I've had this song stuck in my head for months. It has such and ethereal, sultry sexiness to it. A sense of placation and worship by the singer towards what I perceive as her muse. There's a steady tempo of sublime, steadfast hopelessness, the chord progression in Bb with a quaint happy-sad violin juxtaposed against the steady movement of the guitar and nothing else. Stripped down to the bone with a bit of bass fiddle thrown into the mix.
I have always loved the Die Hard series of movies, in particular the third one and in particular the terrorist who is the love interest of Jeremy Irons. Her plain, fit and Nordic look and propensity to get aroused at the hint of violence.
Also I have always loved T Bone Burnett's work in so many spaces and genres. A month ago at the Elvis Costello concert, seated next to him I was thrilled to just be in his presence. Adoring Roy Orbison's "Black and White Night" of which he produced as well as "August and Everything After", "O Brother Where Art Thou", "Raising Sand", "Walk The Line" and a plethora of Elvis Costello and Sam Philips albums he is a legend in the music industry while at the same time being anonymous.
So tonight when I sat down to play this song on the guitar and eventually deciding to write about this song I was amazed that Sam Philips was the female terrorist in Die Hard with a Vengeance. Being entranced (and admittedly turned on) by both the movie and this song...I don't know, it validated my opinions of what I am attracted to in women. Couple that with her landing such a mate as T Bone and what we have is a terribly talented women that makes me unhappy to know that she is taken.
I have heard this song prostituted itself in the show Gilmore Girls however I remember it mostly from the wonderful movie, my favorite movie of the past decade Crazy Heart. I saw it on a date with a particularly fascinating Lebanese woman who didn't drink and hence the movie date. She was a wonderful person, shy in a sense and cute in every sense of the word, a person who broke me out of my malaise in a way as while she encompassed much of which I desire, lived a life much different than my own, I don't think I ever even went on a movie date in high school. We sat in the theatre in SoHo on a frightfully cold night entranced with the film and walked almost all the way uptown, freezing and holding each other as per her suggestion as I would almost certainly have taken a car.
She took me to a church in midtown which had a southern Gospel feel to it with preachers and singing, a meeting at the Waldorf Towers with a man who was part of the Lebanese Civil War, him telling stories about smuggling arms in and out of the country for the Christian fighters. Her stories of Catholic boarding school in Cyprus, her knowledge of the blues and wonderful music, how she used to speak to me in French and I would half ass my way some type of reply...
So I think of her a bit when I listen to this song and how someone who was very suited for me just didn't work, how when we decided not to see each other and just be friends at Mon Petit Cafe on 62nd and Lexington how hard it was for me to bring up the subject that is just wasn't working out. But I also think of someone else who is out there in waiting who encompasses so many of those good qualities I enjoy along with the extra few that could make it really work, leading to nights and encounters such as those from the scene in Crazy Heart of which this song is used.
As a word it is used too frequently but this song is truly beautiful in its composition, its lyrics and the feel that it delivers. I'm going to go back to playing it a few times over before I retire and dream about that mystical person I have in my mind and have been waiting for.
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