Sing a Song of Somethin' Somethin' Pence

So talking about song lyrics the other day got me to thinking about what song lyrics mean to me. That answer should not be surprising: they mean very precious little to me.

To explain, generally, when listening to music, my mind treats vocals as little more than another instrument. And the "litttle more" that my mind gives to the vocal is simply the nod that I am hearing the Prince of Instruments, the musical tool that boasts the greatest range and variety, and is the most difficult to master.

One of the most common refrains for kids with moralistic and worried mothers—kids who don't want to be deprived of that cherished album of Metallica, Nirvana, Limp Bizquik, Public Enemy, or whatever slightly inapprorpiate pop band they fear to be deprived of—runs along the lines of, "But mom, I don't know what he's singing about! I don't even hear the lyrics! I listen for the music!!"

Now, how much truth there is to this claim probably varies from kid to kid. As for myself, it would be, for the largest part, an accurate description of how I experience music. The fact is: it's actually very difficult for me to make heads or tails about a song's content unless I pull out a lyricsheet for the simple reason that I'm not actually hearing intelligible communication through the sung vocals. Instead, I'm hearing just another instrument. A human instrument, for sure, but still just an instrument.

I hear the notes sung. I hear the quality and vibrations of the voice. I even hear the special flavour that one word can give that another word couldn't. But though I can't potentially gather an aural mood, I simply do not hear semantic meaning.

For a long time, in my childhood, I presumed that this was normal. That no one else was hearing these kinds of communications through song. Then, as I grew older, I met people who held intensely to certain songs and garnered great meaning from them and placed great importance on what they were "saying." Even though I can accept that this is the case with some, the experience is entirely foreign to me. Generally, even singing songs in church is a vain activity for me, as I rarely know what I'm singing. Even if I know and appreciate the lyrics of a song (having read and studied them at some other point), there is rarely any connection for me to their musical recitation.

Songs whose lyrics I know well enough to sing are slender in number, with a scarcity that should make them quite valuable. Wendy should be able to attest to this with ample examples and anecdotes, all featuring me singing a few words of a chorus and rapidly devolving into some scat-like approximation of the vocal melody (or butchering the lyric entirely). If I have a particular fondness for a particular song and find it within the range of things I might find myself singing, I might hazard to learn the words in order to better facillitate my singing enjoyment. But doesn't this help me to understand the song I'm singing? Not necessarily.

I can sing, from start to finish, nearly the entirety of Weezer's "El Scorcho" (from their Pinkerton album). It's a fun song to sing. Jaunty. Lively. With fun sound combinations. I've known the words for years. Not once did I really consider the content. The other day, I was talking with Wendy and she mentioned how she had a new appreciation for the song and talked about how Rivers (songwriter, singer, and presumable narrator) is all creepy and interesting because he's the kind of guy who would find a girl's diary and read it. Now I've sung the lines hundreds of times (or more!): "I asked you to go to the Green Day concert. You said you never heard of them. How cool is that! So I went to your room and read your diary." And in all those times, nothing ever struck me as interesting or odd. I had absolutely no sense of the storytelling going on there (or that there even was storytelling going on!).

My mind just goes into full-blown right-brain operation where music is involved.

One thing that has an opportunity to aid my conception of a song as semantic communication is the addition of appropriate video. Besides the wonderful quality of sound in Jonathan Coulton's music, I've grown to love the storytelling in his songs. And the only reason that I ever realized that was going on? The WoW machinima videos Spiff created for several of his songs (viewable on YouTubes). Now I've grown to appreciate and adore Coulton's lyrical genius and storytelling abilities in a way inaccessible to me without the videos. Thing is: when I sing Coulton's songs while meandering through my day or riding home from work, I am once again divorced from the story (save for very particular and abbreviated passages that will always stick with me).

I think it is for this reason that PJ's implication that a Christian life that is without a robust experience of the singing of Psalms is a deeply impoverished Christian life really grates on me. In reality, the addition of the singing of Psalms would likely add little to my experience of the gospel. In all likelihood, it would be further exercise of vanity. Don't get me wrong. I love the Psalms and the experience of the level of devotion found there. They are a great comfort to the people of God (the reason that they are, in fact, the most popular reading material in Scripture for the bulk of the church). I want to learn them and commit their truths to my heart.

But really, and put yourself in my shoes, what has singing to do with that goal?

Land of Temporary Sideburns

Since its been awhile since I've posted any glamour shots and Wendy claims I'm balding, I thought it was about time. Have a good weekend.

