Youtube Comments on Summerhead

The Cocteau Twins were a Scottish band active between 1979 and 1997. The original lineup consisted of Robin Guthrie and Will Heggie. They added Elizabeth Fraser later on, who gave the band their signature airy, wordless, but emotion-filled vocals. The Twins first signed on to the 4AD label after being auditioned by John Peel and Ivo Watts-Russel. They first contributed to the multi-band effort It’ll End In Tears, with Song to the Siren and Another Day.

From time to time, I indulge myself in listening to my favourite Twins tune, and this summer, it was its namesake, Summerhead, from the album Four Calandar Cafe, released in 1993. It was a song which appeared at a certain period in my life where I felt I was making a decision to go on a certain path, never to return. I was getting married, going into a stage of my life where I had to find work, and take on serious responsibilities. This song, with Fraser’s signature wordless vocals, conveyed the mood, the fear, the uncertainty, the excitement, the passion, and the heartbreak that was that new stage of my life. But I was listening to this song on YouTube, so I fell into the temptation to read the comment section. It seemed that there were lots of people whom the song hit them in a similarly powerful way. Here are their thoughts, with names removed:

  • my favorite song of theirs. the lyrics hit like a breath of fresh air. first time i heard them i was sobbing
  • One of [Elizabeth Frazer’s] most heartbreaking melodies..
  • So full of human love and loss, happiness and despair. My brain feels so much with this music than anything else I have listened to. A Cocteau Twin song is like human emotion in a bottle, being released all at once in a beautiful explosion within the heart.
  • I don’t know why, there are certain sad memories I have with this whole album, but, somehow, I feel happy with this songs. Perhaps I feel they were there to me to listen and sweep away everything else.
  • I can’t explain what Cocteau Twins do with my emotions, but they are honestly the most amazing thing that has happened to this earth.
  • I’ve never been loved by anyone but I imagine it feels like this album.

Jeff Buckley (1966-1997) and Elizabeth Frazer got together as the Cocteau Twins were breaking up, and co-wrote “All Flowers In Time Bend Toward the Sun” (unreleased, 1995-96), which I heard on YouTube as well. More comments:

  • Elizabeth Fraser didn’t think this version was ready for release, and every time I hear it, I think I’m listening in on a great secret.
  • Despite Elizabeth Fraser’s misgivings about this recording, I (and it seems many others) honestly feel that this is the perfect version of this song. Putting a whole bunch of production into a song like this would probably make it feel much less immediate and heartfelt.
  • I read an interview with Jeff where he talked about his music. I’d never heard a note of his music yet his words went straight from the page to my heart. He was playing that same night, one concert in Sydney at the Phoenician Club. I didn’t know it was impossible to find tickets for it. I never went to concerts. But I had to go to this one. To go to be with this soul. I went & stood by the entry door gazing into the Club. A man came to the door and said he had some complimentary ticket & would I like one. So I entered as if I was meant to be there. Like coming home to hear my dear beautiful heart brother sing. Jeff was real. A one in a million so rare one. I miss him.
  • Liz’s giggle at the start is heartbreaking. It then goes on to become the most beautiful duet i’ve ever heard. This is what music was always meant to be. Magical.

Lyrics to “All Flowers In Time Bend Toward The Sun” – Tim Buckley and Elizabeth Fraser (contributed by a commenter)

My eyes are
A baptism
Oh, I am fuse
And sing her
Into my thoughts
Oh, phantom elusive thing

Oh, all flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no-one for you
But here is one
All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no-one for you
But here is one, but here is one...
Here is one

Aaah
La da dada...

Oh, all flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no-one for you
But here is one
All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no-one for you
But here is one, but here is one...

Keep it going in me, wicked traveller
Fading farther from me
With your face in my window glow
Oh, Where will you weep for me?
Sweet willow

It's ok to be angry
But not to hurt me
Your happiness
Yes, yes, yes
Darling, darling, darling
Oooh...

All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no one for you
But here is one
All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no one for you
But here is one
All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no one for you
But here is one
All flowers in time bend towards the sun
I know you say that there's no one for you
But here is one
But here is one
But here is one...

The most annoying sound on radio

This picture was shot at Square One … no, in Vaughan, no, in Scarborough, … Edmonton?, … oh, well… they all look alike.

Why do jewellery commercials have to be so tasteless and annoying? I single out jewellery commericals, since they are more annoying even then furniture commercials, their main competitor for the gold standard of tastelessness.

But no. We have sharpers like Russell Oliver, and others who will go on TV and radio and in the most garish manner known to man, tell you how you can trade in your jewellery for cash, in a way that seems to rob your most prized possessions of all the dignity and memory they once had. But I don’t believe he is the worst.

