From Sunset Over Slawit:
Songs don’t often make me cry.
It’s not that I’m a hard bastard or anything – I regularly cry at movies, TV shows, books… even comics… but much as I love music, it rarely moves me to tears. I always feel slightly envious when I read about someone who weeps buckets while listening to Yo Yo Ma perform the prelude from Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 or Morrissey lament his loneliness on Never Had No One Ever. I adore both tracks, but neither has ever produced any more than a sniffle.
There is one song, however, that makes me cry every time I hear it. It comes from Shirley Lee, lead singer of Spearmint, though the track appears on his eponymous solo album released in 2009. The song tells a highly personal tale of Lee’s relationship with his late father, how they often used to take walks round their local reservoir together when he was a boy…
Never knew you loved Jacques Tati
Never knew you did impressions
Of John Wayne and Jacques Tati
I knew you had a temper
Which you passed on to me
When I was a boy
Yorkshire Sunday mornings
We’d drive out
And walk round the reservoir
And I’d talk to you and
You’d listen to me
And no matter what
You’d always support me
The last time I saw you, you were so ill
I said that my music might just turn out well
And you laughed at me as if to say
“Firstly, you’re a fool and secondly, that would be lovely”
The side of a hill in the Belgian rain
A view over town in the Belgian sunshine
That’s where you lie now for almost four years
I’ve been missing you now for almost four years
Wish I could see you again just one final time
Walk round the reservoir with you
One last Sunday morning
Tell you what’s been happening in my life
And tell you my plans and
You’d give me that smile because somehow
Then there would be hope
There would be hope…
But most of all I’d like to see
Your impression
Of Jacques Tati
And if that wasn’t enough to break through the cast iron shell of my heart, as the song plays out we hear Shirley’s father himself, one of the last answerphone messages he ever left his son… and though I’ve heard this described as a cynically sentimental move, I don’t believe for a second Shirley’s intentions were anything but respectful. I’m not even listening to the track while writing this post, but just thinking of it and typing those lyrics from the CD booklet has brought tears to my eyes. Every time I hear it I think of my own elderly father, a man I love and respect more than anyone else in the world (along with my mother) and imagine not being able to talk to him any more. One day – hopefully far into the future – when that terrible day finally dawns, I doubt I’ll be able to listen to this record again. Or maybe I will… for some kind of solace.
: Shirley Lee - The Reservoir
Donate to Cancer Research
Songs don’t often make me cry.
It’s not that I’m a hard bastard or anything – I regularly cry at movies, TV shows, books… even comics… but much as I love music, it rarely moves me to tears. I always feel slightly envious when I read about someone who weeps buckets while listening to Yo Yo Ma perform the prelude from Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 or Morrissey lament his loneliness on Never Had No One Ever. I adore both tracks, but neither has ever produced any more than a sniffle.
There is one song, however, that makes me cry every time I hear it. It comes from Shirley Lee, lead singer of Spearmint, though the track appears on his eponymous solo album released in 2009. The song tells a highly personal tale of Lee’s relationship with his late father, how they often used to take walks round their local reservoir together when he was a boy…
Never knew you loved Jacques Tati
Never knew you did impressions
Of John Wayne and Jacques Tati
I knew you had a temper
Which you passed on to me
When I was a boy
Yorkshire Sunday mornings
We’d drive out
And walk round the reservoir
And I’d talk to you and
You’d listen to me
And no matter what
You’d always support me
The last time I saw you, you were so ill
I said that my music might just turn out well
And you laughed at me as if to say
“Firstly, you’re a fool and secondly, that would be lovely”
The side of a hill in the Belgian rain
A view over town in the Belgian sunshine
That’s where you lie now for almost four years
I’ve been missing you now for almost four years
Wish I could see you again just one final time
Walk round the reservoir with you
One last Sunday morning
Tell you what’s been happening in my life
And tell you my plans and
You’d give me that smile because somehow
Then there would be hope
There would be hope…
But most of all I’d like to see
Your impression
Of Jacques Tati
And if that wasn’t enough to break through the cast iron shell of my heart, as the song plays out we hear Shirley’s father himself, one of the last answerphone messages he ever left his son… and though I’ve heard this described as a cynically sentimental move, I don’t believe for a second Shirley’s intentions were anything but respectful. I’m not even listening to the track while writing this post, but just thinking of it and typing those lyrics from the CD booklet has brought tears to my eyes. Every time I hear it I think of my own elderly father, a man I love and respect more than anyone else in the world (along with my mother) and imagine not being able to talk to him any more. One day – hopefully far into the future – when that terrible day finally dawns, I doubt I’ll be able to listen to this record again. Or maybe I will… for some kind of solace.
: Shirley Lee - The Reservoir
Donate to Cancer Research
No comments:
Post a Comment