The Most Perfect Songs, Vol. III
It's come to my attention that some people don't like this series. I make music so... I don't know what to tell you.
Something unexpected happened when I lost my job exactly two months ago. (But who’s counting?) I started writing my second album. Insane, I know, especially because I’m also working on a 12-month project about my newish relationship. One song a month, basically written in realtime, detailing the ecstasy and the apprehensions of falling in love in your thirties. It’s a lot of music, and because of that, I’ve been only listening to music lately that I really, really love. I figured it would be a good opportunity to put another “Most Perfect Songs” post out into the ether. I have to say, these are all exceptional.
I wish I could say this is the weirdest collection yet, but let’s face it: they’re all kinda weird.
Paradise, Coldplay
Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that it’s gauche to like Coldplay: they had a pretty solid run of albums from Parachutes up until Mylo Xyloto, most of which were almost perfect. I’m a huge fan of Brian Eno, Coldplay worked really closely with him on the two latter of those, so is it any wonder that I love Mylo Xyloto in particular? According to the band themselves, Eno brought in a hypnotist to “do his thing” while they were in the studio. It makes sense, the hugeness of the album—both in its powerful, anthemic moments and its quieter ones—has a certain hypnotic quality to it. The thing that gets me about the song Paradise in particular is the synths, of course. (Thank you, Mr. Eno.) There’s a lot of build-up, tension, and so many layers that cause this song to pull you in immediately. There’s playful banter between Chris Martin, those beautiful synths, and what can best be described as “twinkle daddy piano tones.” Being part of a concept album about love finding a way despite dystopian circumstances, Paradise sets the scene—two soon-to-be lovers separate but yearning for each other. According to Martin, “‘Paradise’ is about a girl really, the female half of the album, just about being a bit lost in the world and escaping through fantasy.”
Feels Like Heaven, Ariel Pink
I’m not allowed to talk about why I love Ariel Pink as a provocateur on a spiritual level so I’ll just say his music is genuinely brilliant and I appreciate his artistry. This song has a very special place in my heart because I listened to it on repeat the few weeks after I met Tyler and started falling for him. It’s kinda shoegaze’y but also very fluid. It’s dreampop in its purest sense—and depending on your mood when listening, it can be taken as a genuine opining for a love never experienced, or a sardonic critique of new love. I'll be your dreamboat lover and roll the dice We'll shine in paradise Get to know the things you fantasize With you I swear it feels It feels like heaven
Kinda sweet, no? Even if you can’t relate to the lyrical content, you have to love all that juicy reverb.
Hallucinogène, Françoise Hardy
If you’ve been around for a while, you know I have a lot of love for my girl Françoise. She was kind of the Lana Del Rey of the seventies, known for her effective ballads of longing.
Eye-liner Cache les cernes de mes yeux Si je pleure On n’y verra que du feu Moiti femme Coupe en deux
Translates to:
Eyeliner Hide the dark circles from my eyes If I cry There will be only fire Half woman Cut in half
I get it, girl. In addition to the beautiful words, the music is psychedelic but in a somewhat-reserved way that only the French would be able to achieve. Yet another perfect song.
Soft & Warm, Voxtrot
Not a lot of information about Voxtrot exists online. They may have been a “flash in the pan” lo-fi indie phenomenon in the mid-aughts, but to me, they’re “lindy” in the sense that my high school boyfriend introduced them to me, they have a sort of nostalgic sound to begin with, and they will always be perfect for those moments when you need a little sentimentality. (As a treat.) They’ll forever exist somewhere in my periphery, if only in flashes of longing for the simpler times.
This particular song reminds me of a Belle & Sebastian composition but with an ethos of excitement rather than a pervasive undercurrent of sarcasm or cleverly-delivered self-loathing. (Not saying that’s a bad thing, by the way.) Despite the palpable excitement, it’s also somewhat plaintive—sort of like the yang to Ariel Pink’s Feels Like Heaven as yin. The music seems upbeat and cheerful, then you listen to the lyrics and it’s like—oh wow, kinda sorrowful. “Everyone loves a man, who lets the hardest people build him up and cut him down to lovable size” and “baby, I'd leave you for the person you used to be” might be perfect lyrics.
Speaking of lyrical perfection…
Chelsea Hotel #2, Leonard Cohen
It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy Leonard Cohen’s music before knowing Tyler, I just didn’t really know where to begin. There’s a lot of it, and what’s an adequate entry point? It could be different for every person. There is certainly enough content for it. My man is a big LC fan though, so I gave it a try. Even when we’d listen to his music together though, I would enjoy but I never fully “got” it—until this song came on and Tyler implored me to listen to the lyrics. They stopped me in my tracks. They’re so raw, they’re so honest, they’re almost quotidian in a way that makes them precious, and I think that’s what makes Leonard Cohen so brilliant. I finally “got” it. They’re sort of like modern art—I think, “I could write that,” but then I think, “but I didn’t,” and then begin to ponder about how I don’t think I could ever be that vulnerable with an audience in an entirely genuine way.
You told me again you preferred handsome men But for me you would make an exception And clenching your fist for the ones like us Who are oppressed by the figures of beauty
It’s painfully beautiful. That and,
You got away, I never once heard you say I need you, I don't need you I need you, I don't need you
It reminds me of the sensation felt upon the realization that an affair of the body has fizzled out before it can become an affair of the heart as well—the lack of constant back-and-forth comes with a kind of peace that is almost uneasy, it’s like a breakup without the breakup. A mutual parting of ways, a calm ending. It’s almost eerie. You begin to wonder what could have been and romanticize the unknown. It’s poignant. It’s a feeling I’m happy that I will likely never experience again, but I can revisit it in song.
