Thinking of an indie pop group I really liked a decade or so back. It is the Glaswegian groupĀ Belle and Sebastian. I don’t follow them lately, but for a while I was buying almost all their CDs and saw them live in concert. They are a big ensemble group whose lead vocalist and songwriter, Stuart Murdoch, is kind of like Morrisey in that both are fey, literate, and somewhat self-pitying. But Murdoch doesn’t seem as self-obsessed or flamboyant as Morrisey.
Murdoch was asked if the sensitivity and ambiguity of his lyrics indicate he is homosexual. He replied with something like, “I’m straight to the point of boring myself.” Me too. The lyrics are usually sad or ironic, but the music is often up-tempo, so there’s an interesting balance. Murdoch said he got into writing because he was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome as an adolescent and had little to do for several years but sit around the house and read. When he recovered, he started this band.
Here are the lyrics to two of their songs that I like. You can find their videos/music on Youtube.
“We Are the Sleepyheads”
Tired like the beggar with the cold inside his bones
Looking for the pleasure that he knew was so far gone
So far gone
I took a turn to myself
And I was surprised, cause I saw everyone who ever I had loved
I felt a whole lot better after that
People look at us and they think were doing fine
People look at us cause they see us all the time
All the time
But they never take to us
We’ve been in this town so long we may as well be dead
So long as people turn their heads
And cross the street whenever we walk on by
Someone told the truth when it really mattered most
The beauty of the moment is the beauty sadly lost
Sadly lost
So I went around to your house
Over tea and gin we talked about the things we read
In Luke and John the things he said
And now it’s morning we are the sleepyheads
“Get Me Away From Here, I’m Dying”
Ooh! Get me away from here I’m dying
Play me a song to set me free
Nobody writes them like they used to
So it may as well be me
Here on my own now after hours
Here on my own now on a bus
Think of it this way
You could either be successful or be us
With our winning smiles, and us
With our catchy tunes, and us
Now we’re photogenic
You know, we don’t stand a chance
Oh, I’ll settle down with some old story
About a boy who’s just like me
Thought there was love in everything and everyone
You’re so naive!
After a while they always get it
They always reach a sorry end
Still it was worth it as I turned the pages solemnly, and then
With a winning smile, the boy
With naivety succeeds
At the final moment, I cried
I always cry at endings
Oh, that wasn’t what I meant to say at all
From where I’m sitting, rain
Washing against the lonely tenement
Has set my mind to wander
Into the windows of my lovers
They never know unless I write
“This is no declaration, I just thought I’d let you know goodbye”
Said the hero in the story
“It is mightier than swords
I could kill you sure
But I could only make you cry with these words”
Oh, get me away, I’m dying…
The group is very prolific and have other good songs including “Funny Little Frog,” “Dress Up In You,” “The Blues are Still Blue,” “The Model,” and “Mornington Crescent.”
Update: I finished an essay on realist drama and social trends and have submitted a proposal for it to magazine dealing with culture and society. It’s not exactly a scholarly essay, but I did do some in-depth reading of primary sources and contextual research. I’ll hear back from the publication in the next few weeks. Now I need to revise a travel piece I wrote a while back. An editor told me it has some interesting elements but was too much like tourist promotion and should be more personal and related to broader concerns about the environment. We used to have a joke when I worked in a press room: It was a cartoon image of a grumpy, cigar-chomping editor yelling, “Get me rewrite!” Indeed.