Category Archives: Music

A song for a spring night, and memories of the seasonal turn in Boston, when the weather finally shifts and one can walk late into the evening. I thought for sure that I had already written a post for this beautiful song by my favorite group James, from my favorite album of theirs, ‘Laid’, in which such gems as ‘Out to Get You‘ and ‘P.S.‘ reside, making it one of the most transforming albums of my youth. Music hits hardest when one is young, and it won’t ever be the same later on. This song actually cuts a little deeper the older I get, the more I see family dynamics from a clearer perspective.

Since your mother cast her spell
Every kiss has left a bruise
You’ve been raiding too much meaning from existence
Now your head is used and sore
And the forecast is for more
Memories falling, like falling rain
Falling rain

I cannot find the original post, if there was ever one written. My memory is shot – I have to google my full name and whatever topic I’m trying to recall, then piece together what crops up – I don’t even remember some of my own words anymore. Fitting for a late-night look-back at childhood damage – maybe some things are better forgotten. They are certainly better when let go and released, however the fuck we’re supposed to effectively do that. Still figuring those intricacies out, still feeling my way into and then out of the muck.

Every view they hold on you is
A piano, out of tune
You’re an angel
You’re a demon
You’re just human
Now your world has turned to trash
Broken windows on the past
Take that child, and teach him senseless
Damage the dream, damage the dream
I feel nothing, I feel nothing at all
I feel nothing at all

Once upon a time a young man I adored, before I revealed my infatuation and scared him off, spent half the night on the phone with me – one of those early conversations that feels like the opening of a lifetime of happiness, electric with spring rain in the air, warm enough to leave the bedroom window open, and trying to find a comfortable phone cradle position in the hushed reverence of this early talk, scared to break the spell, not wanting it to end. He hinted at childhood terrors and read me a poem he’d written that had won an award. A hauntingly beautiful work, it made me instantly fall in love with him just a little bit upon hearing it. I knew enough not to mention that so early, even if I knew nothing else and would frighten him away anyway. I remember wishing we’d been friends as children, wishing we could have had just one person of safety and security in those tender years, wishing we could have been there for each other.

In this gloomy, haunted place
All the feelings are of shame
All the windows have been broken by the children
So the wind screams up the stairs
Slams the doors, and rattles chairs
I wish we weren’t conceived in violence
Damage the dream, damage the dream

I had wanted this to be a hopeful spring post, a reminiscence of Boston evenings beneath cherry blooms, the sweet perfume of flowering crabapples and Korean spice viburnum on the night wind. It took me down a different lane, through a different portal, the way music will bring you back to the places it chooses, whether you want to return there or not.

I remember the room.

I remember the little bit of light, the way it turned everything gray.

I remember the silence after we hung up. Remembered fragments of his poem.

I remember the happiness of hope.

The return of spring.

The magic is broken
The house is in ruins
Your memory’s one-sided
The side that you’re choosing feels nothing
Feels nothing at all
We feel nothing at all

Candy has been a delectably fertile creative ground here, where flights of fancy are seeded, where sugar-spun fantasies are wound like shiny clouds surrounding a towering croquembouche. Candy has been poison here too, insidiously insinuating itself in deceptively innocent fashion – as if it wasn’t going to rot your stomach, rot your teeth, and rot your soul with its deadly sweetness. Candy has been a girl in love, a girl above it all, a girl unaware of being the prettiest one in the room. Candy, now, is telling the story of this song…

Candy says, “I’ve come to hate my body

And all that it requires in this world.”

Candy says, “I’d like to know completely

What all they discretely talk about.”

Candy is seduction and promise – pure titillation and pure honey hope – the fabled, the fabulous, the albatross of fame flung so casually around the neck like some string of pearls – and Coco Chanel whispering always to take off the last thing you put on before leaving the house.

I’m gonna watch the blue birds fly over my shoulder

I’m gonna watch them pass me by

Maybe when I’m older

What do you think I’ll see

If I could walk away from me?

Candy on a necklace, candy on a toss, candy on a bracelet, candy on a cross, candy on a kick, candy on a cock, candy on a prick, candy on a frock… candy as a reminder that rhymes don’t always lead to reason, that madness can sometimes be sweet, and temptation, when handled delicately, can be dangerous and divine.

Candy says, “I hate the quiet places

That cause the smallest taste of what will be.”

Candy says, “I hate the big decisions

That cause endless revisions in my mind.”

Candy caught in the crosshairs of vulnerability, deciding how much is safe to reveal, deciding what is best kept concealed, and struggling to relax into being desired. She wanted it before untangling its problematic roots and shoots – sugar forged into glass – shattered and splintered into shards and razors and the possibility of pain and destruction – the slow bleeding out from a cut too fine to be felt or found.

