Don't Play That Song For Me!

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A question for married people and others in long term relationships.

Has the way you have listened to love songs changed since you stopped being single? If you are/were a romantic who got carried away with the sentiments expressed in love songs, that is. I mean it's fine to go on identifying with songs that are straightforwardly about being in love with someone, but most love songs aren't like that. They're specifically about young, single (in the old-fashioned 'unmarried' sense) people longing for love, about new lovers, unrequited loves, heartbreak, and coping or not coping with lost love.

Do you continue listening but in a more detached way? Or do you still get carried away and feel guilty or confused about the strength of the emotional pull? Is romantic escapism harmless or a sign that one is dissatisfied with one's situation? What does your partner think about it all?

Or do you just listen to electroclash these days?

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

You know, my current girlfriend is the first I've had with whom I don't have an "our song." I have this weird feeling that's a good thing -- we don't have any drama or wistfulness to put to music and didn't have to overcome any hurdles except my really not wanting to move out of New Orleans ever ever.

Anyway, what made me think of that: I don't think I listen to any songs differently except the ones I specifically associate with exes (anything by Marillion, Bowie's "Absolute Beginners" which would have played at my wedding, and Springsteen's "Atlantic City.") But I listen to lyrics only slightly more than Ned does.

― Tep (ktepi), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 15:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Moderators: please change the title of this thread so that it doesn't remind me of a shitty Police song.

― NA (Nick A.), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 15:43 (twenty-two years ago)

Have changed it to a more accurate transcription of the song it's from.

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 16:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Spared

i've been
spared

all the nickling
all the diming

Spared

i've been spared

all the powder
on a trumpet
of Gabriel

Don't play
that song
for me

you won't
play that
song for
me

The riff
with the
swaddling
hair

Those sisters
who never
broke
us

The link
missing
at the
rear

and the
halo
halo of locust

Mama danced
four feet
away
Papa danced
four feet
away

in the rubbing
and fusing
the sealing
and pivoting

gotta dance
four feet
away

Spared

i've been
spared

All the handles
a body
could handle

Spared

I've been
spared

All the powder
on a Magdalene
Mary

Don't play
that song
for me

you won't
play that
song for
me

Those threads
you would
never wear

The sobbing
that just
might choke
us

Those tooth
fairies
wait till
they get
here

and the
halo
halo of locust

I love this season
without its cleft

left hook to
the right foot
right cross
to the left

I love this season
this very night

right cross to
the left foot
left hook to
the right

Mama danced
four feet
away
Papa danced
four feet
away

in the rubbing
and fusing
the sealing
and pivoting

gotta dance
four feet
away

― RJG (RJG), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 16:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Do you continue listening but in a more detached way? Or do you still get carried away and feel guilty or confused about the strength of the emotional pull?

It's strange, I'll listen to a lot of the more heartbreaking love songs now and almost feel nostalgic for when I used to feel that way and almost wish I felt that way again. Then I realize how miserable I was then and feel silly.

― Larcole (Nicole), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 17:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I still get carried away by love songs. Just as great to me married as they were when I was single. Perhaps better now.

― Chris V. (Chris V), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 17:14 (twenty-two years ago)

But who do you think of as the object of the songs when you get carried away?

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 17:44 (twenty-two years ago)

[I'm not trying to lure you into saying 'that cute girl down the grocery store']

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 17:50 (twenty-two years ago)

heh. she worked at the snack bar at the law library, and i'd see her at hockey games & anime shows all the time:

(I'm in love with the girl who works at the store
where I'm nothing but a ...)
Customer
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
How about cigarettes?
I'll take sugarless
You sell waterbeds?
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
Yeah, can I get change?
Where're the twinkies?
What's on sale?
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
I'm a customer
I love you

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 17:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Vintage deep soul heartbreak songs have always been about my favourite music. Thing is, it was my ex-wife's too, and I did her a bunch of tapes and stuff that she really loved. So I'm always reminded of her whenever I hear, in particular, For Your Precious Love. Maybe especially the magnificent Linda Jones version. For a while after we split there were a few songs that I could hardly bear to hear, but there are none like that now.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 19:17 (twenty-two years ago)

I think I like love songs more now that I understand love more.

― teeny (teeny), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 19:22 (twenty-two years ago)

I think I basically listen to love songs the same way, except I have noticed this unsatisfied element in a lot of them. It's the same with romantic movies. I often get a hankering to watch a romantic film, but they are almost always about finding a new relationship. Usually, the film ends with a marriage or a kiss marking a union, as if the story ends there. I wish there were more movies about people already in good relationships, but I guess there wouldn't be much to resolve there.

― Sarah McLusky (coco), Tuesday, 26 August 2003 19:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Teeny, how come?

