Fluxblog Weekly #169: Phoenix, Janet Jackson, Björk, Radiohead
This week I wrote about some old favorites to take a break from new material and work through some feelings and ideas. I had written about the Phoenix and Radiohead songs here when they were originally released many years ago, but revisited them after recently seeing both bands live.
July 14th, 2018
From The Mess To The Masses
Phoenix “Lisztomania”
Not long after this song came out nearly a decade ago, some brilliant person made a video for it cutting together scenes from John Hughes movies from the 1980s. Maybe you remember it! The “Brat pack mashup” video is a joy to watch, partly for obviously nostalgic reasons, but mostly because it connected the essence of the song – and Phoenix’s overall aesthetic – to this kindred spirit from the past. The editor of the video recognized what was happening in “Lisztomania” from the start: The boppy rhythm that invites you to swivel your hips and lighten your shoulders, the vocal that expresses a pure-hearted desire with a small dash of neurosis.
Thomas Mars’ lyrics are on the cryptic side, but it’s clear what this is all about. It’s about needing the thrill of romance, and cherishing the rush of raw, undiluted emotion. It’s about fetishizing the obstacles in the way of love, because they make everything more exciting. It’s about epiphanies and desire and dancing. It’s about wanting to feel fully alive.
Hughes movies are so resonant because the emotions and desires of the characters are amplified by youthful hormones, but have incredible clarity because they don’t have much more to think about aside from social status. This is true of a lot of fiction about teenagers, but what makes this all so seductive is that Hughes knows this is all great FUN. The creation of identity, the pursuit of connection, the ecstatic angst of a crush, the burning need to rise above your circumstances to something more glamorous and beautiful and exciting. You watch these films, and listen to the sort of pop songs that evoke the same feeling, because you yearn to feel like these kids. It’s all very instructive and aspirational. There’s a power in wanting things very badly.
Phoenix’s music comes from an adult perspective, but makes a case that this sort of feeling is not a thing you grow out of: It comes, it comes, it comes, it comes, it comes and goes! Mars sounds like he’s talking himself out of his feelings at first – “so sentimental, not sentimental, no / romantic, not disgusting yet” – but the music makes him succumb to it. It starts with the hip swivel and the lightness in the shoulders, and it quickly moves to your heart.
Buy it from Amazon.
July 15th, 2018
We Had To Prove Them Wrong
Janet Jackson “Love Would Never Do (Without You)”
Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis’ songs are typically highly dynamic, with mostly percussive elements shifting around to give the melody maximum emotional impact. In the case of their work on Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814, it’s like drawing several underlines beneath the hooks. There’s a softness in Janet’s voice, but the music explodes with great force. As expressive as her voice is, she’s always understating the feeling relative to the intensity of the keyboards and drum hits.
“Love Will Never Do (Without You)” is even more dynamic than usual because it was initially written as a duet with a man – they wanted Prince, then thought maybe they could get Ralph Tresvant, but nothing really worked out. So Jackson sings the first verse in a much lower register than usual, which greatly exaggerates her range within the track. This works to the advantage of the song, which starts out rather joyful but keeps escalating into dizzying ecstasy as it moves along.
The lyrics follow the sound of it, with the lowest vocal part at the start approaching the love between Janet and her partner in analytical terms but by the time she’s up in the giddy stratospheres, she’s nearly at a loss for words. (“No other love around has quite the same…ooh ooh!”) But as extraordinarily joyous as this song gets, the words are grounded and reasonable. The love in “Love Would Never Do” is not unrealistic – there’s work to be done, there’s conflicts and temptations, there’s a need to prove the doubters wrong. The loveliest and most romantic line in the song is so simple and direct: “I feel better when I have you near me.” If this song is doing anything, it’s just trying to capture that specific everyday happiness.
Buy it from Amazon.
July 16th, 2018
You Can’t Say No To Happiness
Björk “Alarm Call”
A few weeks ago, after a series of epiphanies that have given me a lot of new focus in life, I heard this song accidentally as the result of an algorithm and unknowingly hitting a bunch of buttons on my phone. It felt like Björk herself appearing to tell me personally that I was making all the right decisions. “You can’t say no to hope, you can’t say no to happiness,” she sings. “It doesn’t scare me at all!”
“Alarm Call” has been a very inspirational song for me for about half my life now, but in that moment I felt like I was hearing it with new ears. What once sounded like advice now resonated as truth. The hope I feel and the happiness I want aren’t scary to me now, they are simply goals to work towards, and feelings I’ve opened myself up to. For most of my life desire was a frightening thing because it seemed like I wasn’t in the position to want things, and I could only envision how I might fail. But it’s better to not focus on outcomes as much as obeying intuition and satisfying curiosity. Follow the feeling and you’ll get closer to it.
“Alarm Call” is one of Björk’s most joyful pieces of music, and also one of the most pop things she’s ever made. It’s her version of Michael Jackson – a densely packed groove that nevertheless feels light as air, with a lot of wordless emoting coloring in between the lines of well composed vocal hooks. Her message here is optimistic and utopian, but very aware of the flaws of the human mind. This positive feeling, this “enlightenment,” it only comes if you fight for it. You get there if you let go of fear, and work for hope and happiness. She’s telling you this is possible, because she’s made it up to the top of the mountaintop. She’s got a radio and good batteries, and this is the joyous tune that she believes will free the human race from suffering.
Well, I don’t know about the rest of you, but it definitely has worked on me.
Buy it from Amazon.
July 17th, 2018
Trapped In This Body
Radiohead “Bodysnatchers” (Live at Bonnaroo, 2006)
We have our ways of making songs what we want them to be. I’ve read the lyrics of “Bodysnatchers” and understand that it’s a paranoid fantasy about helplessness and living a lie, but I decided what this song was about for me 11 years ago. It’s all in one line: “I’M TRAPPED IN THIS BODY AND CAN’T GET OUT.” That line, in a song that sounds like trying to frantically shake your own skin off, is what I’ve connected to, and that’s because I so badly have needed that song to exist.
I saw Radiohead play this song for the first time since 2006 on Friday night. It came near the end of the best show I’ve ever seen them play, and one of the most powerful live experiences I’ve ever had in terms of being at a high level of emotional and physical connection to the music for such a sustained period of time. “Bodysnatchers” was the emotional pinnacle of the show, and shouting “I’M TRAPPED IN THIS BODY AND CAN’T GET OUT” along with Thom Yorke was an incredibly cathartic moment for me. I felt like I was letting go of an idea I’d been holding on to very tightly for most of my life.
In that moment, during that song and during this show, I didn’t feel trapped in my body at all. My movements, typically either rigid or self-conscious, were loose and intuitive. Not graceful, but comfortable. I came out of that show feeling like I’d reversed a hex I put on myself many years ago, if just by fully realizing how horrifying Yorke’s line really is and that I don’t have to live like that if I don’t want to.
Buy it from Amazon.