It was five years and one day ago when I started doing this column. Look!
Little did I know that I would still be doing it five years later. And I think that five years is long enough to constrain myself to music. See, I (and in some important cases for which I am grateful, we) always did songs. Week in, week out, it was songs. I have not gone through all of them, not by a long shot. But I am passing up SO MUCH OTHER STUFF. The Usual Suspects, Roseanne, Waco, the first Gulf War (the one everyone liked), all of that is ripe for exploring, picking apart, mocking. All the stuff we usually do, but not always musical. Hell, even Jimmy Fallon got in on it this week with his Saved by the Bell Reunion.
Why should I leave all that comedy gold to the guy who has the best job in TV? I can probably get the guy who was the voice of Doug. He’s probably alive. I hope.
I can’t let this rich history go to waste. And I can’t let five years of music go without playing one of the most memorable songs of the decade. I remember one of my friends telling me that he heard Eddie Vedder was at a beach and heard some dude singing some of their songs and when he started to play Black, Eddie went up to him and asked him not to sing that one because it meant too much to him. Now, that story makes no sense at all because nobody who only wore corduroy jackets would ever go to the beach, but it doesn’t make the song bad. It just makes my friend a liar.
And seriously, this song is REALLY sad. If you can read these lyrics, especially the end, and not have a face in your mind when you do it, you are either cold and dead or really frigging lucky. And nobody is that lucky. But you know what? I feel pretty lucky to have been doing this for five years without getting bored or tired. And if you do, too, then let me know what you want to read. Got a thing for Full House? Want to drone on endlessly about Pulp Fiction? How about the first reality show ever: The Real World? Let me know – the possibilities are endless, just like Bill Clinton’s baffling sexiness!
Friday Nineties is dead; long live Friday Nineties!
Sheets of empty canvas, untouched sheets of clay
Were laid spread out before me as her body once did.
All five horizons revolved around her soul as the earth to the sun
Now the air I tasted and breathed has taken a turn
Ooh, and all I taught her was everything
Ooh, I know she gave me all that she wore
And now my bitter hands chafe beneath the clouds of what was everything.
Oh, the pictures have all been washed in black, tattooed everything…
I take a walk outside, I’m surrounded by some kids at play
I can feel their laughter, so why do I sear?
Oh, and twisted thoughts that spin round my head, I’m spinning, oh,
I’m spinning, how quick the sun can drop away
And now my bitter hands cradle broken glass of what was everything
All the pictures have all been washed in black, tattooed everything…
All the love gone bad turned my world to black
Tattooed all I see, all that I am, all I’ll be…
I know someday you’ll have a beautiful life,
I know you’ll be a star in somebody else’s sky,
But why, why, why can’t it be, can’t it be mine?
uwotm8
I swear on me mum
Hands down my favorite Pearl Jam song ever
I think mine is Daughter because I used to change the word Daughter to Dummy and sing it about my dumb friend.
This song makes me feel old and emo as fuck.
You old!
Fuck the song. I love this post. So hard.
Oh you will be sooo happy, Bobbi Jo.
I haz a sad. Last year, I searched back through all your Friday Nineties posts (ALL of them) looking for this song and I was so glad when I didn’t find it. Not because I don’t love it, because I do, but because I learned it on my ukulele and I wanted to send you a video of myself playing it to use on a future Friday Nineties post. But then I forgot, I’ve got kids, and Slee, and shit to do and so no video.
I suck. 🙁
Happy Five Years of Friday Nineties, Acadia! They’ve all been great, and I wish for many, many more.
#yourock
Make a goddamn ukelele video RIGHT NOW
See, but now that you’ve done Black, I’d rather do Creep (Radiohead) because you already did that one a while ago.
Just to see if I could, I recorded Creep as an mp3 file on my Chromebook this very minute using a voice recording app I found in the Chrome store but I have no idea how to upload it to anything because I am a computer DERP.
No video. Because Sunday morning pajamas and bedhead. Hell, bedface. 🙂
Well, that was a fun Sunday morning project. Here’s what I learned:
1) Chromebooks record audio for crap.
2) How to convert a .wma (.wap? I can’t remember) file into a .wav file.
3) How to convert a .wav file into an .mp3 file.
4) How to upload it to YouTube.
Here is my “video.” I will warn you, the recording and sound quality is so poor, it will break your brain. Sorry. Not doing it over, I have to bring my son to his dance class. (Yes, dance class. He is awesome.)
http://youtu.be/aaQexw0NQ0c
I cant see it!