Thursday, January 14, 2010

Pop Music from the North in Winter

Prescript: there are links to special songs hidden in this post. Oooh! fun!

I've discovered that in the wintertime I need some encouragement from Scottish people. And sometimes the Swedes. And occasionally the Icelanders. That's right; I need pop music written by people who shouldn't be cheerful but are somehow managing it.

Take Belle and Sebastian for instance: winter in Scotland must be--pardon the salty language, but it must be said--Shitty. Crushingly, horrifyingly, nightmarishly poopy. In fact, I just looked it up, and it is currently 36 degrees and raining in Edinburgh, the sun is set to rise at 8:37, and it will set again at 4:11. That's less than 8 hours of daylight. And of course the Scots totally feel it--how could they not? But here's the thing: they don't let the dark-as-the-inside-of-a-cow-and-yet-not-cold-enough-to-snow climate keep them from writing music that can make you dance around the kitchen singing into a spatula on a week when it didn't get over 40 degrees in Georgia. Ahem...I live in Georgia. And frankly I'm sick of freezing my tukus off.

But here's the thing:
On Monday morning, I went into the bathroom at work (there's a huge sunny window in there) and stood with my eyes closed in the sun and listened to my ipod: five minutes of people who've got it much worse than me, but are doing it with tolerable cheer. Then I went back to my desk and felt as if I could write another email.

So, thank you Scots. You too, Swedes. Keep it up, Iceland people. You're all better men than me.

2 comments:

  1. Don't you remember Missoula? The sun rises at 8:20 and sets at 4:52 pm toward the end of December (it's a little better now: 8:09 and 5:27) . It's 32 for the high today. It's been raining a lot, and freezing like a popsicle that makes your tounge bleed.

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