Creep
“I’m a creep,” my iPod croons through my earbuds. “I’m a loser…”
This is the song I most feel like hearing right now. Unfortunately, the only recording I have of it is not Radiohead’s original, but a cover by the aptly named lounge singer Richard Cheese. “What the hell am I doing here? Hey!" Richard oozes.
I turn off my iPod. I do feel the need to be punished, but this may be too much. Let me consider the situation: In my defense, I certainly did not set out to be as creepy as I now feel. My intentions were innocent.
I was housesitting for a generous man who had told me to feel free to enjoy his CD collection while he was away. I flipped through his enormous CD wallet, selecting just a few to load onto my iPod so that I could safely listen to them at work the next day. I even saved them in a special playlist to remind me to delete them later, so as not to violate the rules of fair use. This was how good my intentions were. My aim was to expand my understanding of folky rock music, which I’d enjoyed learning about with my great, now estranged guitar teacher, Brian. (Why estranged? Feel free to read my first blog entry, “Now That’s Comedy,” and then to ask, as one of my friends did, “Why does everything with you have to be so painful?”) This CD collection, with Crosby, Stills and Nash, the Allman Brothers, Jim Croce, lots of Neil Young, and the like, would be great for my education!
I got stuck staring at White Ladder by David Gray. I felt I should know who David Gray was, but I really didn’t. What did he sound like? Would I like him? Did he deserve a space on my little playlist? I realized that I had read about him before, about a year ago, when I’d last Googled Brian.
No, this is not the creepy part. I Google myself and my friends all the time. I highly recommend it. It’s fun. I’ve learned, for example, that my friend Janette has written scripts for three popular TV shows that I’ve never seen. I’ve found, to my surprise, at least one other person with the unlikely combination of names, Anita Harkess. I have also learned that Brian has written several passionate, eloquent CD reviews on Amazon.com. One of those CDs is by David Gray.
I couldn’t remember why Brian had liked him so much, so I Googled Brian again. The Amazon review, of Lost Songs, was still up, and Brian convinced me that I would, indeed, like David Gray. Strangely, though, Google now also listed a string of results for a songwriter by Brian’s name, who had an album available for purchase or download. I convinced myself that it wasn’t the same person. Brian has a fairly common last name, and his first name is, well, Brian. Still, curiosity made me click one of the links. I was taken to the web site of a small company that markets independent and homemade albums. I read this Brian’s liner notes: Grew up in Minnesota. Now lives in Colorado. Spent many moonlit nights racing his bike through his hometown while playing the Doors too loudly on his Walkman. This was the Brian I knew!
A line of links offered two-minute samples of his songs. I clicked one. Brian’s fast, intricate guitar picking filled my ears. Wow. In the two months since I’d last seen him, I’d forgotten how good he was. And was that his voice? The singer sounded like Brian, or like the best singing voice I could imagine based on the way he spoke. He had always avoided singing where I could hear him. Even when he was teaching and had to show me what “Sugar Mountain” or “Helplessly Hoping” sounded like, he would just mumble under his breath. Why? On the album, he had a rich, growly, expressive voice, interspersed with very successful imitations of Bob Dylan. (Yes, I realize that not everyone thinks it’s a good idea to imitate Bob Dylan’s singing, but Brian loves Dylan’s voice. By anyone’s taste, imitating him is, at the very least, a neat trick.)
Clicking on another song sample, I started to pay attention to the lyrics. This song was about his late mother, and probably written when she was still alive. Poor Brian. I could hear now how much he’d loved her. He must miss her terribly. I clicked on yet another sample. Brian sang about a beautiful woman. From the details of his description, I was sure I’d met her—Boulder is a rather small town—though she never had the effect on me that she’d had on him. Wow. I wished I could impress any man like that.
I moused towards another sample link, but a clutching heaviness in the center of my chest slowed me down. I stopped to examine the feeling: guilt. Guilt? Why? Well, having just learned that Brian was even more talented and sensitive than I’d thought he was, I felt really silly about having bitched at him because he didn’t fancy me the way I fancied him. I should have been grateful that such a person would deign to speak to me, let alone teach me and let me try to make music with him. I felt guiltier still for having hurt his feelings—those deep, raw, grumbly, expressible feelings.