I’m gonna watch the blue birds fly over my shoulder

I’m gonna watch them pass me by

Maybe when I’m older…

Candy coming on strong, oozing syrup and goo and sweetness – Candy coming on weak, tripping over her own trepidation – Candy coming on incorruptible in the pure innocence of original sin. Candy wanting only to be held, Candy wanting to be protected from the rain, Candy wanting only to be cared for – Candy always wishing and hoping and praying for something to be different, something to be whole.

What do you think I’d see if I could walk away from me?

This crown imperial (Fritillaria imperialis) has not flowered in years, but I don’t grow it for decorative purposes – it is to keep away the critters who might eat up the single crocus we have left, with its powerfully-pungent odor. For just long enough until the crocus foliage can ripen and start dying back, giving food for next year’s bloom.

Who loves the sun?
Who cares that it makes plants grow?
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart?

Who loves the wind?
Who cares that it makes breezes?
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart?

This song by the Velvet Underground sounds more like summer than spring, but we need summer more than spring right now because winter is still creeping into the nights and mornings. Ephemerals are coming up even in the most frightful weather – the enchanting and all-too-fleeting hardy flowers whose delicate appearance is at odds with how tough they need to be this early in the growing season.

Who loves the sun?
Who loves the sun?
Not everyone
Who loves the sun?

Who loves the rain?
Who cares that it makes flowers?
Who cares that it makes showers
Since you broke my heart?

Spring is made for the contradictions – the tender with the tough, the rustic with the refined – and throughout it all the battle of sun and rain, the celebration of flowers and showers. What will the next day bring? No one can know…

Who loves the sun?
Who cares that it is shining?
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart?
Who loves the sun?
Who loves the sun?
Not everyone
Who loves the sun?
Sun
Sun
Sun

Shades of pink and lilac swirl in layers of tulle and lace, the sheer refinery playing beautiful tricks on the eyes. A cloud of color billows about and behind – maybe it’s the dress, maybe it’s the perfume, maybe it’s the illusion of pink. A portal to the past reveals itself in every bubble – it’s the bubble of self-awareness, the bubble of knowledge, the bubble of realizing that maybe you’ve been wrong.

There’s that beautiful girl with a beautiful life
Such a beautiful life built on lies

‘Cause all that’s required to live in a dream
Is endlessly closing your eyes

She spins such beautiful stories to sing her to sleep
Full of magic and glory and love
She’s the girl in the bubble, the bright shiny bubble
Blissfully floating above

Ah, but the truth has a way of seeping on in
Beneath the surface and sheen
And blind as you try to be
Eventually, it’s hard to unsee what you’ve seen

Galinda’s transformation in the ‘Wicked’ movies is shrouded outwardly in pink fabulosity, shimmering with ethereal beauty and sparkling wands, but doesn’t fully take hold until she dons a black cape, muddy boots, and rides out in the night to help her friend. By then it’s too late, and sometimes life is about accepting the way that your choices have played out, making the best of circumstances that were never quite what you wanted or expected. It’s never too late to change, to become something better than you are today, even if nothing else changes. You can be different. You can be better.

And so that beautiful girl
With a beautiful life
Has a question that haunts her som?how
If she comes down from the sky
Giv?s the real world a try
Who in the world is she now?

Does it feel a little frivolous in a world on the seeming edge of nuclear war? Perhaps, but think of the burnt bagel theory: if the worst thing in your day is that your bagel was a little burned, that can feel catastrophic. Not saying it’s right, just saying that comparison works in myriad ways. Usually it’s the thief of joy; sometimes it can be helpful. We want so badly to make sense and order of the world, especially when it makes us feel yucky, or we feel like we have failed. Revelations and transformations are difficult, especially when they start to change lifelong archetypes and beliefs.

And though so much of her wishes that she could float on
And the beautiful lies never stop
For the girl in the bubble, the pink shiny bubble
It’s time for her bubble to pop

For the popular girl, high in the bubble
Isn’t it high time for her bubble to pop?

Music lends itself to spring moments, and this song touches on beauty, one of the themes of this lilac season. Here is our growing, and increasingly eclectic, playlist:

• Lilac Wine

• Symphony for a Queen

• I’m Beautiful

• Beautiful Life

• Get Happy

• 24hr Dog

• Love Song

• Showgirl at Heart

• Glued

• Lilac

• How Beautiful the Days

• Lilacs in the Rain

This was supposed to be the morning post, but the music and the sentiments were too moody to stand up to the morning light. Certain music must be heard only when the sun has gone to bed, the way certain flowers only emit their perfume late into the evening like an angel’s trumpet. Perhaps they’re afraid of the cold, brisk, bracing frost that still troubles the mornings. Lilacs are hardier than that, forged before the winter even begins to wreak its havoc. Spring blooms have to be stronger than those of summer.

