We went out for karaoke tonight so I’m going to talk about music. Some of it will pertain to being in China and some of it won’t. It should be noted that the group of students and staffers (all Chinese) that I interact with and go out to karaoke with are solidly upper middle class or higher. So when one of them started singing to Green Day I confronted the fact that they may be the least punk group of individuals I’ve ever spent time with. Unfortunately the karaoke machine had NO Clash in it because I really wanted to drop “The Guns if Brixton” on them. Not that it would have made any difference; they wouldn’t have understood either the lyrics or my joke. There were three couples in the group, two of which were insufferably cute together. So I tried to drop love songs into the mix. The thing is, I define “love song” very differently than most people. The pieces of music that most people define as “love songs” are, to me, just songs about passion or lust or something. They aren’t love songs. There is a scene in the draft of my novel, which I’m afraid may hit the cutting room floor, In which Phoebe gives Caitlyn my definition of a love song. A love song isn’t about how much you want to be with someone. It deals with the question of how you are going to stay with someone when they are really annoying. Or it deals with how you are going to honor your commitments to someone when what you really want to do is to tell them to get lost. A love song isn’t about when it is easy; it’s about the times when it is hard. So I did my best to search the Chinese karaoke machine for love songs. I found one that came close: Queen’s “Too Much Love Will Kill You”. Several others I looked for were nowhere to be found, particularly Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes”, which may be the greatest love song of all time. What I was able to play was The Proclaimers “I’m Gonna Be (50 Miles)”, which is a truly great song. I have no idea if the people I was with understood my singing because you really have to try to sing it in a Scottish accent. Charlie and Craig Reed are, after all, Scottish nationalists and so it would be wrong to sing in the Queen’s English. So I sent the MP3 of the song to David when I got home, at his request. He and his girlfriend were the last of the couples there and they really were sickeningly sweet together. (I offered to let Yao use the second bed in my room if he needed to since he and David are sharing an apartment.) I told him that he needs to look up the definition of the verb “to haver” if he really wants to understand it but he probably won’t. One thing that is interesting to watch when we go out for karaoke is that it is apparent that I take music much more seriously than any of the other people there. I don’t mean that my taste in music is better than theirs is, though it most certainly is. It’s that no one else in the room FEELS the music like I do. They enjoy the songs that they are singing but they giggle in the middle of the songs they choose. I just can’t imagine doing that. I’m not a very good singer. I mangle most of the songs that I choose in karaoke. But while they’re playing and the screen is kicking up the lyrics for me that song is my world. It doesn’t matter whether the difference is that the people I’m with (and this is as true of Jeff and his girlfriend as it is of any of the Chinese) don’t take the songs seriously or whether they are specifically picking songs that they don’t take seriously. I just wouldn’t do either. Even in a fun environment like going out to sing karaoke with a bunch of friendly acquaintances I’ve known for three weeks I can’t imagine choosing a song on jukebox that doesn’t have real meaning to me. And if I’m singling the lyrics to a song that has real meaning to me I am not going to sit back and mail it in. I am going to do my best to convey the meaning that that song has to me. Music is too important to me not to.
Posted on: Tue, 30 Jul 2013 16:58:23 +0000
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