The Repeater
I have a confession: I am a song repeater.
Which is to say, once I get obsessed with a song I have to listen to it. Over and over. And over and over again. And again. Back to back to back to back. Like some kind of an idiot. The average obsession with a song usually lasts about two weeks, during which the song is on repeat at least an hour a day, if not more.
When I was a kid and tapes were the thing I would rewind and press stop and then play and then stop and then rewind. Over and over. I would memorize the length of the rewind time and could hit the beginning with Tivo like accuracy. Of course today’s advanced repeating technology only enables the repeat OCD all the more.
This has driven a couple of boyfriends crazy. “Again? Really? We just listened to it. Again?”
Why do I do this? Because a favorite song is really just a way to experience a feeling, right? Some necessary emotion. And by playing it constantly for an hour I get to really nestle in it, freeze it, hold onto it, stare at it and lay my head down on it. Root around in it with my snout like a sad little truffle pig sniffing for some pleasant melancholy.
Currently on repeat as I write this: Angels in the Snow by Elliott Smith.
Just recently on extended repeat: Love Story by Harry Nilsson.
Repeat Hall of Fame: Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands by Bob Dylan.
On repeat in the car earlier today: Say Hello, Wave Goodbye by David Gray. (A word on this one. This is over eight minutes long. To properly repeat requires a real time commitment. It podshuffled up right as I was driving down the canyon home from work. Perfect melancholy soundtrack for leafy curvy canyon driving, marveling at how perfectly gold the sun was turning everything as it was setting and feeling at peace about all the seemingly unhealable hurts caused by all manner of dumb dumbs, which have somehow healed, of course; and also feeling newly calm about the formerly troubling idea that I no longer have any idea at all about what the future holds in absolutely any area of my life. So the song ended and then I hit backtrack for one more play and ended up getting to my house before it finished. After a moments consideration I realized I had to let the repeat play out to the end. I parked the car and just creepily sat there, soaking in the song.)
Upshot: I like revisiting the things I like. Music, food, people. Showing up at the door with unironic flowers for a spontaneous thumb wrestle.
That is all for today. Stay tuned for a very serious post about peanut butter.
June 10th, 2008 at 1:07 am
first of all, there isn’t anything to be gained by mocking the very peanut butter our founding fathers fought so valiantly for. i don’t want to demagogue the issue but are you prepared to live with dead babies and war crimes on your conscience? why do you hate freedom? freedom and peanut butter are very much the same – they can both get messy when you try to spread them around too quickly. so, young lady, think long and hard about the troops next time you decide it’s amusing to level derision on the american way.
‘peanut butter – it weeds out the weak children’ – margaret sanger
‘peanut butter plus cat – endlessly amusing! also ticklish’ – colin quinn
‘peanut butter – it’s what’s for dinner now that we’re china’s bitch’ -
zbigniew brzezinski
‘peanut butter – i’d like to eat some off of zac efron’s ****’ – sean hannity
June 12th, 2008 at 2:57 am
Right now, it’s Radiohead’s “Where I End and You Begin (The Sky is Falling)”. It’s absolutely about finding your way into and settling down in a certain feeling… and yet it still feels somewhat obsessive of me, so I repeat in private
Also: I ruined at least one Duran Duran tape in my youth during a particularly obsessive listening jag, and I jammed a few fingers along the way. Good times.