the life that we lead here is a metaphor in another universe or dimension.
don't forsake it.
closer
I just got myself a copy of Sarah McLachlan’s ‘THE BEST OF’ collection.
I see an artist who has evolved and progressed not only in terms of her writing skills but also of the images that she presents in each and every song she sings.
It is clear that she’s committed to perfecting her craft and she has chosen an impeccable line up of masterpieces she has written over the years.
Her full name is Sarah Ann McLachlan, she was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia and later on moved to Canada, and I have read that it was with her adoptive parents. She learned to strike black and white keys at such a tender age, and from the very onset, her folks knew that she would make it big. She got her first big break in 1987 and signed a record deal with Arista. She founded the Lilith Fair tour which brought together some of the biggest female musicians in the 1990's.
The collection included songs that I have ceaselessly listened to since high school (remember the TV series Felicity? Apparently the character’s a fan) – ‘Vox,’ (from Sarah’s first album - Touch) ‘I will remember you,’ ‘When she loved me,’ ‘Adia,’ ‘Building a mystery,’ ‘Path of thorns (Terms),’ (studio versions of the last three songs mentioned were present in the collection and the live covers are equally stunning). I was hoping that ‘Do what you have to do,’ and ‘Fear’ will be part of the album…but fear not, you will hear the crushing and outright excruciating words when you get a copy of ‘Surfacing.’ Fans will most definitely enjoy songs from her last studio-CD ‘Afterglow’ – ‘Fallen,’ ‘Stupid,’ and ‘World on fire.’ I am wondering why she did not include ‘Answer,’ emphatically one of my personal favorites.
Additional tracks are the heart-wrenching ‘Don’t give up on us’ – shedding light on Sarah’s capacity to make all those who listen to her linger in a standstill, with lyrics like ‘Baby don’t give up on us, I know you’re heart is full of doubts, you don’t need to be without these loving arms that will hold you through your darkest hour…’ In her song ‘U want me 2,’ she effortlessly renders her signature falsetto – I suppose she’s the only artist (for me, at least) anyone and everyone will most likely appreciate even when she doesn’t belt. She comes in soft yet strong, as the words defy gravity, then at the end of the chorus, her voice fades into almost a whisper, muttering the lines ‘Do you want me to stay and say I still want you…you want me too…don’t you?’ If you are to ask me I would say the song is more of an invitation rather than a question.
I have always felt that my life is a Sarah McLachlan song. Meaning I am always in the brink of depression. I was kidding. Not always but I suppose the more appropriate term would be ‘often.’ When she sings ‘Every moment marked with apparitions of your soul, I’m ever swiftly moving, trying to escape this desire,’ I am reminded of an unrequited love I couldn’t run away from for years. In the song ‘Fear,’ Sarah croons ‘I have nothing to give, I have so much to lose here in this lonely place, tangled up in your embrace, there’s nothing I’d like better than to fall…’ and I reminisce of the times I fell for someone but knew I would lose in the end yet I couldn’t put a halt and I descended, breaking my heart and my idealistic concepts of love. Her song ‘Train wreck’ bare these words: ‘a wild fire borne of frustration, borne of the one love that gets me so high…’ understanding how huge of a mess I was and I still am (I think) when I fall in love. You see when I do love, I fall so hard and I fall flat on my face sometimes and I don’t think it’s something we all would learn (too quick) from. We’d really have to go through it several times over prior to considering loving ourselves a little more before offering our affections and ourselves to another being.
Her songs are not simply maudlin…the emotions are raw and you know that the process she subjected herself through to conjure not just her heartbreaks but also her demons was painstaking. I think she’d make a good scriptwriter because she flawlessly depicts images and metaphors, for the purpose of evoking an all too familiar experience - bruising anguish and rupturing bliss - at the same time. Don’t ask me how she does that. Beats me.
What I love about her music is that it is intelligent – she’s multi talented – she plays a number of instruments and pens all of her songs. That is what makes her a force to reckon with. Though her music is categorized as ‘pop,’ as an artist, she has taken the language that she uses to express herself in different heights and levels. The melodies she uses are catchy but to some point unconventional – which really, to me, is essential, especially that people who call themselves ‘artists’ are sprouting everywhere.
And all I can say is WOW.
I see an artist who has evolved and progressed not only in terms of her writing skills but also of the images that she presents in each and every song she sings.
