high fidelity

when i saw the movie, i was so taken by john cusack's character. the obsessive tape making, the effort to get it just right. i remember making those tapes when i was a teenager... it was such a fine art. or so i thought at the time.

first there would be a list: all the songs that came into my head, that conveyed the mood i was trying to get at, that i wanted to share with whoever i might be sharing the tape with. then came the shuffle: play the song list in my head, imagine the breaks between and the effect of one ending leading into the opening chords of the next track, rearranging accordingly. then finetuning: where on the tape was the sideflip going to occur? was that appropriate? would it work there? rearrange again, accordingly. then the final pass - last chance to change a certain song. remember, this is going to be permanent. this is going to *say* something about you. and finally, the naming. what to call this mix? and the sides? will side A and side B suffice, or does it need something more clever, something more personal? and the finishing touches - the case. get the right pen - something that won't smudge. all caps or all lower case? definitely not cursive, but should there be two colours of ink? so much work went into those old tapes, so much of self, so many attempts at becoming a self.

a few years ago, when i replaced the last tape deck in my life with a cd player, i got rid of all those old tapes. i still think of them sometimes, though. and miss them.


Mixed Tapes

They almost ask for musical backing, some feelings,
or even to be sung, but since life (you know this)
isn't opera, and your all-too-spoken arias
are prey to mundane upstaging, missteps
of the tongue, you pick tracks of singers scattered
in time, and temper -- yet bound by the way
they overheard your heart, and pinched
its unformed lines -- and you record them
in skewed new orders:
.......................Nick Drake opening for Nina Simone,
John Prine in bed with Edith Piaf,
and later, languid and alone, tragic smoker
under a Gatsby-green light, on a summertime pier....
No, you choose the name.

You know how clichés, the same
you'd never leave in a poem, that would shame you
breathed into a mouthpiece, are disguised
somehow -- or are they renewed, justified
by the right tune? Still missing you.
Keep kissing you.
Maybe that's what a tune is for. Maybe
it's why you burn mixed disks, make tapes
in hi-fi, normal bias - 60 to 90 minutes
is best; no rushed declarations of love.
You'll sit up with a bottle of something red,
a tape deck, and this clichéd, constant
aching, to reclaim lines you mean so deeply
they must be your own.


With this kiss my life begins.


You're not alone, anymore.

-- Steven Heighton, from The Address Book


Nick Drake - From the Morning