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You may have realized by reading almost all of my recent reviews, but for the love of verbosity, I'll state it: I'm nostalgic for the nineties. When I was sixteen and was neither fish nor fowl nor soy... When I tried to be more eclectic, confident, a leader, an entertainer, simply charming, and instead stood out precisely because I was a blond, scared, awkward, half-agoraphobic little gay guy, and to top it off, with a moped without a muffler.
They, in love not with me, but with their own mental state and their own ideal, which coincidentally more or less aligned with the male beauty standards of the time. Inside me, I felt like a volcano destined to explode, and deep down I couldn't wait to do so, and my inability to break out forced me into a limbo of inadequacy, ill-preparedness, inaccuracies, stammering: all this was a great fortune, it must be said.
In the '80s, a loser like me wouldn't have even been considered, yet in those nineties, the more of a loser you were, the better off you ended up. Let's try comparing adolescent existence with chart-topping music... You didn't have a penny, drank like a Nibelung and smoked like a Turkish metalhead? Women are something with fishnet stockings to be bent over? Guns n' Roses. Plus, you haven't washed your hair in a year and a half? Then Guns n' Roses plus Piero Pelù! When your long-sleeved shirt got stained with sauce on the belly, you threw another shirt on top, but the darkest one you had had little sleeves? Cobain! Your white Converse were no longer white, and you could be smelled coming from afar? Like the blonde guy from the Lemonheads who, in the video clip, jumps into the tub with his girlfriend with all his clothes on: in the summer, with Converse on my feet, I went to the beach every day, and I swam in them; back home I showered, dressed, put on the still-soaked Converse and left the house again.
Neither before nor after was it so easy, and above all, so cheap. Nowadays you have to pretend to be a Renault manager even to go out with a Romanian girl, and the Russians want to give me lessons in Italian style... In short, nothing goes right for me. I recognize that, as much as I've tried to come along well, the subsequent versions of myself haven't rendered enough.
Ah, the beautiful nineties... Antiheroes becoming heroes, losers winning, shadows turning into emblems, misfits becoming icons; and sex, like all the other things for which one has innate modesty, emerged along with all other "interiorities": pulling out your dick was like exposing "your inner self"... I miss those years, and I miss the easy life, even though back then I didn't understand it, even though I wanted something superior at the time, knowing it would be more complicated to live.
Today, no publisher has published my efforts, the band has split, the group is a memory, it's been a while since I visited any English-speaking country, today I don't drink anymore, today I'm left alone at the bar wanting to change the world and myself while the Romanian waitress brings me pineapple juice with airs, I think back to the Connells, this band from North Carolina that started in the eighties and would never, believe me, never have had a globally successful album if not in 1994, and then inevitably fell back into obscurity, even though they may have released, before and after that, many other albums, some who knows?, perhaps even better.
A band that could never have changed the planet's fate, traditional guitar-driven root and pop rock, rich in acoustics and with some jingle jangle. With a singer with a soft voice and a pair of glasses that makes him look like a supermarket accountant. An album to sing along to, from the first to the last verse. One you can listen to even if you haven't shaved, perfumed, or slicked up. Even if your favorite jeans have been at the laundry for a week, because the lady wants money, but work... A bit like me, all things considered. Making peace, therefore, also with the laundry lady, who belts out Baglioni songs at the top of her lungs while ironing. I, on the other hand, sing "'74-'75", and think back to when I broke it out with the guys at the bonfire, in total drunkenness, waiting for the right moment to pull out my dick too. And it came off well, because we had played it a million times, in even worse psychological and physical conditions.
I wonder if one day someone will sing "'94-'95" and make a video like the Connells', where you see what the seventies kids looked like twenty years later (after forty, you know, everyone is responsible for their face)... Faces and smiles of people perhaps serene, but who lack the light in their eyes from their black-and-white photos, two decades ago.
Someday, if life goes as it should, I too will be that way.
I finish my pineapple juice and head to the newsstand: who knows if they sell Russian courses on DVD!
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Slackjawed (04:00)
Someone tells me somethin'-- Well I'm prepared to listen. Nothin's goin' on, nothin's goin' on. Standing next to no one, Well that was my intention. Nothin's goin' on, nothin's goin' on. But then you're back and I'm guessing it's not so bad at all. And I've been standing slackjawed since you were here. Yea, I've been standing slackjawed. Something says this may be the strangest light I'll mention-- Someone left you on, someone left you on. Saying next to nothing--the words were my invention. Someone left you on, someone left you on. And now you're here and I'm thinking it's not so bad at all. And I've been standing slackjawed since you were here. Yea, I've been standing slackjawed.
02 Carry My Picture (03:57)
You never think to occupy my time,
And you never require.
And you never lean too much.
And it's always been this way.
It's wearing thin,
Your words come crowdin' in,
But I want you to know
It's the stuff that stirs me up and follows me away.
So write my name and carry my picture
There's nothing wrong.