On the radio station I listen to, which doesn’t play a lot of ads, I admit, there is that infernal commercial from Spence Diamonds. Oh, that Scream! I didn’t know that it has been dubbed the “Spence Scream”, and even hashtagged #SpenceScream since at least 2014. It has even attracted some imitators, and an attempt had been made to vote it out of existence (Spence didn’t listen and it still persists to this afternoon). Since it was Spence that initiated the vote, I believe that maybe they thought it was too memorable, and couldn’t come up with a less annoying idea.

I am annoyed because I am already married, been there, done that. Having been through it, it is a tad degrading to hear it. The marriage (mine, at least), was about love. Clearly, Spence is agaisnt this idea. They want it to be about their diamonds.

Curiously, the comment sections of the YouTube videos of Spence promos have curiously well-worded and lucid critiques of Spence’s advertising practices. These are not your normal trolls. These apparently well-educated and erudite people seemed to have a lot of time on their hands, and are gravely preoccupied with dignity and class.

I think: look, the couple sounds very much in-character on the radio, just get rid of the scream.

Commentary

These are some rambling thoughts on things I have found lying around on YouTube and other locations.

My jazz station plays too many jazz covers of hit songs. If I wanted to hear Woodstock, I would tune into an oldies station to hear the original.

Americans are being offered Tim Horton’s Poutine doughnuts. Yuck. My biggest worry is that Americans are thinking “Canadians eat this stuff all the time!”. It is not offered in Canada.

Youtube is littered with spectacle and it threatens to over-run the good stuff on there. Videos currently tread on the topics of dog tricks, Trump vids are ubiquitous, Cyanide and Happiness, the Kardashians, Marvel comic characters, and other trivia.

One topic that comes up at least as often as these is regarding search engines as a topic, usually discussing the absurdity of auto-complete. One person did a vlog on someone who google’d himself, and another more constructively (but not much more) did a vlog on the web’s most searched questions. It just ends up being goofy.

Popular musicians for the next hour or so according to YouTube appear to be Ed Sheeran (1.6 billion views on one video); The Chainsmokers with Coldplay; DJ Khaled; French Montana; and Bruno Mars. There are many others, most of whom I have barely heard since I started preferring to listen to Jazz and Classical music.

Search terms that did not quite make it, annotated.

On WordPress, we can see a list of search terms people used to find entries on our blogs. Here are some of the more amusing ones. These won’t lead to anything useful on my blog. While my blog has the odd bit of nudity, this is not the mainstay of the blog. All mis-spellings are from the search string used:

  • valerie bertinelli topless
    • I have only a bad drawing of VB’s face; and it appears with about 20 other celebs on the same crappy album cover (CAC).
  • naked klingon women
    • I have no klingons, klingon women, or naked klingon women. Just a fully-clothed CAC with William Shatner, and a fully-clothed g-rated vid with Leonard Nimoy.
  • topless lobsters
    • If you are looking for topless lobsters, the closest you’ll get is to go to New Brunswick. I have only the odd CAC depicting topless women (human ones). Sorry to disappoint.
  • scottish kilt organist
    • I have nothing with kilts, few to no Scots that I can think of, and maybe a few organists, but they are wearing pants.
  • beautiful naked women with their legs sp
    • This search string was cut off just as shown, but I get the point. Most of the women here are on album covers; and if they are nude, they are not spread-eagled. Frankly, if you are looking for porn, my site is the most boring place in the world to look for it. By Internet standards, what I have in terms of nudity is campy, perhaps “naughty”, but I would stop short of calling it porn. By Internet standards, far short.
  • seventies boobs
    • Seventies boobs. Not the same as eighties boobs I suppose. There is an empty-headed blog article in this one somewhere, I know it.
  • lady wrestler leg photos
    • No lady wrestlers on this blog, so no lady wrestlers legs. The only wrestler I can think of, Sweet Daddy Siki, is male, as implied by the word “Daddy”
  • guy jumping guitar album cover
    • No CACs of guys with jumping guitars, no guys jumping a guitar (WTF?), and no CACs of guitars jumping. Sorry once again.
  • topless seductive nipples
    • … As opposed to “topped” seductive nipples? or topless “ugly” nipples?
  • topless flautist
    • The only topless flautist I have is a CAC of Herbie Mann. No topless women playing flutes (musical or otherwise) on this blog.
  • topless chocolate wrestle
    • Topless women wrestling in chocolate will only make it here if it is a CAC. None have been found, so as of yet we have no chocolate wrestlers, and no topless wrestlers.
  • swedish women football women beach tople
    • No football, no beach football, and no women’s beach football, no women’s football, and certainly none with topless women, topless Swedish women, or topless Swedes.
  • artistic hair dye raccoon
    • ?