COREYSAYS'S

500 Days of Summer – it was, without question, my favorite movie of 2009.  Sweet and heartbreaking…I identifed with it on levels I was not prepared for.  There are many aspects of the film I could wax ecstatic on, the outstanding performances of the two leads, Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, or how the directors fantastic use of color and shade made each scene all the more powerful.  But, at this moment, I’m feeling compelled to share my introduction to a whole new world of music.  A world I knew was out there…but never actively participated in…until 500 Days of Summer opened me up to it.  And what new world of music am I speaking of?  Well…that world is The Smiths!

I remember hearing “How Soon is Now” several times back in the day – at bars, parties, or on the radio…and each time I would ask who ever was standing closest to me “who is this?” and they would look at me with a knowing smile and reply, “The Smiths”.  I would always think to myself  ‘I need to check them out’…but I never did. 

How I made it through my youth without being exposed to The Smiths I will never know…but thank god I did…because I would have been even more of a miserable, emotional train wreck then I already was.  In my younger years I loved being depressed…I thought it made me feel “alive”.  It was the classic ‘I would rather feel pain then nothing at all’ sort of thing.  The more heartbreaking the song, book, movie, breakup, or unrequited love, the better…and the worse I felt about something, the more meaningful that something was.  The Smiths put many of my thoughts and feelings at the time to music…I was just not aware of it.  Instead I was using Radio Head, Depeche Mode, Pink Floyd, and Toad The Wet Sprocket to supply the background music of my life.     

Now, at the age of 35, The Smiths are just coming into my life.  Over the past two weeks, my iTunes collection of songs that make me want to throw myself off the nearest highrise has grown considerably.  Aside from “how soon is now”, the three tracks getting the most play are “Girlfriend in a Coma”, “Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want”, and “There is a Light That Never Goes Out”.  I love the melancholy lyrics by Morrissey and the excellent and never overpowering support of Johnny Marr’s guitar.  Now, when I want to take a stroll down memory lane to all the doomed relationships and the depressing experiences of my past, I just select The Smith’s playlist…and away I go.

So thank you writers and director of 500 Days of Summer…for making an outstanding film I will no doubt have memorized before 2010 is through…and for helping me find some excellent additions to the soundtrack of my thoroughly, and completely self inflected, depressed youth. 

“So, for once in my life, let me get what I want…lord knows it would be the first time”

Morrissey 

~ by coreysays on January 10, 2010.

Posted in Music