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 11:00 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't mean to say that when I was young I didn't understand love or feel it deeply, there's just certain aspects of love that you understand better when you get older, or at least have more experience. (Maybe also I am less misanthropic as a whole nowadays.)

Love songs for me aren't romantic escapism...there is something very painful and raw about the pure love emotion, and it can be difficult to confront. When I'm by myself on a road trip, I nearly always end up crying to something on the radio.

I don't even know how to talk about this without bringing up a particular example: late 90s, the b/f and I are going through some rough times and break up but remain friends. I spend a lot of time listening to I Am Shelby Lynne and Car Wheels on a Gravel Road. Lucinda's Metal Firecracker really gets me. This line: "All I ask / Don't tell anybody the secrets / Don't tell anybody the secrets / I told you."

I don't know, I guess it helped me realize that even though I was having problems with a relationship, I was still deeply in love and couldn't imagine sharing so much as I already had with my boy with anyone else. At the time I didn't know that we would get back together, so I identified with the loss in that song, but the intensity of the love also reverberated with me.

There is a whole host of potentially embarassing songs which absolutely move me to tears because they capture the depth of a love that I'm lucky enough to know.

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 13:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Aw. :-)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:12 (twenty-two years ago)

me and my fiance's fav song was always "in time" by robbie rob, you might know it from bill and teds excellant adventure. any way, last year, my fiance was decapitated in an auto accident, but listening to that song still brings a smile to my face and a tear to my eye.

― ryan t hoffman, Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:26 (twenty-two years ago)

I know what Larcole means.

I think the difference now is that I only enjoy GOOD love songs, whereas when I was in all kinds of angsty unrequited shit/new flush of romance I would well up and moan 'ohhhhh that's so TRUUUUE boohoo' at any old bollocks.

Matt and I tend to have various songs de jour that we sing and giggle at/dance to together, rather than one 'our song'. But if we did have, I'd say it was Heaven of my Heart, which I still intend to be the first dance at our wedding :)

― Archel (Archel), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:36 (twenty-two years ago)

You know, one of the reasons why the girlfriend and I don't have an "our song," or any songs that have special meaning for us, is probably cause the overlap of our musical tastes is stuff like Tool and Radio Iodine. I don't want to be That Couple who, in forty years, gets all misty-eyed when "Stinkfist" comes on the radio.

― Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:41 (twenty-two years ago)

but then again, bill and ted is my fav movie, i'm still listening to stuff like bon jovi, and def leppard's my fav band of all time, so i'm told my opinion on anything is void and invalid.

― ryan t hoffman, Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Well sometimes certain songs makes me think of past loves and some songs make me think of my wife.

― Chris V. (Chris V), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 14:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Good try Ryan, but that ain't going to work...

― Mark C (Mark C), Wednesday, 27 August 2003 15:01 (twenty-two years ago)

ain't going to work, mark? what are ya talkin about?

― ryan t hoffman, Wednesday, 27 August 2003 15:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Teeny, I think you must listen to more mature love songs than me.

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 29 August 2003 10:31 (twenty-two years ago)

i thought the title of this thread was referring to that awful 70s song, "Please Mr Please":

Please Mr. Please
Don't play B-17
That was my song that was his song
but it's over

Please Mr. Please
if you know what I mean
I don't ever want to hear that song again

― Orbit (Orbit), Friday, 29 August 2003 14:53 (twenty-two years ago)

It's an Aretha Franklin song.

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 29 August 2003 23:15 (twenty-two years ago)

not scott walker?

― RJG (RJG), Friday, 29 August 2003 23:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't know.

― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 29 August 2003 23:37 (twenty-two years ago)

It's not an Aretha song.
It was a hit for Olivia Newton John!

― Orbit (Orbit), Saturday, 30 August 2003 00:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Sorry - I made a mistake. It's actually a Mariah Carey song.

― N. (nickdastoor), Saturday, 30 August 2003 09:14 (twenty-two years ago)

It's a Gareth Gates song.

Don't play that s-s-s-s......oh go ahead.

― Ally C (Ally C), Saturday, 30 August 2003 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

s-s-s-single bed?

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Saturday, 30 August 2003 11:27 (twenty-two years ago)

No do play that one.

This is why I gave up 1nd13 obviously. Except I was going out with the same person all the time I listened to it, so that's a lie.

I can still get choked up by some love songs, just not so much all the unrequited ones, or if I do it's because I'm feeling sorry for the singer, not feeling identified or envious or anything like that. Songs about long-term relationships, or getting through difficulties, feel pretty 'real' to me - "Always On My Mind" had me sighing the other day.

― Tom (Groke), Saturday, 30 August 2003 21:35 (twenty-two years ago)

'Always On My Mind' is the long-term relationship song. Though cynical me sometimes wonders if it also the song of choice for wife beaters.

― N. (nickdastoor), Saturday, 30 August 2003 21:46 (twenty-two years ago)

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