Lookahead

When it comes to music, I’m not quite adventurous. I love music from the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. The genres I listen to most are classic rock and the blues. I love a dirty guitar tone. I love a fast and tight rhythm section. I despise autotune. I’m quite oblivious to most new music releases and artists, taking recommendations only from friends and people I know who share the same music taste as me. Quite stubborn, I know, but music is about comfort for me. I’m content inside my bubble.

So when James suggested a writing exercise that involved us exchanging songs with each other and then writing about them, I was initially apprehensive. But I found myself enthusiastically agreeing to it, and I’m glad I did.

James shared three songs with me, none of which I had heard before. Gimme Sympathy by Metric, Kid by The Revivalists, and Lyla by Big Red Machine. My task was to pick one and write about it.

Even before I had heard a single note, the Metric song grabbed my attention. The similarity of the title to The Stones’ Gimme Shelter and Sympathy for the Devil, two songs I adore, had me thinking, could this be a reference? A homage? With Keith Richards’ iconic opening riff from the Let It Bleed opener ringing in my ears, I opened Apple Music, found the song, and hit play.

The opening synth note immediately hooked me. The vocals come in soon after, with a slightly distorted guitar and a steady drum beat in the background. My first thought was, I like this voice. It carries no artifice. And it complemented the modern rock sound the guitars were laying a foundation for.

Listening further, I was intrigued by the lyrics, especially by the lines:

Who would you rather be, The Beatles or The Rolling Stones?

and

Come on, baby, play me something like "Here Comes the Sun"

So there was a Stones connection after all! And The Beatles! Why choose between The Beatles and The Stones? What could the story be? Who is the singer talking to? The more I listened to the song, the more I wanted these questions answered.

With the goal of understanding the lyrics better, I found myself reading about the band. This song is from their 2009 album Fantasies. The music video for the song was first released on MySpace. In an interview with the now archived music website Drowned in Sound, frontwoman Emily Haines had explained how the song came to be. The lyrics had been inspired by a conversation between her and the band’s guitarist James Shaw.

We opened for The Rolling Stones two nights at Madison Square Garden in NYC and since then analyzing what they represent has become a favorite theme of band conversations. In this song we ask the age-old question, ‘Who would you rather be: The Beatles or the Rolling Stones?’ Here’s Jimmy’s answer: ‘Neither. One is dead and the other is corporate.’

While I may not fully agree with Shaw’s reading of things here, I see his point. It’s tempting in any field, especially when you start out, to compare yourself to, or aspire to be, someone who had already taken that path. It sounds like Haines and Shaw are making a statement that their journey will be different. Of course, they have the self-awareness to know that when they “get too close to the flame”, things may not be easy. But they’re giving themselves permission to take chances and make mistakes. The lyrics

I'll remember someday all the chances we took

and

You're gonna make mistakes, you're young

express this quite clearly. The line that had initially stood out to me about The Beatles’ Here Comes the Sun starts making sense when you analyse the lyrics in this context. Even though they’re acutely aware of the challenges they may face, their outlook is positive. The George Harrison classic is capable of lifting anyone’s spirits—it’s life-affirming. Of course you’d want someone to play it for you, would you not?

Gimme Sympathy is a manifesto. It’s upbeat. It’s hopeful. It’s about looking ahead to the future without being defined by the past.