2006-08-12

I've Been Waiting...

So not too long ago, I was making a big show of leafing through the latest issue of UTNE (because I would have people believe that I am a thoughtful, meticulously well-read intellectual, even though what I really want to be doing is eating KFC and watching porn, pretty much all the time) when I saw an ad touting a remastered, reinvigorated and reissued version of Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend." I read this ad not without a little cynicism, like, "C'mon. This album is barely 15 years old and they're REISSUING it?!" True enough, I thought, I own it, and once upon a time loved it madly, but many years had passed since I last popped it into the stereo, and there are certain things -- like baby barrettes, longhaired guitar players, and using all lower-case letters when writing -- that belong in one's twenties. And so I also believed this to be the case with "Girlfriend" -- a nice, misty memory, but not anything that one should revisit without a good dose of irony.

But this morning, on my out to the gym, I realized that I'd let my iPod's battery dwindle to an almost nonexistent charge, and so had to make do with my clunky CD walkman. I had to have SOMETHING to listen to, something that I wouldn't have to skip around on, and so as I scanned the shelves upon shelves of little jewelboxes, I landed upon "Girlfriend."

"Oh, for fuck's sake. Why not."

Let me tell you, chickens. I wasn't even halfway across town when I was just completely awash in nostalgia. I had really, truly forgotten what an awesome record this is. What a shimmering, yummy little bit of pop. I sat there on the train, hearing Matthew Sweet sing I didn't think I'd find you perfect in so many ways, while marvelling at the nice weather, and I thought, "Goddamn if this isn't the PERFECT summer record." Sunshine and jangly guitars and being in loooooove. It was the soundtrack to my early 20's, much more so than Nirvana, or Pearl Jam, or any of those dirty flannel boys. I was just gobsmacked as I kept listening, thinking, "This just gets BETTER AND BETTER."

(Well, that's not ENTIRELY true. I never did like the song "Winona," as I never did like Winona Ryder or any of the songs she quite bafflingly inspired between '91 and '95. Skipped right over that one. But still.)

Oh, and then "You Don't Love Me" came on, and I very nearly lost it right there on the crosstrainer. I played this one over and over when I was 24, having been unceremoniously dumped by a longhaired guitar player. Sat in my bedroom and drank and cried and listened to that one song repeatedly, so I did. Now, you couldn't PAY me to go through that year again, but I swear to God I very nearly believed that as I listened to this song, I would open my eyes, look in the mirror and see not a heaving, blotchy, nearly 36-year-old on a crosstrainer, but a heaving, blotchy 24-year-old with a half-finished bottle of Merlot. O tempora! O mores!

I came home, and I have to say, I'm excited about this reissue now. I can't imagine how they would make that record sound any BETTER than it already does, but I am willing to find out. My birthday is nearly a month away, but I've already put this on my wish list, damn it.

lisamcc at 1:18 p.m.



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