I see lilacs in the rain,

And you are with me again,

When April sprinkles her dreams in my heart

When we parted in the lane,

The skies were tearful with rain,

The scent of lilacs remained in my heart.

Andy mentioned the angel’s trumpet in passing a little while ago, and maybe this is the year we bring them back – the first year is really just the planning – their show usually happens after overwintering for a year or two, when they can develop roots and trunks and soar like small trees, dangling their sweetly-lemon-scented blooms in the nights of summer.

Two other arms around you now,

Some other love has found you now!

But when love forgets to smile,

My darling, once in a while,

Remember April and lilacs in the rain!

For now, the lilacs will have to do, and they stand on their own perfume-wise. I’ve been afraid to examine our lilac trees to see how many buds might be present – there’s nothing other to be done whether they are full or scant, and lately I’ve been focusing on what is real, what is present, what is at hand – a method of mindfulness that fills the head-space when overthinking runs the risk of overtaking.

The previous sentence dangles there without a proper ending. It began in such busy fashion and then just petered out. Playing with words is merely an excuse for disguising something deeper, something more vulnerable and telling. Lilacs evoke such sentiments – they have me spilling secrets of the heart’s desires, and the heart’s hurts. That’s why this post would have never stood up to the unforgiving light of day; there wouldn’t be enough shadow to shield…

When we parted in the lane,

The skies were tearful with rain,

The scent of lilacs remained in my heart.

A record of a lesser-known musical titled ‘The Most Happy Fella’ by Frank Loesser peeked out at me from a bin at a downtown Albany thrift store. A lovely-enough introduction to an operatic excursion, the few song excerpts I found online illuminated why it never made much of a lasting splash, but there is beauty in this song, and the atmosphere provided by the Percy Faith treatment fits in well with this beautiful lilac spring we’ve conjured to gain some traction out of this recent hazy winter.

Without words, the music creates atmosphere over distinctive scenes or plot points – evoking a feeling, a sense of something, a hint of emotion – and the rest you can fill in from your own earned experience. What does it sound like? Where does it place you? It is possible to believe you’ve had an experience just by hearing certain songs, even if you’ve never quite had it. Music does that, even in the most trifling song, if you let it, if you give it the space to live.

Spring begins its song softly, rising from the winter, not so much a phoenix as a brand new bird never before seen. It’s a different experience sometimes, as if happening for the very first time.

Cold nights.

Cold mornings.

Ice crystals on the ground.

The infancy of spring somehow more cruel than the dying days of fall.

A song named ‘Lilac’ because there are no signs of lilac in the air yet.

Only false echoes of what we think we remember.

At the time of this writing I am felled by a sinus/cold thing that has my head stuffed and throbbing. I’ve had to miss a day of work and the No Kings rally. The world feels separate, removed, muted – more like winter than spring. And I don’t want to rush, but I don’t want to remain…

Dreaming of lilac trees, and the way their gnarled trunks last from year to year and the beauty that only age can create. Their perfume and flowers are the showiest and shortest part of their annual cycle. The most seemingly wonderful things don’t usually last, but when you learn to find beauty in the venerable gnarled trunk as much as the fleeting flower, you can find beauty everywhere and always, in sickness and in health.

When The Body Shop announced it was bringing back their ‘Dewberry’ line from the 90’s, my heart took a nostalgic leap as I hurried to the nearby mall to pick up a fragrance that I felt certain would bring back some questionable memories from my youth. As I approached the area where I remembered the store was located, it was nowhere to be found. It’s been a while since I was in a mall, or at least since I was paying attention to the stores rather than just walking through to the movies. Apparently all of The Body Shop stores had closed long ago. Alas, we live in an online world, and within days I had a bottle of ‘Dewberry’ body wash and body butter in my possession, where I kept them for a bit, saving them for one of the early moments of spring.

On a recent evening, when the hope of this new season tickled the senses in a warm night wind, I rubbed the Dewberry between my hands and inhaled the sweet aroma as it surrounded me in the shower. Suddenly, I was transported to the days of ‘Always Be My Baby‘ and ‘Waiting in Vain‘ and ‘Be My Lover‘ and the freaking choo-choo train… the music was cheesy and awful and I still remember every song like it was yesterday…

Back in the 90’s, I didn’t place much importance on colognes, at least judging from the small arsenal of scents I had at the time – Curve, Cool Water, Eternity, Safari. Of greater relevance was the fragrance of my skin and haircare products – I was keen on specific shampoos and body washes, and one of my favorites was the ‘Dewberry’ line at The Body Shop. (I also loved their tea tree oil products.) ‘Dewberry’ was vibrant, fruity, and sparkling in a way that said spring and summer to me. By the spring of 1996, I was living alone in Boston, and focusing on what made me happy rather than trying to impress anyone else.

