(Music) Mezzanine

I think about music a lot. I rarely get to talk about music. So I’ll blog about it.

I usually take songs on their own individual merit, which is actually how this very writing started. It was going to be solely about the song Inertia Creeps by Massive Attack, from the album Mezzanine. Which led me to Risingson, another track off of the same album. Then I listened to Angel, and here we are, with the whole album. Have you listened to Mezzanine? If not, you should, right now. I can wait.

Generally, in my blogs, I don’t use people’s names, because even though this is all my story, I am actually pretty private, and I’m not here to name names. Here’s the exception.  My friend Joey has influenced my taste in music more than any other human in my life. When we met, I already had my love of The Cure and Depeche Mode, Rosetta Stone, and Sisters of Mercy. I love to dance, more than almost anything on the planet. Joey gave me so much more (he’s a DJ) and loud, so that I could feel it. He gave me Sneaker Pimps, which led to my love of IAMX. He has played all kinds of nonsense for me, over the years, just so I could hear it really loud. Without him, I might me missing so much from my life, like Faster Kill Pussycat by Paul Oakenfold. Joey has affected my enjoyment of my world and my life more than pretty much anyone else, and I can never, ever express how much I appreciate it, or how much it has changed me. There is not a single day that I don’t hear something in my headphones that Joey didn’t introduce me to in the past 25 years.

Joey gave me the song Angel.

Once upon a time, we had the best Goth Nights in the world. We even got videos. Way back, I rarely talked to anyone when I went out. I don’t think I talked to Joey, even, for a few years. We had a giant screen for videos, too. The first time I heard Angel, I stopped dead, on the dancefloor, and stared at the video. I assume it was 1998, around when the album came out. The video is dark, and a little frightening, and completely compelling. As a first track, Angel sets the tone for the whole album. It’s dark and slow and gritty and obsessive. Technically, this album is thier first excursion into trip hop and heavier electronica. I don’t know what either of those things mean. I just know what I like.

I’m not taking the tracks in order, but, Angel is the first. Almost everyone is familiar with at least part of Teardrop, as it was used for the opening credits of the TV show House. As a track, it’s fine. Exchange is one of the most fun things that I listen too in headphones. It’s laid back, and if I close my eyes, it feels like some sort of really cool, laid back fairy is smoking dope and circling my head. Dissolved Girl starts with a panic attack pulse into really deep bass. The lyrics will feel familiar to anyone who has done something that was much wanted, but ill advised. “I need a little love to ease the pain.” Purely physical, not entirely passionate, sexual, but not necessarily relief.

I enjoy the other tracks, but I want to get to my favorite, Inertia Creeps. Now, I happen to know that Robert Del Naja wrote it about a relationship that had recently ended. It feels like it, like yearning for something that isn’t in reach anymore. I love Del Naja’s voice. I love everything about him, actually. He is an amazing artist, and one way or another, without him, we might not have Banksy. I digress.

Inertia Creeps and Risingson are both aural sex, to me. There are few songs that have an actual, physical effect on me. These two songs might as well be really heavy foreplay. I dance to both of these with my eyes shut and belly dancer hips. These two songs describe in my head, with sound, the place I would like to be. A dark bar, half sex club, dark booths, shiny black vinyl and soft black velvet,  bass you can feel, dancing like no one else is even there, unless of course, you have someone to dance with. Boots spinning on concrete floors. Risingson even has a touch of that familiar anxiety, why am I here, now? These two songs are why I want to learn to hula hoop. They make me want to have someone to grab by the hips and hold on to. The line “toy like people make me boy like,” always makes me smile, you want to be a toy, I’ll play.

Gotta go dance around for a bit.

Thank you, Joey, for giving me Inertia Creeps, hella loud, in a dark room.