’t listen to music to comprehend the meaning behind lyrics, anyway, because most song lyrics either suck (New Order, I’m looking at you), or are perfectly fine, but don’t transcend anything the that music can do on its own. The band I’m listening to right now, Maserati, who sort of sound like a muscular, complex, and more fleshed out soundtrack to an old Mega Man game, or something, would have vaguely funny but terrible lyrics if they sang – the theme song to Orgazmo comes to mind. They’re a little too aggressive and intense to soundtrack important, submission-bound writing, but they’re good for writing a blog post, for example. (Not that blog posts aren’t important, mind you, but there’s less pressure. Which is sort of ironic, since more people will see this than 95% of everything else I write, but what can ya do.) What about you? Yea or nay to listening to music while reading/writing? If so, any suggestions?

There’s been a lot of talk on Bark about cool people. Here’s are video arguments for:

Lou Reed

David Byrne

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