Then the main problem dawned on me. I looked over the song titles again: songs about his family, crushes and ex-girlfriends, friends, travels, hopes… and I realized that, in essence, I was thumbing through someone’s diary—me, someone he knew and might have to face in person—without his knowledge or permission. Without thinking about it, I had wandered, click by click, down the path from curious student to major creep.
I closed the web page, vowing never to listen to those songs again unless, through some undeserved stroke of luck, I should someday be able to talk to Brian again and get his permission. Instead, I opened my iTunes library and began clicking on songs by artists I hadn’t played Frisbee with, whose cats I had never met, whose asphalt-scarred knees I hadn’t been shown. Still, every song struck me as disturbingly personal. Dar Williams sang “As Cool as I Am,” and her story was so specific that I was sure she had dated my last boyfriend, too. Sarah McLachlan sang “Possession,” a song famously created by editing together the letters a stalker sent to her. Alanis Morissette began a song with, “These are the thoughts that go through my head in my backyard on a Sunday afternoon…”
This is what art does, I realize. All of the artists who really touch me do so by revealing too much of themselves. Great artists require not only talent, skill, sensitivity, and depth—they’ve got to have guts! To create a song, a painting, a story, or even an essay that really touches people’s hearts, the artist has to hang his or her own heart out for all to see. Artists air the thoughts and feelings that the rest of us are too shy, too private to reveal. We love them or hate them because they say what we are afraid to say about ourselves.
I’m still a creep. Brian has potential, but he’s just growing into his artistry. There was a reason why he wouldn’t let me hear him sing. He wasn’t ready to share that much of himself with just anybody. I will not listen to his songs anytime soon.
Still, I’ve thought of a more fitting penance than listening to Richard Cheese: I want to be an artist someday, too. I want my writing to have courage like that, along with the skill to use it well. I will keep practicing these columns, at least one each week, until they are really brave, really touching. Then, if I ever do see Brian again, I’ll invite him to read them.
This is the song I most feel like hearing right now. Unfortunately, the only recording I have of it is not Radiohead’s original, but a cover by the aptly named lounge singer Richard Cheese. “What the hell am I doing here? Hey!" Richard oozes.
I turn off my iPod. I do feel the need to be punished, but this may be too much. Let me consider the situation: In my defense, I certainly did not set out to be as creepy as I now feel. My intentions were innocent.
I was housesitting for a generous man who had told me to feel free to enjoy his CD collection while he was away. I flipped through his enormous CD wallet, selecting just a few to load onto my iPod so that I could safely listen to them at work the next day. I even saved them in a special playlist to remind me to delete them later, so as not to violate the rules of fair use. This was how good my intentions were. My aim was to expand my understanding of folky rock music, which I’d enjoyed learning about with my great, now estranged guitar teacher, Brian. (Why estranged? Feel free to read my first blog entry, “Now That’s Comedy,” and then to ask, as one of my friends did, “Why does everything with you have to be so painful?”) This CD collection, with Crosby, Stills and Nash, the Allman Brothers, Jim Croce, lots of Neil Young, and the like, would be great for my education!
I got stuck staring at White Ladder by David Gray. I felt I should know who David Gray was, but I really didn’t. What did he sound like? Would I like him? Did he deserve a space on my little playlist? I realized that I had read about him before, about a year ago, when I’d last Googled Brian.
No, this is not the creepy part. I Google myself and my friends all the time. I highly recommend it. It’s fun. I’ve learned, for example, that my friend Janette has written scripts for three popular TV shows that I’ve never seen. I’ve found, to my surprise, at least one other person with the unlikely combination of names, Anita Harkess. I have also learned that Brian has written several passionate, eloquent CD reviews on Amazon.com. One of those CDs is by David Gray.
