A feeling rises up in me, I don't even know what it is. Maybe it's the memory of hearing it at my Aunt's wedding when I was 8 or maybe it's just the pure fun and joy of the song itself. Anyways, I crave it like crazy 'cos what this guy is doing sounds so much like LIFE! Isn't that why we love art? Isn't this why we continually want to find music that resonates? I'm making my way home after seeing 'The Woman In Black', and it sucked so bad! Such an awful movie. I thought I'd get all filled up on a movie but it turns out I'd get my fix from a busker doing an ABBA tune.
And then his next track: "Baker Street" by Gerry Rafferty. Hell yeah! That's one of those songs you really hate but really love. And it reminds me of Dito's movie "A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints" and it reminds me of every time me and my friends have played air-sax to the tune.
The tube train rolled into the station, but I didn't board it! I ran upstairs to get closer to the music. Music can really suck sometimes, just turn on the radio and you'll see. We get our fixes in different places. There are three drunk girls opposite me on the train right now, they're being obnoxious and loud, singing some song (I think they're Brazilian, hard to tell). As much as they're pissing me off, I can't help but enjoy it a little, because they're singing and finding their fix. Music that means something to them, it's come from their culture. Or maybe they're singing gibberish and are high on cocaine, who knows! But it sounds to me like they're loving it.
Once upon a time they invented the camera and the radio (I don't mean the drunk Brazilian girls), and humans craved it, and they trusted that they'd be entertained, they'd get their natural highs from the novelty, from the artists. But then big business took over, it was all about singles sales and box office receipts. You had to please everybody to get seen by anybody, or you went underground and played a different game to the system.
Now it's blown right open. People don't even know where to rent a movie or download a track anymore - the whole thing is in chaos. We go to the cinema, we listen to the radio, we see the stars being interviewed on TV, but how often do we stumble upon magic? How often does it resonate through to our very core? Hardly ever. Don't look to the old safe bets, don't expect the chart music to give you what you need. You have to go to different places, you have to be open, you have to go underground, just as I did, literally, tonight.
Great piece but now I've got Baker Street stuck in my head.
ReplyDelete