Haircut Reaction

So here's a big and important question: how should you respond when someone says they think you got a great haircut? For quite sometime, I responded with the typical, "Hey, thanks buddy!" But the other day, after getting a fresh cut, someone said that they liked my haricut and I simply responded, "Oh! Cool." (Actually, this happened several times.) And you know what? I think it's a better response.

If I thank someone for my liking my haircut, I'm implying that I bear some sort of responsibility for the cut. As if I had something to do with the stylist's work. This, obviously, is not the case at all.

This is why I think it better to simply express a happy sort of surprise or even an "I know, huh?" if you are certain that the cut is good too. In this way, you're acknowledging both the skill of the barber and the aesthetic eye of your friend - all without falsely taking credit for something yourself. Bravo!

Woe. Woe Unto Hair

Just for kicks, I thought I would add some more pictures of my lamentable hair-state circa 1991. For those who wonder, the cut is very short on both sides and long in the middle (kinda like a mohawk). In the beginning, I would typically wear it over an eye or through the hole in my backwards ballcap. Later, I would just wear it how it fell, with it generally falling largely to the left.

Incidentally, that portrait was in my senior yearbook and still gives me chills of laughter even as it should you. Also of note is that during this era, my brother (who had a more generally acceptable head of hessian metal-do) dressed as me for Halloween one year.

Cast Your Pearls before Harbours

Even as the seventh of December is yearly marked as Pearl Harbour Day and is celebrated by much hooplah, drinking, and revelled abandonment, the day is also marked by a far more solemn anniversary. Without becoming too somber in my elocution here, it will suffice to say that it has been fifteen years since I cut my hair, on 7 December 1992.

1989-1992
R.I.P.

Sunday Morning Woes

Sunday morning, I awoke from a fitful sleep after a night dominated by an immediate and acute trouble with my breathing, and all the coughing and weezing that accompanies such states. I roused, while breathing mostly regularly, to a strange assembly of maladies - chief of which was the fact that I was at odds with my own body. It seemed foremost to my mind that my arms had grown by several inches in length and I had not yet time enough to adjust to their new extension; as such, I became quite ill at ease with myself and could only hope that time would comfort me and that I would find my recently acquired condition to be some sort of boon.

Additional distress was caused by the fact that I felt the pain of extreme hunger in a newfound manner - newfound to me that is (I wholly suspect that there are entire tribes living in the remotest peaks of some the world's more famous ranges that live each day in this particular state of internal strife). It was a hunger that found itself not so much at home in my stomach but more made its residence in the entire community of my organs. I felt this strange starvation in the whole cavern of my torso. These pangs assaulted my liver, pancreas, and appendix, and found a special habitation in my lungs.

Yes. My lungs were hungry. Woe unto us all.

Dreams of an Insomniac

Last night I couldn't sleep. I lay in bed with that weary kind of wakefulness that belongs only to the true insomniac. Then, when I at last fell asleep around 4:oo in the morning, I dreamt that I was in bed trying without success to fall asleep. Then I woke, realized I was dreaming and couldn't get back to sleep.

It was exhausting.

Two Months Later

It's not swollen like it was two (or even one) month ago and I've got a fair amount of movement out of it now - but if I hold something wrongly or something heavy, white blinding pain. *sigh* And drawing for any duration longer than fifteen minutes is tough on it.

Grr. Pain, how I hate thee!

In a Den of Gypsies

Friday night, I popped over to the Gypsy Den in Santa Ana and ran into The Rambler. It was, as always, good to see the li'l fella.

While he toyed with his camera in the lushly dim atmosphere, I sketched Den patrons on napkins. One of the benefits of public places is that you have much greater freedom to sketch/snap/film real life people in candid situations. And we both took some small advantage of that factor.

Still though, I'm uncomfortable if a subject realizes they're the subject of my eye, so I'll purposely stare at someone who's not my subject while sneaking glances at the true object of my momentary attention. Unfortunately, the only evidence of the night that remains are these few photos that The Rambler was so gracious as to forward to me yesterday afternoon.

I ended up being divested of the sketches by and to the subject of each sketch. Regardless, it's good to be sketching again. Really, it's been years since I did any serious human studies and I feel a bit out of touch with the human form. Also, drawing still irritates my thumb and so I'm trying to work around that as best I can.

P.S. I broke my right thumb. The one on my drawing hand. Which isn't even a third as cool as it sounds. Plus, it makes typing a real pain. And makes me feel like throwing up about five-eighths of the time.