Ben Folds

One of the things I really missed while I was living in South East Asia for a year was music. Sure, we had local music, but I could never understand the words, it was always played at a painful volume, and any song that was even remotely good was in constant rotation. So as soon as I got home, I had the radio playing 24/7 trying desperately to get back up to date. It didn’t take me long to stumble across Ben Folds’ new c.d. Way to Normal.

Even though it took a few listens to grow on me, it eventually revealed itself as a typical – hence good! –  Ben Folds album. Irreverant and funny lyrics made me laugh out loud, like those in Free Coffee:

When I was broke, I needed it more,
But now that I’m rich, they give me free coffee

Hiroshima (a song about Ben falling off stage during a concert in Japan) and Bitch Went Nuts (I have been told that this is his ‘divorce album’) also fall into this category. You Don’t Know Me was a real treat, as it featured Regina Spektor on backup vocals, another one of the favourite singer-songwriter-pianists.

However it was the song Cologne that really struck me – it felt like a classic ballad from the tradition of Ben Folds Five, his previous band which I began listening to when I was in high school. A lot of memories associated with Ben Folds music suddenly came out of nowhere and took me back to my past. Like when my friend came to school and told us about this great new song Battle of Who Could Care Less that she had heard from their second album. Quoting the words of Philosophy to my first boyfriend in a conversation, which sparked a 4 hour metaphysical discussion (we started going out the next day). My friends going to see a Ben Folds Five concert in Sydney (which was three hours away) and bringing me back a shirt that was too big, which I felt rubbed salt in the wound of not being able to go. Spending hours with my guitar trying to figure out how to play Brick and other songs (you can find these attempts at my first ever website, http://realityforge.net/su!) It was bizarre when I realised that I was now old enough to have had moments in my life with accompanying pieces of music – and I was still listening to it ten years later!

So I thought I’d compose a (short) list of my favourite# Ben Folds/Ben Folds Five songs.

• For when you feel like singing (or laughing) really loud: Julianne and Underground (Ben Folds Five), Song for the Dumped (Whatever and Ever Amen), Army (The Unauthorised Biography of Reinhold Messner), Hiroshima (Way to Normal)
• For when you feel like some quiet time:  Boxing (Ben Folds Five), Brick and Evaporated (Whatever and Ever Amen), Magic (The Unauthorised Biography of Reinhold Messner), Fred Jones Pt 2 (Rockin’ The Suburbs)*, Cologne  (Way To Normal)
• My favorite: Philosophy (Ben Folds Five)

# Ben Folds followers will notice I’ve left out an album here – Songs for Silverman, his second solo album. The truth is I can’t find it!!! Hopefully I will see it again one day…
* This song features John McCrea from Cake, another one of my favourite bands!

Coming up will be a review about…writing!! I just completed a five week Creative Writing Course at the Sydney Writers Centre – so stay tuned for some thoughts about that