A&W, Lana Del Rey
In case you missed it, I wrote a lengthy piece about Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd last week. The tl;dr is that I loved it, but it transported me to a place of uncanny sorrow wherein I found myself faltering, so it won’t be entering the regular rotation—at least for now. A&W, however: I’ve never heard a song like this. It blew my mind.
Musically, I feel like this song created a whole new genre. Psychedelic folk with some light homages to trap? Lyrically, it’s relatable in an ugly way, but it softens the edges. It touches on aging (“Did you know a singer can still be looking like a sidepiece at thirty-three?”), the complexities of being a woman who desires sex in the way a man would—alluding to it as an addiction (“It's not about havin' someone to love me anymorе; this is the experiеnce of being an American whore”), and—most relatable for me—being bummed out that Forensic Files isn’t on* (“Forensic Files wasn't on”).
*But for real, it feels wrong to be staying in a Marriott for work and to come back after a long day and not have Forensic Files on the TV to watch while falling asleep, which I’m aware is probably insane for a woman to do when traveling alone, but something about it just makes sense.
I Love How You Love Me, Bryan Ferry
I don’t know what took me so long, but I hadn’t gotten into Roxy Music until Tyler and I started listening to music together. (Sensing a theme developing here.) It’s brilliant, and Bryan Ferry’s whole “sensuous vampire” vibe is, of course, something I can support. I Love How You Love Me is a cover of a song by The Paris Sisters that came out in 1961: it’s great, but something about Ferry’s version (perhaps the proximity to my sweetheart’s interests?) really gets me. It’s kind of playful, it cuts to the core of what good love if supposed to feel like. It’s earnest, but it doesn’t take itself too seriously.
I love how your heart beats Whenever I hold you I love how you think of me Without being told to I love the way your touch Is so heavenly But darling most of all I love how you love me
Plus, the saxophone solos are just fun. We need more fun. (My music is not very fun, it’s more brooding, which is why I can appreciate artists who can be fun without being too corny.)
Army Dreamers, Kate Bush
Step aside zoomers, I’m a longtime Kate Bush stan. I’ve just always adored her, she’s so weird, but the moment I heard her song “December Will Be Magic Again” in the car with my dad as a kid (my father’s “A Very Special Christmas” compilation CDs—Keith Haring artwork and all—left a significant impression on my art-absorbing brain, starting at a very young age) I knew I’d always love it. I remember finding a couple of her albums on vinyl back when I was living in my NoLibs apartment (if anyone has been following me since those days, bless you) and would spin them while laying on my bed with the windows open as I was home alone during the day trying to adjust my circadian rhythms after a couple years of the overnight shift at a local TV news station. For a while, whenever I listened to Kate Bush, I was transported to that era in my life. I couldn’t listen to her for a while because of it, but enough time has passed that I can once again romanticize my turbulent early twenties.
As for this particular song, on the first listen, it sounds kinda whimsical and video-gamey with its bodhrán, mandolin, and waltz rhythm. When you start paying attention to the lyrics though, it’s very dark. It’s also very maternal—the music and the flow is undeniably feminine, a heartbreaking story shared from the perspective of a grieving mother, punctuated by guttural shouts reminiscent of men in battle. It’s high art, and it’s painfully beautiful.
Our little army boy Is coming home from B.F.P.O. I've a bunch of purple flowers To decorate a mammy's hero. Mourning in the aerodrome, The weather warmer, he is colder. Four men in uniform To carry home my little soldier.
This song came out over 40 years ago but its sentiment still stands—it always has, and probably always will. “What a waste of army dreamers.”
He’s Alive, Dolly Parton
I love that this song tells a familiar story in a new way. It’s just fun. It builds up slowly and surely, it despairs for a moment, and then it celebrates in a huge way. In the Orthodox liturgical calendar, Christ’s resurrection is the most important event, and we celebrate it in a huge way as well. The song is reminiscent of the Orthodox journey through Holy Week, we walk alongside Christ as he does the last of his miracles before his death, as he’s led to his crucifixion, as he’s in the tomb for three days. It’s sad, it’s visceral, it’s overwhelming at times. At the end though, it’s beautiful, and it leads to some of the happiest moments I’ll have all year.
This song captures that feeling so well, and for that, it is perfect.
Bigmouth Strikes Again, The Smiths
This was the first Smiths song I ever heard, and I immediately was hooked. Who couldn’t love that riff, and again—a common theme in this round—the song is just so, so fun. I appreciate a sardonic critique of something as unanimously fucked as the music industry, especially when it’s done in a slightly-self-deprecating way. When asked about the song, its meaning, and it as a response to music press in particular for NME, Morrissey said, “I can't think of one sentence [I regret saying]. We're still at that stage where if I rescued a kitten from drowning, they'd say: 'Morrissey Mauls Kitten's Body'. So what can you do?”
A fun fact I learned about this song while I was reading more about it: the high harmonies are sung by Morrissey himself, and altered to be in that higher pitch. Formally, this is credited to an, “Ann Coates,” which is a reference to “Ancoats,” a neighborhood in Manchester. Clever ole Mancunians!