July 14, 2010: Jeff Buckley - So Real

Jeff Buckley - So Real: youtube.com/watch?v=EcaxrqhUJ4c

The first time I heard Jeff Buckley I was on my way to Shawn Prestons grad party. I was sitting in the front passenger seat, Tim was sitting behind me and Claudia was there too. My friend who was driving us put on Grace and said, “I heard this last night when I was high on mushrooms, just as the sun was coming up.” It was framed, right from the start, as some ecstatic experience.

For most who talk about Jeff Buckley (especially first time songwriters, people who are full of themselves and super-sensitive men) he is an ecstatic experience. I can understand this to a degree as I went through a Jeff Buckley phase; I learned how to play a lot of songs off Grace and tried to emulate his falsetto vocal style (which, admittedly, probably has a lot to do with my stronger upper and middle range as it currently stands. Oops!). I bought into the canonization of this man, his apparent untouchable sainthood. It’s almost embarrassing to admit that I still love Jeff Buckley’s music, can still listen to it gratefully, though I’ve become more critical of music and art in general and am generally turned off by his fans.

The first time I knew it was okay to listen to Jeff Buckley was when Tim’s Dad was driving us to a cottage one day and Tim put in a mixed tape. It had Sonic Youth, ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Radiohead and Jeff Buckley’s “So Real.” When that song came on Tim went on a diatribe on the chaotic and discordant elements that always were underneath his songs and wanting to come out, as happens after the second chorus of this particular song.

I realize it’s uncool to like Jeff Buckley now, even for me and the rest of us who defend his songs. If I was at a show and an artist did a cover of a Jeff Buckley song I would almost certainly walk out. If someone put Grace on at a party I would probably spend a few minutes complaining about it to whoever was unfortunate enough to be talking to me at the time (though I couldn’t say the same about (Sketches For) My Sweetheart the Drunk, if it came on). Despite this I will gladly listen to him by myself. There are elements of study that are important to what was contributed. It is no ecstatic experience (and I question whether it ever was) but it is appealing to my senses; darkness, humour, chaos, longing, the whole bit.

It’s very unfortunate that Jeff Buckley died when he did. Aside from the obvious human tragedy I think he was going somewhere musically that his immediate fans would have hated. He was progressing to an interesting place as an artist, as can be heard in his demos for My Sweetheart the Drunk. Listen to “Your Flesh is Nice.” It’s difficult to listen to at first, all fuzzy guitars, graphic lyrics, death and sex. If he had continued this way people would not perceive the tortured, romantic artist they make him out to be. I guess this goes into how we’re all perceived after we die; will people create you into a martyr or the embodiment of some casue? Do you want that? Does it even matter?

I’m currently reading God Is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. In it, he describes a microcosm of religion as seen in a documentary called Mondo Cane where islanders who have never experienced anything outside their island have American GIs come and visit. Their first ever visitors, they are surprised anything exists outside of their island. They take one GI in particular, canonize his name, create an annual celebration for him, claim his return to their island to be the signal of great future prosperity. This man, though, is simply an American GI who happened to be there and probably went back home afterward to return to a state of normalcy. Does it matter that they mistakenly made this man super-human? That he has become some invisible guide for a whole culture? Does he want that? How would his attempts at clearing his name be received? (Note: Read this book. My second hand account is nothing compared to his analysis.)

I heard Bono say once that when he dies he wants a lot of people to cry at his funeral. Isn’t that ridiculously stupid? I hope people are joyful on my death.

I remember the first time I thought that listening to Jeff Buckley was uncool. My dorm roommate and I had to share a sleeping space. I couldn’t sleep so I put on some music to focus my scattered thoughts. I put on Grace. My roommate sighed, tossed and turned in his bed frantically until I turned it off.