Tindersticks...
I killed myself to this band.
They made up the soundtrack to my London, the broken hearts, the deaths and the late night emergency calls.
On vile winter evenings, it was them playing in my headphones as I rushed around pharmacies picking up clean needles. When I suffered a mild overdose it was my mother's tears dripping over the Tindersticks that I came around to.
But this post cannot be about words... at least not mine. So all I will further say is that I discovered the Tindersticks during a storm, that Stuart Staples is an absolute poet, and along with The Smiths, they have played out my days for the past 15 years.
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OK, without any more fuss, Mesdames et Messieurs, je vous donne Les Tindersticks.....
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(May take 30 seconds or so to start.)
Stuart Staples and David Boulter
Stuart Staples
Tindersticks... It was worth all the dying just to have heard them.
Links:
21 comments :
I don't think I've heard of them.
When I clicked on it went to Let's Pretend, which sounds great - very Scott Walker (who I love) in voice and tone. I also love orchestral stuff in pop - ABC's first LP being the ultimate in that respect.
Listening to Patchwork now. Great too, sort of 60s. Melancholy.
Reminds me why I'm avoiding music - if it's bad it irritates, if it's good I respond too emotionally. And I'm postponing that for the moment.
Hi Joe,
I'm just trying to fix the player or find a better one. It seems it plays randomly and if you select a song links off to the music site.
Would you believe it's taken 5hrs to make this silly little post!!! I'm going crazy here... Aarrghh!
:)
but
:(
x
It is playing randomly but that's OK.
It just clicked to My Oblivion -
How weird that I just linked to My Death...
Loving this band, I have never heard of them before, I love their sound and lyrics ..I must download some of their stuff I good music and new sounds. I have been listening to Starsailor again this weekend, I love his voice..sadly it reminds me of the time when my father was ill and it evokes such a deep pain one that I had almost forgotten. It is amazing how music can take you back to times and places like nothing else can.xx
Favourite songs?
Shane,
You introduced me to The Tindersticks (thank you!) when I heard their music on your blog. I love them, too. And the Smiths are another favorite band. I have a bunch of Morrissey t-shirts and two posters of him in my stairwell.
You have good taste, my friend. Rock on.
Love,
SB
This band has rocked my world since you posted this. Thank you.
Hiya Ruth,
Yes, the texts are great. I think Staples is one of the greatest songwriters (ever). And I know it sounds quite dreary and melancholic at first, but the more you listen, it becomes strangely uplifting. But there are some very hard songs also.
XXX
Elemental Tray,
Hiya.
My favourite songs... there's so many.
There's one song which I love called 'Her' which isn't on the playlist. Also Bathtime.
Cherry Blossoms because I have such memories of a certain time to that song and I always refer to Cherry Blossom in my writings.
You know what, they're all my favourite songs... and there's so many more I left off the playlist as I wanted to give a feel for all the different stuff they've done. I prefer their earlier albums to the later ones.
Wishes, Shane. x
Hi again Joe,
i've just been having a nose around on Scott walker. His name's always been familiar but I never really heard much from him and what I did were cover songs.
He seems to have done some interesting stuff, though. I'll see if I can pick up a CD or something later. There's a wonderful little record shop in Lyon which stocks everything.
There's some music that was playing in the background as I grew up that I cannot bear. it's a nice story actually, because my mothers room, where a lot went on, backed off onto a bar. Every evening we had the old bar songs and drunken karaoke singers drifting through the house her tragedy. I think that's maybe why I don't like Jukeboxes.
Linked to your own death? Forward it on to someone else... let them deal with it!
x
Hi Shane
I was just catching up with your posts. I know you disliked them - or hated writing them at least - but I thought that the withrdrawal diaries were incredibly strong and fascinating. One dope fiend to another, when you wrote:
"Constantly having internal dialogues with myself convincing the junkie in me that this will happen and I can do that, and if I use it like this and save on that it'll be fine - that I can afford another 5 grams. But it's all bollocks. Once you even begin to think like that it means you cannot afford it, that something or someone else is going to suffer for your excess."
