Soundtracking

As a student of cinema, I’m enormously appreciative of a good soundtrack. A good soundtrack can uplift a movie, make it greater than it would have been without it. Numerous films are defined and remembered through their iconic songs.

But why should films have all the fun?

This is my soundtrack.

*to be added to and subtracted from as life’s events warrant*

…

“Fast Asleep” – Voxtrot

Everybody wants a piece of some easy enterprise, can’t this world cut your face and carry the news that you’ve got a gift to be given? Cut it out, cut your loss, we don’t dream we fantasize, and this is how we measure the cost, the joy and the pain of 21 years of good living.

When you look at me do you see someone with a future? Music to my ears it makes me happy when you tell me this place is like a womb, you live so well from doing nothing. One day you will learn there is some beauty in the the thing that makes you sweat.

Gotta take something great just to get me out of bed, and I woke up with a song ’cause I had a dream, yes I had a vision of people lying in the sun -

- sleeping on the rocks and stones, waiting just to die -

They were fast asleep like lions, they were fast asleep like lions in summer.

When you look at me do you see someone with a future? Music to my ears it makes me happy when you tell me this place is like a womb, you do so well from doing nothing. One day you will learn there is some beauty in the thing that makes you…

Swear all the years of wasted time

half divine

half of what you could be…

Oh, all this time they let this city get sad and empty ’cause they’re only half awake.

Oh, all this time they let this city get sad and empty ’cause they’re only half awake!

When you look at me do you see someone with a future? One day you will learn there is some beauty in the thing that makes you sweat.

… 

“Pennywhistle” – Augie March

It’s just an ordinary day, I knew that autumn was on it’s way, I could see by the gilt of the clouds, the burnish on the bay, a ring of effusia settled on the city like a vision of the future before the scales fell away. A vision of the future looking more than just okay – a good feeling. Just a good feeling. It only happens now and then.

Out of the mouth of a black dog. Out of the terrors of 3 a.m.. Out of the dark and whispering fen. I was blind then I could see, now I’m blind again.

So I hollered up to Jill, “Come down from the mountain, your ears are a’burning, my speech is a fountain, it’s been another long year but you know I’m not counting, I dreamed you like you dreamed me. O, the bomb dreamed the fuse and the drowner dreamed the sea.” What a strange feeling. Yes, it’s a strange feeling. Only happens now and then…

Out of the mouth of a black dog. Out of the terrors of 3 a.m.. Out of the dark and whispering fen. I was blind then I could see, now I’m blind again…Most of the Aegean Sea rushes into my bedroom and glitters for me. The hills of Gallipoli all throw up their bones for my industry, so I build from the charnel the ale house, I build from the tomb a palace of dreams. That old barren rockface got silver seams for a miner of middling means, singing poems of dissolution and schemes -

My penny whistles, lo!

Now I summon up Jack, sat up on the hill, the wrong kind of music, the wrong kind of pill. Impotent as a potato but still pleading, “Give it up, Mary, but not by degrees…”

A portrait of Jack, a study in sin, well I knew of myself before I knew of him, now even I couldn’t tell you just who it is asking “Give it up, Mary, but not by degrees, give it up, Mary, your virtue, please…”

Into the mouth of a black dog – I go

Into the terrors of 3 a.m. – I go

Into the dark and whispering fen – I go

I was blind then blind again…

Into the mouth of a black dog – I go

Into the terrors of 3 a.m. – I go

Into the dark and whispering fen – I go

O what beast has my name on it’s snaggletooth, and eternal slobber for my finishing youth?

My penny whistles low.

…

“The Golden Age of Aviation” – The Lucksmiths

For argument’s sake let’s pretend we could stop arguing over which one of us is wrong, and why it isn’t you. We’re barely awake before your head’s up in the clouds again. There’s nothing you like more than having nothing much to do.

Stood akimbo, staring out the window at the sky…

All afternoon you’ve been buried in a biography of an aviatrix lost at sea, never to be found. Holed up in your room, holding out for an apology, but gravity will get to you eventually. You’ll come down from upstairs again, with all those model aeroplanes…

And the novelty wore off when the pilots still wore goggles, but your eyes look skyward and your mind still boggles.

I’m going grey but you look younger than a year ago, when you put your hair in pigtails and you put your hand in mine. We’ll be okay – I’m happy when you’re here. But oh, your smile can seem as far away as once upon a time.

You can’t help it, hopelessly nostalgic. a passing interest in the past, but I think it’s going to last a little longer. I’ll hold onto your hand as tightly as I can, but modelling glue is stronger.

The novelty wore off when pilots still wore goggles, but your eyes look skyward and your mind still boggles. Through frequent flyers’ disappointments and disasters, the golden age of aviation never lost its luster.

…

“Don’t Be Afraid To Sing” – Stars

Your quiet eyes. Your mouth that never tells lies. You’ve got one hour, it’s time you told your story.

Eighteen, alone. In love with the ansaphone and too afraid, you’re too afraid to fall for anything and too afraid, much too afraid, to sing.

I won’t pretend that I can’t see the end,

But,

it’s far away, it’s in the distance. We’ll find a place. There isn’t room for two of us. The minutes drag, then there’s a world between us…

and I’m too afraid, much too afraid to fall for anything and I’m too afraid, much too afraid, to sing. To sing.

We all come to an end, and we all end together. We all come to an end, and we all end together. We all come to an end, and we all end together.

We all end together.

…

“Look For Me (I’ll Be Around)” – Neko Case

When you tire of all the bright lights, haste that’s killing, and you’re willing to stay home nights. When your feet are back on the solid ground. Look for me. I’ll be around.

