Kate Nash || Foundations
You said I must eat so many lemons,
‘Cause I am so bitter.
So here’s what happened.
May 21 was the scheduled US release date for Random Access Memories, so this morning I downloaded it from Spotify to save for a dedicated listen-through.
The first song started and I jumped up to grab a sketch book. I haven’t drawn in a good while—fliers for theatre club don’t count, and stuff on the backs of notecards barely count—but hearing this music, the start of Give Life Back to Music… There was too much not to create. Not reading, not writing, nothing that would require active thought.
The one on the left was the first. I decided not to erase any of the pencil marks. I didn’t give a damn about wonky anatomy or drawing an instrument without reference. And the figure came without being generically pretty—just a bassist, eyes focused at the distance, music the greater focus. From the beginning the figure wasn’t pretty, and that’s different from aimless drawing of the past, and I like that.
She came together from Give Life Back to Music through Within, finishing on Instant Crush where I was already getting ready for the next.
The second came together through Lose Yourself to Dance and Get Lucky (dear God I don’t know if I know a better song about getting laid, I mean hot fucking damn). She is where the red came out, first the lips, and nowhere else until everything else was finished while Beyond and Motherboard played. Originally, she was going to be all in white, but something in Beyond really struck me to give her shiny black pants. Usually in drawing what I want to be a beautiful woman, I follow the usual social codes that long hair = beauty, but the short hair here surprised me and worked. It’s free, and that’s incredibly fitting for Lose Yourself to Dance through Get Lucky.
Because of the space on the paper, I’d already gone back and detailed red everything I wanted to detail red, and the music wasn’t immediately inspiring new figures to fill the space, I took the picture and started typing here. Right now is this crazy rising tension in the song Contact, the highlight of the relative slump that started with Beyond (it wasn’t bad, and parts of it were really good; it just had to follow Get Lucky).
And then Contact ended, and I was shocked. I had to check the track listing again to make sure it was actually over.
This is a really good album.
I don’t actually have anything to say. I just love this song.
Despite my undying devotion to the Goblin King, David Bowie just isn’t typically my thing. However. Modern Love is always my thing.
To me this song is the soul twin of The Warrior, and I barely even know why.
…Aaaaand In a Big Country started playing again? There’ve been, like, six songs in between.
I-I, psssh, I’m not shouting “Shootin’ at the walls of heartache” like a wolf howling at the moon. That’d be, like, weird or something. Ahem.
Okay this song isn’t terribly similar to the others, particularly the structural root song of the station being Wall of Voodoo’s “Mexican Radio,” but still evidence that this is a fun station.
Okay my Dad is kind of obsessed with this song because he cannot get over rock and roll bagpipes. To be fair, no one should be able to get over rock and roll bagpipes, especially with Scotch-Irish heritage.
This is a great roadtrip song. Imagine driving freeways through mountains with the windows down and this blasting.
So because I love the song “Mexican Radio” by Wall of Voodoo, I decided to check out what Spotify Radio had for it. I like Spotify’s similarity algorythms much more than Pandora’s.
Carry On My Wayward Son (lullaby Version)
Why can I so easily picture this playing in the spn series finale as the camera takes one last look moving over the dead bodies of all our favorite characters, stopping on the rusting frame of the impala and then slowly fading to black?
No! Into the corner with you!
As the music starts, the camera shows the sightless eyes of Kevin Tran, lying on the floor, weak body from starvation and sleepless nights apparent. The camera moves to show his mother, Mrs. Tran, lying next to him. Both of them tried to shield the other in the chaos and blood. They lie dead together.
The next scene shows Garth, lying on the ground, Bobby’s cap lying beside him, stained with blood. He is loosely holding a rifle, which contained salt, in an attempt to fight them off. To win once and for all. The salt is scattered on the ground around him. His body remains there until decayed.
The camera comes up from the ground to reveal the blank face of Sam Winchester, the one Azazel chose, the one who threw himself into hell for the good of earth. He lies, jacket stained, separated from his brother and his friends. He never got the family or the happy ending he wanted. His hair is stained and chopped, uneven in places. The blood drips down the side of his face, mirroring Jess.
Finally, we see Dean and Cas, dead on the ground. The scorch mark of Castiel’s wings cover the ground and Dean’s face and body, shielded by an angel until the very end. A gold amulet on the ground next to him, fallen out of his ripped trench coat. Dean clutches a demon blade, covered in blood, but more of his own than of the enemy. His body lies close to Cas, destined to remain together since he was raised from hell. They are now burnt and broken shells of men and angels. But they knew their only purpose.
In the corner of the field, hidden away in a presumably good parking spot, is the Impala, where it has been for a while, and will continue to be there until the trees and plants grow around it, crushing the windows, demolishing the rust, moulding the leather seats. The army men will be consumed by the soil, and in many years time, decompose. This car will be like any other old car seen abandoned in a field or on a road. Its age will show when Dean is not present to take care of her. The heater will never rattle again.
People will find the bodies, perhaps, and catalogue them as John or Jane Does, unknown to the world, unknown to the great service they gave them. They all gave their lives. And in return we live ours for them.
The camera fades to black.
DON NOT PLAY THE SONG WHILE READING THAT. YOU’LL FUCKING REGRET IT FOR LIFE OH GOD
Are you fucking kidding me right now holy fuck my life just ruined i don’t even want to thinking about that shit why would you do something like that on my god it’s six am and i’m fucking crying my eyes out thank you for that you asshats.
WERE YOU NOT HUGGED ENOUGH AS A CHILD
DID I KILL YOUR FATHER
IS THAT WHY YOU’RE HURTING ME
what if i killed you
my fucking keyboard is wet. GET OUT
so do you wanna drown by my tears now or now
good lord.. i’m not even in this fandom and that HURT!
For my final paper in Modern Novel I was writing (b.s.-ing) my way through a research paper on Don Delillo’s White Noise (which is a fantastic novel which I should totally read in full now), and this is the playlist I made for that final paper. I’m pretty sure I emailed the professor the link to this playlist, and I’m pretty sure he wrote this off as a weird college student finals week thing.
