15 Songs That Make Me Lose My Mind

Jun 242010

I don’t consider myself a deeply sentimental person. But then, no one who is deeply sentimental does. I’m a deeply sentimental person. I fight myself. I’m no stranger to heavy hits of emotion, both legitimate and bastardized. Knots in my throat, heat in my ears, stones and butterflies in my stomach in equal proportions,that sort of thing. And while I feel that most people find these sorts of bouts of raw emotion unpleasant and occasionally disturbing, for whatever reason I relish them. I connect and ride these great waves of catharsis like some sailor relishing the fact that he gets to experience the storm he’s sailing through in its purest form. And music, I find, is one of the best vehicles for this practice.

The other day I put together a list of fifteen songs that make me “lose it” so to speak, along with my favorite lines from each. After looking at it for a while and trying to think of an interesting way to present them, I thought that it might be a fun exercise to try to create a word-collage (a-la Burroughs) from bits of their lyrics to accompany them, which is found below, along with the songs themselves. I hope they do as much for you as they do for me.

Eden is a hell of a place,

but I’m still swingin’ from the liquor tree

and I ain’t coming back again.

And the man came back on his fiery throne,

to measure the fairest of heart.

He spoke to me.

Said,

“Take only that which you can carry on your back,

get out of those shoes and grow wings.”

“Fall over yourself, break heads.”

“Crawl out of your skin!”

And the entire time it rained.

Naked and red, I half-heartedly explained -

but gave up peacefully ashamed.

Said, “A glass can only spill what it contains!

I am a flightless bird!

I’m dumb and wild and free -

I don’t know how to do this!

And there will be no more after me.”

So I put on an argyle sweater and put on a smile,

got down on both knees,

and you’d think that he could see it through my skin.

But evil don’t look like anything.

And I ain’t coming back again.

And I felt it coming for so long,

but my heart is changed now.

So you go on ahead,

I said a prayer for our safe arrival,

and you’ve got to wait for me.

There is a church, there is a steeple,

open the door, and see all the people drinking lover’s spit.

They clean their face with it.

So here is the church, here is the steeple,

and my body is a cage.

My body is a cage.

So break me, Lord,

and with the pieces make another tree.

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Colin Flanigan is a writer, musician, and artist. He currently studies English and Media studies in the Chicagoland area, heads up the band The Aches and Pains, and blogs at The Syllabus.

3 Responses to “15 Songs That Make Me Lose My Mind”

Josh Gore says:

June 24, 2010 at 11:47 pm

I could not agree more with some of your choices. My body is a cage, I often use to motivate myself.
Josh
Evan Mather says:

June 25, 2010 at 12:00 am

I always see My Body as a Cage as a lament, a sort of prayer that you know won’t be answered. Especially with its placement at the end ever-so-bleak Neon Bible, it has such a pleading quality. The only way out of this world, the only way out of the pain and misery and death and hurt, is to exit your body. I guess you could see it as a plea for transcendence, but coming after all those other songs, I think it may be a final request to be put out of one’s misery. That could be just me, though.
Nate Gass says:

June 26, 2010 at 10:10 am

Your list reminded me that I need to get mewithouYou’s Brother Sister.