When the new crowd starts to bore you, just remember there is someone to adore you when you’re weary of nights up on the town. Look for me. I’ll be around.

May not seem exciting the way those others do. I’m emotion. My devotion you will need some day as I need you.

When the kicks go that it brings you, you will hanker for an anchor just to cling to. When you’ve lived it up till it’s got you down, look for me, look for me.

Look for me.

I’ll be around.

…

“Red Right Ankle” – The Decemberists

This is the story of your red right ankle and how it came to meet your leg, and how the muscle, bone and sinews tangled, and how the skin was softly shed. And how it whispered, “Oh, adhere to me, for we are bound by symmetry. And whatever differences our lives have been, we together make a limb.” This is the story of your red right ankle.

This is the story of your gypsy uncle you never knew ’cause he was dead, and how his face was carved and rift with wrinkles in the picture in your head. And remember how you found the key to his hideout in the Pyrenees, but you wanted to keep his secret safe, so you threw the key away. This is the story of your gypsy uncle.

This is the story of the boys who loved you, who love you now and loved you then. Some were sweet, some were cold and snuffed you. Some just laid around in bed. Some had crumbled you straight to your knees, did it cruel, did it tenderly. Some had crawled their way into your heart to rend your ventricles apart. This is a story of the boys who loved you.

This is the story of your red right ankle.

…

“Lost Girls” – Tilly and the Wall

Girl, I know the hall looks dark, and the storm it seems so scary, your face lit up on beats of lightning. You start, you start running, and your eyes are like screaming. And since there is no end and no beginning you will run. You will run, you will run.

Girl, I know the woods look dark, and the trees they seem so deadly. The girls around you are so frightened, and you start, you start to panic and your courage starts to vanish, and the world it really is on fire, and it burns. And it burns and it burns and it burns.

Vivian, your life is told through nineteen thousand pages in a world too real to behold. Your innocence has faded, faded all your blues to grey. Your skin has bruised through moving days, glue is peeling away. Curling, cracking, painted.

Girl, you’ve been rolled up in colourful carpets. Your blood is rushing, look around you. You’ve froze, you’ve frozen quiet and your eyes, they are widened. Room unfurnished, no light for nightfall, just rugs for rolling you up, you know you can’t get up. When you do, you swear that you will run. You will run, you will run, you will run.

No one will ever save you if no one can ever find you. No one will ever save you if no one can ever find you.

Lost girls.

Lost girls.

Lost girls (Girl, I know the hall looks dark when you’re all alone).

…

“Adventures In Solitude” – The New Pornographers

Balancing on one wounded wing, circling the edge of the neverending, the best of the vanished marvels have gathered inside your door.

More than begin, but less than forget, spirits born from the not happened yet gathering there to pay off a debt brought back from the wars.

We thought we lost you.

We thought we lost you.

We thought we lost you.

Welcome back.

Sleeping for years, pick through what is left, through the pieces that fell and rose from the depth from the rainwater well, deep as a secret nobody knows.

Less than forget, but more than began, these adventures in solitude never done, to the names of our rooms we send the same blood back from the wars.

We thought we lost you.

We thought we lost you.

We thought we lost you.

It will all come back.

I know you want to run far away from one more, and that it’s coming at a bad time. Some cold place, heartless ways, for all we know.

I know you need to breathe through, come back, come to, but it’s coming at a bad time. Some lost heart, tangled day, for all we know.

I know you want to run far away from one more, and that it’s coming at a bad time. Some cold place, heartless ways, for all we know.

I know you want to breathe through, come back, come to, but it’s coming at a bad time. Old scarred face, survivor’s guilt, for all we know.

…

“Stay Loose” – Belle & Sebastian

I was choking on a cornflake, you said “Have some toast instead.” I was sleeping maybe three hours, you said “You should get to bed.” I was waiting at the church door for the minister to show. I was looking at the new year, you said “Walk before you crawl.”

I was feeling like a loser, you said “Hey, you’ve still got me.” I was feeling pretty lonely, you said “You wanted to be free.” I was looking for a good time, you said “Let the good time start.” With a quiver of your eyelid you took on someone else’s part.

But what about me? I don’t really see how things will improve, if all you want is to… 

Maybe I’m a little greedy. You said “Think before you speak.” Sometimes I’m a litle seedy. You said “Everyone is weak.” Now I feel a little better, is there something I can do? But I never had the answer, I never had a clue.

But what about me? I don’t really see how things will improve, if all you want is to stay – the lights are out in the house tonight, gonna creep around, gonna creep into your head, all you want is to stay loose.

There’s a little echo calling, like a miner trapped inside. If I tell her of this moment she will in my doubts confide - and she’s on me like a blanket, like a stalk of wilting grass. I’m not sure about her motive; I’m not sure about her past.

But my faith is like a bullet, my belief is like a bolt. The only thing that lets me sleep at night, a little courage of the soul.  If it starts a little bleaker, the year may yet be gold. Happiness is not for keeping. Happiness is not my goal.

So what about me? I don’t really see how things will improve, if all you want is to stay loose. But what about them? You play mother hen to a gaggle of gangling youth, all you want is to stay – the lights are out in the house tonight, gonna creep around, gonna creep into your head, all you want is to stay…

I was living through the seconds, my composure was a mess, I was miles from tenderness. It was dark outside, the day it was broken in pieces… Everything is flat and dreary, I couldn’t care what’s in the news. Television is the blues. Television is hysterical laughter of people.

And I know it could be me, I’m always asking for more (more!), more (more!). I keep running round in circles. I keep looking for a doorway. I’m gonna need two lives to follow the paths I’ve been taking.