It is clear that she’s committed to perfecting her craft and she has chosen an impeccable line up of masterpieces she has written over the years.
Her full name is Sarah Ann McLachlan, she was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia and later on moved to Canada, and I have read that it was with her adoptive parents. She learned to strike black and white keys at such a tender age, and from the very onset, her folks knew that she would make it big. She got her first big break in 1987 and signed a record deal with Arista. She founded the Lilith Fair tour which brought together some of the biggest female musicians in the 1990's.The collection included songs that I have ceaselessly listened to since high school (remember the TV series Felicity? Apparently the character’s a fan) – ‘Vox,’ (from Sarah’s first album - Touch) ‘I will remember you,’ ‘When she loved me,’ ‘Adia,’ ‘Building a mystery,’ ‘Path of thorns (Terms),’ (studio versions of the last three songs mentioned were present in the collection and the live covers are equally stunning). I was hoping that ‘Do what you have to do,’ and ‘Fear’ will be part of the album…but fear not, you will hear the crushing and outright excruciating words when you get a copy of ‘Surfacing.’ Fans will most definitely enjoy songs from her last studio-CD ‘Afterglow’ – ‘Fallen,’ ‘Stupid,’ and ‘World on fire.’ I am wondering why she did not include ‘Answer,’ emphatically one of my personal favorites.
Additional tracks are the heart-wrenching ‘Don’t give up on us’ – shedding light on Sarah’s capacity to make all those who listen to her linger in a standstill, with lyrics like ‘Baby don’t give up on us, I know you’re heart is full of doubts, you don’t need to be without these loving arms that will hold you through your darkest hour…’ In her song ‘U want me 2,’ she effortlessly renders her signature falsetto – I suppose she’s the only artist (for me, at least) anyone and everyone will most likely appreciate even when she doesn’t belt. She comes in soft yet strong, as the words defy gravity, then at the end of the chorus, her voice fades into almost a whisper, muttering the lines ‘Do you want me to stay and say I still want you…you want me too…don’t you?’ If you are to ask me I would say the song is more of an invitation rather than a question.
I have always felt that my life is a Sarah McLachlan song. Meaning I am always in the brink of depression. I was kidding. Not always but I suppose the more appropriate term would be ‘often.’ When she sings ‘Every moment marked with apparitions of your soul, I’m ever swiftly moving, trying to escape this desire,’ I am reminded of an unrequited love I couldn’t run away from for years. In the song ‘Fear,’ Sarah croons ‘I have nothing to give, I have so much to lose here in this lonely place, tangled up in your embrace, there’s nothing I’d like better than to fall…’ and I reminisce of the times I fell for someone but knew I would lose in the end yet I couldn’t put a halt and I descended, breaking my heart and my idealistic concepts of love. Her song ‘Train wreck’ bare these words: ‘a wild fire borne of frustration, borne of the one love that gets me so high…’ understanding how huge of a mess I was and I still am (I think) when I fall in love. You see when I do love, I fall so hard and I fall flat on my face sometimes and I don’t think it’s something we all would learn (too quick) from. We’d really have to go through it several times over prior to considering loving ourselves a little more before offering our affections and ourselves to another being.Her songs are not simply maudlin…the emotions are raw and you know that the process she subjected herself through to conjure not just her heartbreaks but also her demons was painstaking. I think she’d make a good scriptwriter because she flawlessly depicts images and metaphors, for the purpose of evoking an all too familiar experience - bruising anguish and rupturing bliss - at the same time. Don’t ask me how she does that. Beats me.
What I love about her music is that it is intelligent – she’s multi talented – she plays a number of instruments and pens all of her songs. That is what makes her a force to reckon with. Though her music is categorized as ‘pop,’ as an artist, she has taken the language that she uses to express herself in different heights and levels. The melodies she uses are catchy but to some point unconventional – which really, to me, is essential, especially that people who call themselves ‘artists’ are sprouting everywhere.
She did not just cross borders…she has succeeded in creating and defining what music is and should mean for this and the coming generations.
