that song "my sister" by juliana hatfield

[goatschool]

evokes an emotion in me, kind of like a lump in my throat, but not really.

while most throat lumps feel weak and near losing it (crying, essentially), this lump is sad and pathos-y in an awestruck way and i can't figure out why.

the thing is, i have 2 sisters i haven't seen in a few years and i really don't miss them, and i have a third one that's a teenager and i see her more or less on a bi-weekly basis.

also, i went to see blake's babies (is that the name?) about 4 years ago w/ some girl i liked and we almost hooked up, but it didn't happen, and furthermore she made such negative comments on my choice of clothes (earlier in the day) that it, in conjunction with one other very negative incident 3 years ago, effected me and fucked me up to this day.

that's rather LJish, isn't it? what i want to know is:

- does the song "my sister" have this sort of effect on anyone else?

- does any song have that kind of stoic sadness effect on any of you? and are you together enough to tell what it is?

 

[goatschool]

i'd also like to mention here that i've posted regularly on 2 video-game-oriented messageboards for a few months and in both instances, in a different style than i usually do. i'm sorry, but i'm feeling like this thread is sort of cathartic for me, because out of all the internet cliques i've observed over the past 6 years, i would say that you people are the most human and down to what i call earth, and having said that, you are enabled as the most severe judges possible, and i think i need a browbeating for contributing that deeply to any sort of video game discussion.

that's an aside, though. the "my sister" song question is the most pressing thing, here.

 

[avi]

there's a wire song that kind of hits me in that way. "the other window" I think, but I haven't listened to it in awhile. I can't really give a proper explanation to its real-world correspondence, but I definitely get that melancholy nostalgic effect. at least, that's how I would describe it.

 

[xfer]

"the blake babies", and i didn't know they were back together. (i was a big juliana hatfield fan in highschool and i do have a couple of her older albums on my Nomad)

"my sister" evokes the memories of me putting it on a mixtape and purposely nonchalantly playing it around my sister and her crying to my mom and me getting punished. later, same mother would rip up the cover of a mixtape i made named "shaq-fu 2: shaq dies horribly" because it was "racist" (cutout collage involving a picture of shaq with the top of his head snipped off and askew and spirals and stars springing from said head). i think i've told that story before.

i want to meet the bizarro goatschools at some point. unless i already have~! (the kleo706 fake account?)

 

[avi]

I'm gonna d/l that wire album now
(I don't have it here with me in SF)

 

[avi]

heck, I just wanna meet one of the goatschools so I can shake his hand.

 

[mindspell]

I don't have any song like that. I have however felt the way you explain depending on the situation and the song but never as consistently as you describe. A couple of Ben Harper songs in certain situation does that. Their is an Air song that reminds me of a long lost relationship that makes me feel weird in certain periods.

I am thinking that since music is all about emotional response, this is the kind of reaction you are supposed to have anyway

 

[xfer]

wow, weirdly, "everybody loves me (but you)" just came up on my mp3 player shuffle!

 

[goatschool]

"melancholy nostalgia effect" - i think that's different than how i feel w/ the JH song, but i feel that, too, w/ other songs. and i can even lump those into phases of nostalgia that apply to different eras of my life, the tension hitting a slightly different chord for each one.

i've never heard wire. i think i'll look into it.

 

[goatschool]

alex, that was a reunion show. i hadn't heard them before that, and i wasn't much into them during.

there's really only one goatschool, and he gets bored.

simon, i agree about the emotional response thought, but i wish i knew what emotion certain things are evoking.

 

[avi]

I was wrong about which song it was. I'm so terrible with song-titles. I blame heavy metal. It's "A touching display".

Anyhow, Nick - PM me and I'll hook you up. Wire is easily one of my most absolute favorite bands ever. There's no one else like them, before or since.

 

[goatschool]

ok

 

[goatschool]

OH COME ON, AZAL

 

[minxnim]

that song 'spaceboy' makes me freak out

 

[azal]

sorry goat, I was not working this week hence intoxicated and not on internet.

 

[Helm]

- does any song have that kind of stoic sadness effect on any of you? and are you together enough to tell what it is?

Yes - Genesis, who I don't like very much generally on their song 'Supper's Ready' which I also don't like very much, have an accoustic segment where Gabriel goes "it's been a long long while... wasn't it" and that specific bit is exactly 'stoic sadness' for me. I have no idea what Peter Gabriel is reffering to there, I have never bothered to read the lyrics of the song, nor does it evoke emotions based on some other actual experience in my life. It's just that the choice of words, as abstracted as they are, coupled with the orchestration, and the major to minor shift directly affect me. Like a borrowed memory, I guess. Like when you see pictures of somewhere in the world, you see sad people in strange cities, and you feel nostalgic and wanting, although you shouldn't because you have no roots there...

This is completely different from as an example what Husker Du's "Pink Turns to Blue" does to me, where basically the whole song reflects events in my life. And it makes me sad, depressed and tired.

 

[FalseTodd]

"Roads" by portishead i don't give a shit about how cheesy you think i am

 

[FalseTodd]

also the third verse of "Ghost of Tom Joad" by Springsteen

f off

 

[xfer]

huh now that you mention it i kind of feel that way re: "streets of philadelphia".

 

[mariovanpeebles]

Streets of Philadelphia is such a good song.

For the topic, Mazzy Star's "Fade Into You" does it for me.