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Paul's SONG OF THE YEAR 2000: "What You Wish For" by GusterJul 11 '05 Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line In which the author breaks up with his future husbear, again and again and again.
Those first few years, it was an argument every Saturday morning. And then, in the middle of August, every year - I don't know that we planned it so much, as it just seemed to cycle around at the same time - we broke up. Only for an hour or so, of course. And we'd talk for awhile, figure out some of the logistics of the split, and then, while talking, start laughing or something, and realize that hey, maybe this isn't what we really want. The first year, we did it over salad bowls and breadsticks at a Pizza Hut. The next, we drove out to Hoyt Park with the lunches we'd packed for work. We'd break up between bites of bologna sandwich; and then we'd get back together, and then we'd each go back to work, feeling light and laughy the rest of the afternoon, whatever fatal conflict had brought us to our last resort melted away in a giddy pool of lovemush. I'd joke with the girls when I got back to the office, putting on my most somber look and mumbling, "James and I split up today." And they'd get all sad and say stuff like Oh Paul, that's so sad, I'm so sorry for you, are you okay? and I'd reply, "sure, I'm fine. We got back together too." Oh Paul, you big silly... you two are so cute. The fifth year we were together, we decided to skip our "August" and get married (as much as we could), and we haven't had an August since. We were both new to this level of commitment. Maybe we were both a little scared of knowing each other as well as we did. We'd already divulged all of our darkest secrets, but maybe we weren't ready to have our checkered pasts forgiven and forgotten so easily. I guess it was some sort of security thing. Our way of reminding ourselves that, like any novice smoker, we could quit anytime. - - - - - It was right around this time that I disovered Guster while perusing the listening stations at the local Border's. From a new music discovery standpoint, these were lost years for me. When I was in junior high and high school, I had MTV (and MTV had videos); in college, I held a position at the college radio station which I kept for a couple years after I graduated. But then, I'd gone off to Savannah; then I'd gone broke and moved back. By then, MTV was all about screaming girls in Times Square, and I hadn't yet figured out Napster. So I would spend the occasional skulking around Border's, trying to figure out what I was missing. The first track from the band's third album Lost and Gone Forever, I was struck immediately by Guster's "What You Wish For". After a gentle acoustic guitar and finger-cymbal intro, the first verse vocals rush forth like a damburst of self-pity and regret, sung with the kind of simple, but amiable bluntness you might expect from Eeyore: Woke up today To everything grey And all that I saw Just kept going on and on Despite the melancholy opening, however, this song - which centers on figuring out what you want, and whether or not you can handle having it - turns itself inside out, from a place of melancholy resignation to a bold statement of purpose. With the gorgeously tag-teaming descants of singers Ryan Miller and Adam Gardner - repeat after me - playing like an inner dialogue - just a little bit closer - over the lead melody, the verses turn into a sparkling post-breakup self-evaluation. Then, after the bridge, in a series of long-held, harmonic notes - the brief third verse: And I... Will get... What I... Deserve... And it's clear, by the rocket-red glare of Brian Rosenworcel's crashing cymbals and beaten-to-a-pulp bass drums, that there's been a reversal, a verdict overturned. He wants her back. and you aren't surprised, love, are you? - - - - - I'd only been in Madison for a month, but I hated my job here, and it made me physically sick to think about going in. I called in sick one day when I clearly wasn't and he told me, y'know Paul, if you hate this job so much, then, instead of just wallowing in it today, why don't you spend the day actually looking for something else? Oh God, I hated him that day. He was so god-damned right. There were days when it pissed me off to no end how, as my mother (or worse, my sister - my best friend) might put it in the condescending tones of someone taking care of an invalid, "good for me" James was. But then, the first time we visited his family in Kansas City, I heard the same things - "You're so good for him. James, don't screw this one up." If they only knew how many times we'd screwed it up, and then put it back together. But then, maybe they wouldn't be surprised. - - - - - SONG LYRICS: Woke up today to everything grey And all that I saw just kept goin on and on Sweep all the pieces under the bed Close all the curtains and cover my head And what you wish for won't come true You aren't surprised love, are you? If this serenade is not what you want It's just how it is, it keeps goin on and on Come out, come out where ever you are Would you do it all over right from the start And what you wish for won't come true You aren't suprised love, are you? So what you wish for won't come true You aren't surprised love, are you? Once had this dream, crashed down in Oz Not black and white, but where the colors are I never dreamed that I would let her go And I will get what I deserve Keep all the secrets under the bed Open the curtains, forget what I said And what you wished for could come true You aren't surprised love, are you? So what you wished for could come true You aren't surprised love, are you? - - - - - SONG CREDITS: Written by Guster Produced by Steve Lillywhite Performed by Guster, 1999 Ryan Miller: vocals, guitar, lyricist Adam Gardner: vocals, guitar Brian Rosenworcel: drums, percussion Chris Manning: bass - - - - - CHART INFO: Didn't chart. - - - - - OTHER IMPORTANT (TO PAUL) SONGS OF 2000: "Music" by Madonna "Directions" by Josh Rouse "Power Struggle" by Sunna "Californication" by Red Hot Chili Peppers "Road Rage" by Catatonia  |
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