Disclaimer: I wrote this not just because I am a big fan of hers or that I am biased to her inarguable talent, but because I really do believe that she deserves to be where she is now.
written November 28, 2008
the breadth
in which your silence falls
drench the impossible
and decrepit weariness
from which my bones
ache and my skin
trembles and in
shackles and chains
i lay in the blackness
my spirit fastened
to the wind rebelling
against the sky
the ocean swallowing
the laughter of
winter and the rage
of despair
with my wounds
open for the memories
to hurt
parting my flesh
with your hands
breaking the
rough edges of my
dream.
drench the impossible
and decrepit weariness
from which my bones
ache and my skin
trembles and in
shackles and chains
i lay in the blackness
my spirit fastened
to the wind rebelling
against the sky
the ocean swallowing
the laughter of
winter and the rage
of despair
with my wounds
open for the memories
to hurt
parting my flesh
with your hands
breaking the
rough edges of my
dream.
home to a stranger
coming home one
sunday from a long
travel an unfortunate
journey i got my
heart bruised and
cracked now your teeth
sinks in my flesh
with our bed unmade
reminds me of the riot
in my head just when
you were holding me
still lying on top of me
under the sheets
naked, naive, nothing
you did make me feel
i am your muse
no longer in vain
all in pain craving
for the silence in this room
my empty eyes
looking out the window
where the heavy rain
falls striking the ground
my soul accelerates
toward your hands
starving, stranger.
sunday from a long
travel an unfortunate
journey i got my
heart bruised and
cracked now your teeth
sinks in my flesh
with our bed unmade
reminds me of the riot
in my head just when
you were holding me
still lying on top of me
under the sheets
naked, naive, nothing
you did make me feel
i am your muse
no longer in vain
all in pain craving
for the silence in this room
my empty eyes
looking out the window
where the heavy rain
falls striking the ground
my soul accelerates
toward your hands
starving, stranger.
revolution
sinking in disillusionments
in the promises that
we never kept
spoken but never
understood
revealed but not
to be believed
too much of the
confusion
yielding to delusion
smokes and reflections
arising from
uncertain midnights
unaware of the
darkness that
awaits
this pain borne of
the separation, the
stagnation and
the repercussions
getting worse
finding out
in the end
i died in the
beginning.
in the promises that
we never kept
spoken but never
understood
revealed but not
to be believed
too much of the
confusion
yielding to delusion
smokes and reflections
arising from
uncertain midnights
unaware of the
darkness that
awaits
this pain borne of
the separation, the
stagnation and
the repercussions
getting worse
finding out
in the end
i died in the
beginning.
the book of answers
i asked:
'we're going to stay forever, right?'
then i opened the book...
it said:
'no matter what'
sct exercise, day 10
I am masochistic. Did that make me sound like a lunatic? I hope not. I really am not fascinated about physical pain, but I prefer it over emotional torment. Whenever I feel depressed, I have the tendency, not to lament about it, but maybe, say, get my ears pierced. So what I wear and what you see in me isn’t just for attracting attention. It is a form of expression, it’s a testament of a specific period in time I went through something in my life.
I know being depressed often isn’t really healthy and at one point I believed it would hasten my death of something. But that is just how I am made. Just this year, before I turned twenty-two, I was feeling nostalgic, always longing for the one person I no longer have – my father. I guess what hurts more is the truth that I am ‘aging’ or getting older, to subtly put it, and my father is not with us. I am growing old and he’s not there to see it. He won’t be around to witness anything – for as long as I live. So I did what I never thought I would do this soon…I got inked. Well, it was something I have always considered, and in a way, I also wanted to do something ‘major’ before I celebrate my birthday.
I had the Arabic word ‘Imani’ tattooed on my hip. It means ‘faith.’ It’s really important for me, it is something I emphatically would want to be reminded of, that I carry within me. The whole experience was cathartic. I know I was conquering my fear. I have always believed that we fear what remains unknown to us. Marking myself wasn’t at all peculiar. It wasn’t as if you would not or cannot imagine me with one, but people did not think I would get mine sooner than I had hoped.
Everything was premeditated. I mean I already know what I would like to put on my body but I never really felt the urgency to do it until some days before my birthday. And now that it is done, the funny thing is that I am not sure if I am over it. It is completely insane – for other people, but I know it is also completely justifiable. I couldn’t say that it was a spiritual experience, but then I couldn’t say that it isn’t.
My exact words after I had it were: ‘I feel totally aligned with the universe.’ And just like anything unattempted in life, we theorize, we consume ourselves thinking about something..like I was expecting that doing it would really, will tremendously painful. But the entire incident wasn’t what I initially had in mind. I think I underestimated my capacity to endure pain.
But that’s precisely the reason why I think I am a masochist.
written sept. 15, 2005
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