That spring the nights could be cool, but they were sweetly scented by crabapple blossoms and Korean spice viburnum bushes. It was magical as much for my being in the throes of youth as for the innocuous musical surroundings of the time. I was lucky that way – lucky to have grown up in a relatively benign time.

As ‘Dewberry’ sparkles in the shower of my middle-age, I remember… and I am grateful.

Attachment and detachment are life and death these days. Sometimes you have to pretend some things are not happening or you run the risk of sinking so low into the actual reality of the moment that there would be no rising from the muck again. At the same time, how much can we actually detach without losing sight of the real hurt and pain that is necessary to make this life worth living, that illuminates how sweet the happier moments can be?

I’m glued to the thoughts in my mind (mind)
They pester like a hawk in the sky
I am glued to the love in you (in you)
It swallows me whole, you’re hard to let go

That conundrum is at the heart of Melanie Martinez‘s brilliant ‘Glued’, which posits the idea of a love that is kept at a distance, a chemistry that is kept at bay, and the question of whether or not to recklessly give in to it entirely or keep safely away. A heart that is hidden cannot as easily be hurt.

Oh, that’s not what I wanna do (oh, no)
Perfectly attached like a noodle in the soup (huh?)
You’re good with the X-Y-Z (Y-Z)
I’m good with the A-B-C

And D-E-F-G, H-I-J-K, baby
We all have our strong suits, built differently
Different experience, different needs
I know we can’t die at the same time (oh, so sad), but please?

I don’t wanna think about the morbid parts of life no more?
I’m tryin’ just to focus on the things that hold me so damn close
I’m sticky, sticky, stuck and solidly sealed up to this reality
I’m seein’ not what I wish to be achieving, the old idea of me is

Glued up, sometimes it’s too much
I’m fucked up and clueless (clueless)
I’m stuck in the vortex, stuck in the vortex
Glue-less, life would be borin’
Empty but no hurting (hurting)
Is it necessary? Detachment is scary

My own romantic history is a testament to giving in to love at all turns, from the earliest infatuations to the lifelong bonds, and where I’ve made a complete fool of myself and risked being completely desperate and uncool are precisely the points of which I am still most proud. When I felt something for someone, I said it, I proclaimed it, I shouted it from the highest mountaintop because it was genuine and honest and brutal and real. Of course it never worked out, because the rules of romance require all those silly games of coquettish pull-back and hysterical hesitancy to the point where we haven’t much evolved from the playground taunting that boys and girls used to pretend they weren’t at all interested in someone.

When my petty feet start to sway (sway)
You better turn around the other way (walk away)
When the doubt starts creepin’ in (oh, no)
It’s hard to let go of old instinctual

Patterns that I picked up from my environment since a baby
Cut the negative self-talk and cut out my procrastination
Being sticky stuck, glue those old habits shut
Paste me to a new way of being, somethin’ to breathe new life in me again

There is something scary and brave and soul-rending about giving yourself up so easily and so soon in a relationship. I’ve always done it, and rarely has it worked to my advantage, but I never stopped doing it, because being real is the only thing I want to be. When I met Andy, I even attempted to play by the rules, our first night ending with my laughably-elusive non-promise of, “I’ll probably never see you again but here’s my number” only to discover later that Andy didn’t like games either.

Glued up, sometimes it’s too much
I’m fucked up and clueless (clueless)
Stuck in the vortex, stuck in the vortex
Glue-less, and life would be boring
Empty but no hurtin’ (hurtin’, no hurtin’)
Is it necessary? Detachment is scary

My favorite album of the moment is ‘Big Disgrace’ by Haute & Freddy. Lead-track ‘Symphony For A Queen’ just helped kick off our spring season, and the rest of the album is a glorious retro-romp through 80’s dance pop.

Highlights for my ears are ‘Anti-Superstar’, ‘Dance the Pain Away’, ‘Femme Hysteria’ and ‘Showgirl At Heart’ (hear below). The titles alone speak to my inner demon diva, and the 80’s synth pop trappings wrap it up in a nostalgic glow while remaining entirely of this very moment of now. It is slightly reminiscent of the magic surrounding Dua Lipa’s spring of ‘Future Nostalgia’, and I am here for it all.

With Melanie Martinez’s newest album ‘Hades’ on the way, this spring is already sounding like a sweetly diabolical season.