16. The Sundays - Here's Where the Story Ends
For #16 I originally planned to use The Smiths' Last Night I Dreamt that Somebody Loved Me. Can you imagine how fucking depressing that read would have been. It would have been apt though. I did spend half the time in my 2nd year at university wallowing in the most irritatingly, mawkish and egocentric self-pity, a state of mind that only Morrisey could have sound-tracked. And having resisted Bern's evangelism over The Smiths for several years, I was now ready to be won over.
But when I wasn't disappearing up my own arsehole in order to fetch the nails that I required to metaphorically crucify my tortured soul upon the cross of maudlin introspection, I was actually really rather enjoying that time.
Therefore, a song which reminds me more of those moderately shit-stained halcyon days was The Sundays' Here's Where the Story Ends. In fact the whole album. Another recommendation from - and another gig with - Bern. The Sundays' guitarist had clearly borrowed not a little from Johnny Marr, meaning that they were sometimes over-simplistically referred to as a female fronted spawn of The Smiths. Harriet Wheeler had a face, a voice and a charmingly whimsical way with words that meant you instantly fell in love with her. Her lyrics spoke of the sort of things that students would want their girlfriends to talk about, with self-effacing sparkle as she sat in a baggy jumper in a dim pub as she nursed a pint of bitter and pulled funny faces:
Oh, you see me in a cardigan
In a dress, dress, dress that I've been sick on
Live for a job and a perfect behind...
England my country, the home of the free
Such miserable weather
Where's the harm in voicing a doubt
You'll find me in the lavatory
My finest hour that I've ever known
Was finding a pound on the underground
I lived out in the 2nd year, in a house with Phil, Ziggy and Long Hair (Simon). We painted the interior with gloomy colours and had beer cans for ornaments. There was tension over Ziggy's phobia of putting his hands in warm water and therefore never washing up (not sure how he coped in the bath.) I chose the smallest room, attracted by the idea of being cocooned and also the fact that it had a sink. It was formerly the bathroom, before the landlord built an extension downstairs and turned it into a 4th bedroom to make more money, but not bothering to change the carpet as there was still a bit cut out of it in the shape of the bottom of a toilet. Given the long walk to the new toilet, I found that my sink came in handy on a cold or drunken night. OK, that was rare, I'm not a complete pig. It proved more useful to get sick in, especially after a Mushroom Double Swiss burger from Mr Tasty, which had mushrooms in, and which I must have swallowed whole, given that they blocked the plug after I threw it all up. We had a lot of 12 hour drinking sessions. Our local pub, The Granby Tavern, opened all day (unusual at the time) and hosted a happy hour at about 5pm (five hours after we'd started drinking). And we bunked lectures in order to watch Neighbours and Going for Gold.
So, yes, I like to remember what was good about that year in 81 Donnington Road, a year of Smiths and Sundays, burgers and beers, friendships forged that would last for life (with Phil, not just a future best man, but just one of life's BEST men) and friendships strained (with Ziggy, with whom we eventually fell out, due to behaviour that was even more bizarre than the hot water phobia nonsense and sadly also unstable, violent and irrational). And a year of lying in my cocoon, either reading classic literature (a recent discovery and distraction from my course) or with the record or CD player filling the tiny room with new albums by Dylan and Kate Bush and new bands like The House of Love and The Sundays. And that's where that story ends.
But when I wasn't disappearing up my own arsehole in order to fetch the nails that I required to metaphorically crucify my tortured soul upon the cross of maudlin introspection, I was actually really rather enjoying that time.
Therefore, a song which reminds me more of those moderately shit-stained halcyon days was The Sundays' Here's Where the Story Ends. In fact the whole album. Another recommendation from - and another gig with - Bern. The Sundays' guitarist had clearly borrowed not a little from Johnny Marr, meaning that they were sometimes over-simplistically referred to as a female fronted spawn of The Smiths. Harriet Wheeler had a face, a voice and a charmingly whimsical way with words that meant you instantly fell in love with her. Her lyrics spoke of the sort of things that students would want their girlfriends to talk about, with self-effacing sparkle as she sat in a baggy jumper in a dim pub as she nursed a pint of bitter and pulled funny faces:
Oh, you see me in a cardigan
In a dress, dress, dress that I've been sick on
Live for a job and a perfect behind...
England my country, the home of the free
Such miserable weather
Where's the harm in voicing a doubt
You'll find me in the lavatory
My finest hour that I've ever known
Was finding a pound on the underground
I lived out in the 2nd year, in a house with Phil, Ziggy and Long Hair (Simon). We painted the interior with gloomy colours and had beer cans for ornaments. There was tension over Ziggy's phobia of putting his hands in warm water and therefore never washing up (not sure how he coped in the bath.) I chose the smallest room, attracted by the idea of being cocooned and also the fact that it had a sink. It was formerly the bathroom, before the landlord built an extension downstairs and turned it into a 4th bedroom to make more money, but not bothering to change the carpet as there was still a bit cut out of it in the shape of the bottom of a toilet. Given the long walk to the new toilet, I found that my sink came in handy on a cold or drunken night. OK, that was rare, I'm not a complete pig. It proved more useful to get sick in, especially after a Mushroom Double Swiss burger from Mr Tasty, which had mushrooms in, and which I must have swallowed whole, given that they blocked the plug after I threw it all up. We had a lot of 12 hour drinking sessions. Our local pub, The Granby Tavern, opened all day (unusual at the time) and hosted a happy hour at about 5pm (five hours after we'd started drinking). And we bunked lectures in order to watch Neighbours and Going for Gold.
So, yes, I like to remember what was good about that year in 81 Donnington Road, a year of Smiths and Sundays, burgers and beers, friendships forged that would last for life (with Phil, not just a future best man, but just one of life's BEST men) and friendships strained (with Ziggy, with whom we eventually fell out, due to behaviour that was even more bizarre than the hot water phobia nonsense and sadly also unstable, violent and irrational). And a year of lying in my cocoon, either reading classic literature (a recent discovery and distraction from my course) or with the record or CD player filling the tiny room with new albums by Dylan and Kate Bush and new bands like The House of Love and The Sundays. And that's where that story ends.
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