I couldn’t remember why Brian had liked him so much, so I Googled Brian again. The Amazon review, of Lost Songs, was still up, and Brian convinced me that I would, indeed, like David Gray. Strangely, though, Google now also listed a string of results for a songwriter by Brian’s name, who had an album available for purchase or download. I convinced myself that it wasn’t the same person. Brian has a fairly common last name, and his first name is, well, Brian. Still, curiosity made me click one of the links. I was taken to the web site of a small company that markets independent and homemade albums. I read this Brian’s liner notes: Grew up in Minnesota. Now lives in Colorado. Spent many moonlit nights racing his bike through his hometown while playing the Doors too loudly on his Walkman. This was the Brian I knew!
A line of links offered two-minute samples of his songs. I clicked one. Brian’s fast, intricate guitar picking filled my ears. Wow. In the two months since I’d last seen him, I’d forgotten how good he was. And was that his voice? The singer sounded like Brian, or like the best singing voice I could imagine based on the way he spoke. He had always avoided singing where I could hear him. Even when he was teaching and had to show me what “Sugar Mountain” or “Helplessly Hoping” sounded like, he would just mumble under his breath. Why? On the album, he had a rich, growly, expressive voice, interspersed with very successful imitations of Bob Dylan. (Yes, I realize that not everyone thinks it’s a good idea to imitate Bob Dylan’s singing, but Brian loves Dylan’s voice. By anyone’s taste, imitating him is, at the very least, a neat trick.)
Clicking on another song sample, I started to pay attention to the lyrics. This song was about his late mother, and probably written when she was still alive. Poor Brian. I could hear now how much he’d loved her. He must miss her terribly. I clicked on yet another sample. Brian sang about a beautiful woman. From the details of his description, I was sure I’d met her—Boulder is a rather small town—though she never had the effect on me that she’d had on him. Wow. I wished I could impress any man like that.
I moused towards another sample link, but a clutching heaviness in the center of my chest slowed me down. I stopped to examine the feeling: guilt. Guilt? Why? Well, having just learned that Brian was even more talented and sensitive than I’d thought he was, I felt really silly about having bitched at him because he didn’t fancy me the way I fancied him. I should have been grateful that such a person would deign to speak to me, let alone teach me and let me try to make music with him. I felt guiltier still for having hurt his feelings—those deep, raw, grumbly, expressible feelings.
Then the main problem dawned on me. I looked over the song titles again: songs about his family, crushes and ex-girlfriends, friends, travels, hopes… and I realized that, in essence, I was thumbing through someone’s diary—me, someone he knew and might have to face in person—without his knowledge or permission. Without thinking about it, I had wandered, click by click, down the path from curious student to major creep.
I closed the web page, vowing never to listen to those songs again unless, through some undeserved stroke of luck, I should someday be able to talk to Brian again and get his permission. Instead, I opened my iTunes library and began clicking on songs by artists I hadn’t played Frisbee with, whose cats I had never met, whose asphalt-scarred knees I hadn’t been shown. Still, every song struck me as disturbingly personal. Dar Williams sang “As Cool as I Am,” and her story was so specific that I was sure she had dated my last boyfriend, too. Sarah McLachlan sang “Possession,” a song famously created by editing together the letters a stalker sent to her. Alanis Morissette began a song with, “These are the thoughts that go through my head in my backyard on a Sunday afternoon…”
This is what art does, I realize. All of the artists who really touch me do so by revealing too much of themselves. Great artists require not only talent, skill, sensitivity, and depth—they’ve got to have guts! To create a song, a painting, a story, or even an essay that really touches people’s hearts, the artist has to hang his or her own heart out for all to see. Artists air the thoughts and feelings that the rest of us are too shy, too private to reveal. We love them or hate them because they say what we are afraid to say about ourselves.
I’m still a creep. Brian has potential, but he’s just growing into his artistry. There was a reason why he wouldn’t let me hear him sing. He wasn’t ready to share that much of himself with just anybody. I will not listen to his songs anytime soon.
Still, I’ve thought of a more fitting penance than listening to Richard Cheese: I want to be an artist someday, too. I want my writing to have courage like that, along with the skill to use it well. I will keep practicing these columns, at least one each week, until they are really brave, really touching. Then, if I ever do see Brian again, I’ll invite him to read them.
posted by Anita @ 12:25 AM
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