I'm willing, I'm willing, I will lead you on.
So write my name and carry my picture, there's nothing wrong.
03 '74-'75 (04:38)
Got no reason for coming to me and the rain running down.
There's no reason.
And the same voice coming to me like it's all slowing down.
And believe me
I was the one who let you know.
I was your sorry-ever-after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
It's not easy, nothing to say 'cause it's already said.
It's never easy.
When I look on in your eyes then I find that I'll do fine.
When I look on in your eyes then I'll do better.
I was the one who let you know.
I was your sorry-ever-after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
Giving me more and I'll defy
'Cause you're really only after
Seventy-four, seventy-five
Repeat Intro
Got no reason for coming to me and the rain running down.
There's no reason.
When I look on in your eyes then I find that I'll do fine.
When I look on in your eyes then I'll do better
I was the one who let you know.
I was your sorry-ever-after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
Giving me more and I'll defy
Cause you're really only after
Seventy-four, seventy-five
I was the one who let you know.
I was your sorry-ever-after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
Giving me more and I'll defy.
Cause you're really only after.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
Seventy-four, seventy-five.
04 Doin' You (03:33)
I wouldn't bet the whale that I'd ever see
The juvenile in your eyes like the one I see.
No I wouldn't climb the highs thinking that I'd find
A reason for honesty without even tryin'.
Doin' you and being new upon it.
Seeing your fog and drive on through it.
Being you with your creature comfort.
Doin' you is like doin' time.
I wouldn't buy your time if it was for sale.
Might sic my dog on you if you brought the mail.
Don't you dream of happiness when you're feeling blue?
Never see modesty from the likes of you.
05 Find Out (03:31)
You're thinking everybody needs to know
What sets you so far apart.
On a hunch I think I could show
But we'll let you keep the part.
You gotta pull it off
When we least expect it.
Really need to see your face on the wall
Of a three or four star restaurant.
Shouldn't take more than a call
You always seem to get what you want.
Gotta pull it off
When we least expect it.
Gotta pull it off...
Then we'll find out
What this is really all about.
Then I'll be the one who says "I don't believe it."
Then we'll find you
Like you'd always want us to,
Face the first in your own favorite way.
06 Eyes on the Ground (03:03)
Really ought to check the hair.
Or maybe you don't care.
Here it comes from the side.
You could see it if you tried.
Ought to check your shoes.
Hey, how about the shoes.
Here they come from the glass,
That you walk by extra fast.
Chorus:
Don't you know that,
You need it sometimes.
Why not go and stare it down?
It's better to see it all as someone,
Who keeps his eyes on the ground.
Nearly bought it all today, like every other day.
Seeing everything so clear, watch out for that...
There's always something that almost turns you 'round.
(repeat chorus)
Don't fail me now, don't forget how,
Don't believe it, leave it.
Gonna get it gonna see.
08 Hey You (03:23)
Standing back before the angels get to me,
Well it seems such a sorry waste of time.
Holding back on those who want the best for me.
I guess I can't be blamed for trying.
It's really very funny how it wears me down,
Waiting for that something.
Hey you, well I'm sorry but it's time to let you know.
Hey you, and it sounds a bit like preaching.
I'd bend over backwards to let you know.
Rolling back around the numbers on the wall,
Well it's sad 'cause I don't have much to show.
Standing back before the angels get to me,
Well it seems the better way to go.
09 New Boy (04:39)
Sometimes I get the feeling things won't fall apart.
Sometimes I think it's gone too far.
Sometimes I get the feeling things seem pretty nice.
Then again sometimes I'd like to leave you twice.
Once we decide upon it
We won't fall apart.
This time I think it's gone too far.
And you get where you can't decide--
Don't ask any other.
And you get where you can't decide.
Didn't I say, "Sorry"
Didn't I say, "Dear"
Didn't I consider
Didn't I stand clear
Didn't you say, "New boy get down on your knees"
Didn't I say, "Trying, I'm trying, I'm trying"
10 Disappointed (05:04)
Change whatever gets strange in your aprons and your curls.
Ah, you really got lost, but you'll string it back together.
You could never make do, and your storyline is a scream.
Change whatever gets strange in your neverending...
All in all it's been quite a fall,
And these days are the days that I walk on,
It isn't that you'll understand...
If I disappointed you, I'm so sorry.
You're a disappointment too.
Fear whatever comes near to your neverlasting home.
Ah, you really got crossed and of course it don't get better.
You could never make do, and your storyline is a dream.
Fear whatever comes near to your neverlasting...
13 Running Mary (04:40)
I was running Mary.
And the days were growing long.
And I was minding mine,
I was doing nothing wrong.
And the news you sent me.
and the bar's upon the door.
And this one caught me blind--
Couldn't stop me anymore.
Tell me how much do I forgive
'Cause you laid one in on me, but I'm all right.
Tell me how much--this goes on and on.
I was running barely
And it's hard to face me more.
And I was minding mine,
And doing nothing more.
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