“I Love Life” – Pulp
(Words/music: Nick Banks / Jarvis Cocker / Doyle / Steve Mackey / Mark Webber, available on We Love Life, PolyGram 2001)
Hi.
It’s been a while, and life got cluttered up with the kind of things that clutter one’s life, so blogging fell off considerably. I convinced myself that it was OK by reminding myself that I proved that I could write everyday, and that over time it became more important that what I wrote was good rather than just writing for the sake of writing. And it was OK – I didn’t feel guilty about it, and most of the time felt grateful that having one less thing to do somehow made it a lot easier to get to bed at an hour where I didn’t feel it the next morning.
Then today I had a strange revelation. I was OK with not writing because I forgot why I started in the first place. Three things led me here.
The first is the return of Conan O’Brien’s show to television tonight. To make an extremely long story short, I ended up identifying with his experience this year all the way down to ending the year in a better place than where it began. More importantly, I admired the way Conan handled it in a classy and composed way. Sure, it’s easy to take the high road when it comes with millions in a contract buyout and another huge contract after it, but his triumph comes from doing what he loves and creating opportunities for himself, whether through his tour or the web.
The second came in Google Reader today. Pitchfork Reviews Reviews today shared that he’s working on a screenplay about his childhood and apologized in advanced for extended absences. Something he said struck a nerve with me. “I write this blog because it is something I like to do,” he says near the end of his post, and after reading that I stared back at the screen for a few minutes lost in thought. I felt like that too.
(Speaking of PRR, indulge me for a moment as I address him directly: I enjoy reading your blog, David, and find a lot of moments in your posts where I nod along in vigorous agreement. Best of luck on your screenplay.)
The final one came when I read about Pulp reforming to play shows next summer. I caught myself reacting with joy and a little anxiousness hoping that Pulp would make it over to the States next summer and started thinking about it. I’ve been lucky to see a lot of terrific bands this year – some old favorites I’ve seen more than a dozen times, and other long time favorites that I hadn’t seen before. Each time, there’s a similar moment of joy in getting the confirmation e-mail for the show, or in removing the shrink-wrap off the new record, or in that breathless moment when the house lights dim and the band walks out on stage. These are the same tiny joys that I try to think about every time I sit down to write. On my best days, I got to return to these moments, and in the rarest instances, I created new ones for myself.
These tiny joys are the things that led me to put on Pulp rather than do work that needs to be done tomorrow. The same joys I find in Jarvis Cocker’s voice and his imagery. The same joy in the way that the music in “I Love Life” restrains itself until it can’t help but explode into distorted chaos. The same way that Cocker’s lyrics read sincere and sarcastic, often in the same line, and the way I marvel at his ability to paint complex pictures in his words (in this case, by making a song full of affirmation still sound dark).
Today though, I’m most grateful for the joy I find in putting together all these thoughts in my head. I’ve always thought a lot about music – I did it long before I started writing this blog, and I’ll do it long after I’ve stopped writing this blog. Today, however, it was important to me to remember why this made me happy in the first place, enough to start writing a post without really knowing where to begin (and having it end up far longer than expected, and certainly enough to hit publish before forever dooming it to my drafts folder.
And it worked. Thanks for indulging me.
More on Pulp: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm
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