Journal: News & Comment

That took long enough

Permalinks to this entry: individual page or in monthly context. For more material from my journal, visit my home page or the archive.

I've long been a fan of Peter Gabriel. Nearly four years ago, when his most recent album, Up, came out (about the time Avril Lavigne began her major label recording career, incidentally), I wrote that "I don't know what [the strongest piece on the album] is yet." Okay, it took me four years, and it's "No Way Out," which is, in its own way, sadder than anything Morrissey or Joy Division or The Cure ever moped down onto tape.

Go head, give it a real listen, and think about the story-inside-the-song about the goldfish, silly at first, and how it ends, abrupt and clear:

I remember how you held the goldfish
Swimming around in a plastic bag
Swimming around in a plastic bag
You held it up so high
In the bright lights of the fair
It slipped and fell
We looked everywhere

Then put it in its context in the song. It's not a loud song by any means, but there's real power and brilliance in it.

Okay, it took me four years, but Gabriel took ten years to make the album, so that's not so bad, is it?

 |