Week 7 - It's Music Week

Edited by G P Kennedy

 Every day this week we will hear from one or two of our Storytellers as they share their two favorite lockdown listens.

 We asked them to choose two songs that really stand out for them during our time in isolation. The songs may be new favorites old classics; they may speak to lockdown feelings or act as a beautiful distraction.

 We had to start in New York City, with our resident professional musician and all-knowing man of music, Daniel.

 

Daniel's Songs

Joni Mitchell - "Harry's House/Centerpiece"

 Joni Mitchell’s records are never far from my turntable for very long in normal times, but for whatever reason I hadn’t been listening to her since the start of the lockdown. But then the other night, while I was making dinner, I decided to put on The Hissing of SummerLawns. It’s a record I’ve come to know very well, but that certainly wasn’t always the case. Joni was someone I came to many years after the fact and, even then, I got to know her records slowly. 

 The first one that I really dug into was For the Roses, which somebody had left at my apartment 35 or so years ago. Then, a half dozen or so years later, I was having lunch with friends at a place in the East Village and I heard Blue for the first time. Of course some of the songs were familiar, but hearing it front to back was a revelation. And so it went for most of her catalog - I’d stumble on another album in one setting or another and immediately grow attached to it. 

 But, in all those years, I’d never come across The Hissing of Summer Lawns. To be honest, I’m not sure I even knew it existed. I knew Court and Spark and Hejira - the records that came before and after, but never Hissing. And so, in the summer of 2003, I found myself leaving a used CD store on Langholmsgatan - a busy street in the Sodermalm section of Stockholm - having just purchased a used copy of Hissing. 

 It was a brilliant June evening and my wife and I were headed to the only swimming beach in the city, driving our rented Volkswagen. CD in hand we exited the shop, pointed the car towards the beach, and put the album in the CD player. And, as was the case with Joni’s records, this resonated with me immediately. Of course it was a lot to take in - the lyrics were dense and the production (and playing) beautifully layered and soulful. But, thinking about it 17 years later - that short drive through the city, and the then 11:00 twilight (ah, Swedish summer) drive back to the apartment - I realize it’s impossible to separate the record from the evening (and vice versa). It just immediately imprinted itself in my musical memory. So, whenever I listen to Hissing, there’s an element of nostalgia for me, an evocation of a wonderful trip to a favorite place. 

 All of which is to say that, when I put the record on this week, I wasn’t surprised that it evoked strong emotions in me. From the first bars of “In France They Kiss on Main Street,” I was once again transported back to that trip, back to that long summer evening. But, with listen came a sense of melancholy: this is the time of year when my wife and I would be packing up to leave for Amsterdam for three months. For the last 15 years, we’ve been spending summers there, living in a small apartment in the Pijp and working out of a borrowed - and unspeakably beautiful - studio on the Realengracht. These trips serve not only as a way of escaping the hot NYC summers, but also help us to reset ourselves after nine months of mega-city craziness. 

 Don’t get me wrong: I love New York City with all of my heart, but it really helps to step away for a while every year (and we feel extremely fortunate to be able to do it). So instead of packing up for the Netherlands, this year we’re wondering when travel will be possible again, when countries will again open up their borders. Such a crazy and unimaginable time. I was speaking to a friend in the Den Haag the other day who told me that the Dutch-German border now has border checks. To say I couldn’t have imagined this just a few months ago would be a huge understatement. 

 As the record played on, I realized I was listening to the lyrics a bit more than I usually do. Savoring them in a way that I don’t usually allow myself. Maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t heard it in a few months. Maybe it was listening to something that was more lyrically oriented than what I’ve been listening to lately. Either way, I took note. But it wasn’t until the eighth song came on - “Harry’s House/Centerpiece” - that I found myself completely immersed. 

 The overall narrative of the song isn’t important - it’s not the reason it resonated so deeply for me this week - but it’s the imagery that drew me in. New York City in the 1970s. Summer afternoons spent at suburban swimming pools. Taxis and airplanes. Business meetings and Bloomingdales. All things that we took for granted just a few 

short months ago and yet, for the moment, if I want normal, the closest I can get is watching a movie or - better yet - have Joni Mitchell sing about it to me. So that particular song has been on repeat play quite few times since. 

The Beatles - “Here Comes the Sun” 

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 What can I write about this song that hasn’t been written before? I mentioned last week that I’m gravitating towards happier music and I have to ask: is there a song any more joyful than this one? I’d say no. 

 I remember someone - in a movie maybe - that you never heard Beatles songs for the first time, that they’re in all of our DNA when we’re born. Which seems true to me. I mean, when was the first time I heard “Here Comes the Sun?” Are you kidding? Here are the things I love about this song: it’s insanely happy and optimistic without being precious or jolly or cloying. 

 It just tells you the sun is coming and everything is going to be great and there’s not a single fucking thing you can do about it. In other words, get over your pity party and get on with it. I love how beautifully played and sung recording it is. Look, it’s a great song and it would’ve sounded just fine with a couple of acoustic guitars and a bit of harmony. But they went to a hell of a lot of trouble to make this epic production with fantastic (and sympathetic) playing and loads of harmonies and an orchestra. 

 Oh yeah, and a Moog part that most people don’t even realize is there. For no reason in particular, I love that it was made during the summer. But one of the things I love the most is that it was made by a band whose members didn’t like each other very much by that point in time and yet still they all give it every ounce of effort they had and made this beautifully perfect jem of a record. It really is perfect (and if someone tells you it’s not, they’re wrong). 

 The fact that I hadn’t heard it for a year or two until this week just got me all the more ready for it. I put it on Monday morning - didn’t think much about it - and ended up listening to it every single day. Often more than once a day.