the blah-blahg of boston-based artist and illustrator cai vail
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsZBX2RhDZE&feature=youtube_gdata_player
I have a particular fondness for out-of-context songs (see above, the fantastic Vera Lynn doing 'We'll Meet again' and the unfortunately un-embed-able ending to the anime Metropolis, with Ray Charles' version of 'I Can't Stop Loving You'). There's something to that irony, of visual destruction with a background of sweetness, romantic sadness...and the flip side is just as exciting, when normally sweet, endearing songs are done in an unexpectedly vibrant, even angry way - This weekend, my wonderful group of western MA folks lost a great friend, the impassioned, whip-smart, loud-mouthed Jameson Lavo, who headed up a local band called Trials and Tribulations; they did a fevered cover of 'You Are My Sunshine' that knocked my socks off the first and every successive time I saw it. I used to sing the song, in it's more traditional form, to the twins I cared for every night. It's so inherently sad when you are attentive to the lyrics, and worked amazingly with Jameson's hardcore energy (the sweat was literally flying by the end of it, and he'd have collapsed on the floor in passionate anguish several times). Four weeks ago I got to dance with him to bad 80's music for the last time, and indulge in some OWS discussion one last time, and thats the way I'll remember him, like a scene of destruction set to gorgeous, swooping music, or as something gorgeous and pure, set to a fevered scream.
