The songs I can't stop listening to (9/8/12)

I'm the mood for boys who write beautiful songs. And Kristin Hersh. Exploration, romantic vengeance, vengeful romance, hopeful romance, resignation, the hard road to making peace with what's happened, a quick visit back to the one who "cut you to the quick," meditation, the need for escape, and the realization that when the right one really does come along, you'd better be ready, lest you let life completely pass you by. Things on my mind this week, things running through these songs. Here's what I've been listening to on repeat this week:

1. Josh Ritter - "Another New World"
2. Pete Yorn - "Simonize"
3. Pete Yorn - "A Girl Like You"
4. The Beatles - "Don't Let Me Down"
5. Josh Rouse - "Start Again"
6. Kristin Hersh - "Quick"
7. Harold Budd & Brian Eno - "The Plateaux Of Mirror"
8. American Analog Set - "Hard To Find"
9. The Head and The Heart - "Coeur d'Alene"

The leading lights of the age all wondered among themselves what I would do next,
After all that I'd found, in my circles around the world, was there anything left?
"Gentlemen," I said, "I've studied the maps, and if what I am thinking is right,
There's another new world, at the top of the world, for whoever can break through the ice...

...

I won't call it rescue,
What brought me back here to this old world to drink and decline,
Pretend that the search for another new world was well worth the burning of mine.
But sometimes at night, in my dreams,
Comes the singing of some unheard tropical bird,
And I smile in my sleep,
Thinking Annabel Lee's finally made it to the top of the world.

An incredible song about the search.



A beautiful, romantic song about, ahem, a serial killer. I want to cover this song and the one after it together, but in the reverse order from which they appear on the record:

Hey
Don't take your life away
I think you'd rather stay
Follow me into the alleyway...



Someday
I'll look into her green eyes
And know that she'll come with me
A girl like you

Too many
Things I do not care for
But one things that I adore
Is a girl like you



I'm in love for the first time
Don't you know it's gonna last?
It's a love that lasts forever
It's a love that has no past

Don't let me down.



And now the pain subsides
And I have realized
That you have changed your mind
And I will start again

...

And all the pain subsides
And I have realized
With you I feel alive
And I can start again



who did you cut down to the quick?
you know it's true

hold back, you've been saved
hold your breath, you've been saved
hold your tongue, you've been saved

maintain your ground

...

can't make your mind up anymore
you're naked on the floor



Unwind.


We stay hard to find
'Cause it's too hard to take it
...
No, we can't fake it


You're in my soul now
You've gotta waste away with me...