...well, you might as well have been inside my head. You nailed it, better than i've ever heard it put down before. The whole thing with checking the ATM was so fucking true. I have my own little ticks which basically mean "Im getting high today" and I laughed at that because it was spot on.
Not to depress you, but even after 7 years off the needle (bar the odd little trip up here and there, but not injected) that horrible internal dialogue never really goes away. You just learn to live with it, although sometimes it still comes through dangerously loud and clear. Even if its not about smack, it just switches from substance to substance, behavior to behavior. Should I have a cocktail now, or wait until noon? What about 11.30? Thats practically noon... Then I wont have another until after two... Or when I manage to get pain pills out of my doctor for whatever ailment I can. I really do mean to make them last for a month, but theyre always gone in a week. "I'll just take them for 2 days, then have a break, then start up again" Never happens. NEVER.
I wanted to tell you that I am also a huge tindersticks fan, and saw them play in Hammersmith just before Nico was born at the "Waiting for the Moon" album had just come out. Beautiful, really, really beautiful. Made me smile to know you dig them too.
Email me if you want, and I will make you a Scott Walker compilation. I am also a big Walker fan, and would love to introduce you to his stuff as per the conversation i was earwigging in on between you and Joe.
My Paris visit has been put off until later in 2011. When I have the dates, I'll let you know and would still love to meet you away from this damn computer screen.
Be good ;) - T
'Linked to My Death' meant to the song My Death performed by Scott Walker - the blue link.(Or did you get that? - we're cross-wiring sometimes on the toneless/humorless internet).
There's an equally great version of Jacques Brel's My Death by Bowie
You should definitely get that Scott Walker compilation from Tony. In the mean time here’s one of his cheerier ones (I think he’s drunk…)
If I could BE for only an hour"
Thank you for your share your information.
mah jongg
Shane-
Glad that you're still writing. Music saves my soul every damn day. It's amazing. The Tindersticks I will always associate with you. :) Hope you're staying sane safe and sober(ish). Want all the best for you.
-Kat
Hi Tony,
I've mostly replied to this via mail, but will also give some words here (just for the history - food for the vultures after I'm dead!)
The seven year non-stop itch, I can imagine. But what I can't imagine is suffering that and not itching it. It's impressive that you manage, a wonderful gesture of love to your little girl. Lets pray she never meets anyone like us when she grows up and so never realises first hand just what a gesture it is.
Oh, we'll meet away from the computer screen... sometime/someday. As long as you promise not to be a good influence on me... deal?
OK, thanks for your words, it's always great to have you around here...
All My Thoughts, Shane.
Hi Shane
Hope you're ok.
I could also kill myself to this band.
Today even.
As long as it's painless.
xxx
Helia
It's never painless Helia... just one of those myths.
You stay well and the better, great times will come... we can chase them together. X
Funny you started on suboxone, I ending on them.
A 30 year run. One that brought me around the world, in and out of war-zones, grinning on a constant reckless but life-affirming rush. Until. Yep. Smack and until are tied together as needle and vein.
Until.
In the words of my favourite - well along with Bob, Nick and Leonard - singer: "If I could only get out of the water, if I could only get myself clean, I gotta give it up."
City sickness crept up on me.
Love left.
I stayed.
And with the true poetic justice of heroin, I ended up in the grey, dull, monotonous world of whines, moans, deceit and grievance.
The very fucking world I took heroin to get away from.
Sterile. Dull. Faux.
I despised stoned people cos I thought God cld I be as sickly, stupidly, animatedly superficial as these fucks.
But anyhow...here I go too. Getting boring about heroin.
One final comment on the shit.
There is no future in heroin.
Give me Sturt and Isabel serenading each other in marriage made in heaven.
P.S. The death threat is already there.
So Shane, keep yrself alive.
It's almost worth it.
Kevin.
So 10 years later...hope you're still around. Amazingly enough, I am. I've loved the Tindersticks forever. Funny though, I never listened to them when I was using. I didn't think I deserved that pleasure. Two years clean; I've started drawing beautiful things again, reading beautiful thoughts, listening to the beautiful noise I've missed so much. Every day is a gift and a pleasure. I hope your still here to enjoy the beauty and the pain.
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