Tsundoku (積ん読) is the phenomenon of acquiring reading materials but letting them pile up in one's home without reading them.
I have wanted to make more themed mixes lately, and inspired by the great topics by Pol Inate over at What's The Connection blog I came up with this mix of songs about reading. It was quite challenging and rewarding as I only had a couple in mind to start with. I began with The Sundays and their iconic line "the books that you read were all I loved you for," and then immediately jumped to Big Thief saying, "I see you as you see yourself through all the books you read." Then I started thinking through the many other releases I have and started finding a lot on the theme of reading books.
The Talking Heads so poetically stated, "The book I read was in your eyes." Magnetic Fields with their quirky charm stated very accurately, "The book of love is long and boring. No one can lift the damn thing." Always easily recognizable, Belle & Sebastian are relatable with, "Our aspirations are wrapped up in books." Nick Cave gives a good history lesson, "John Wilmot penned his poetry Riddled with the pox. Nabokov wrote on index cards, At a lectern, in his socks. St. John of the Cross did his best stuff Imprisoned in a box. And Johnny Thunders was half alive When he wrote Chinese Rocks." I could've chosen any of a dozen songs from him.
Ian waxes poetic with "I've seen it in your eyes, I've read it in books. Who wants love Without the looks?" Bob Mould gets nostalgic through his track, which gets more and more relatable with each passing verse. Then we have Los Campesinos with one of the best track titles. Her Space Holiday makes you wonder what people remember of you, did you impact someone so much that they think of you when reading books or listening to music? Caamp reminds us that, "we're just books upon a shelf." Emily Haines (a new one for me while compiling this mix) sparks the imagination by telling us about "All of your lives unled, reading in bed." Camera Obscura touches on something very important (as a father of two daughters) in their "Books written for girls."
I went way back for this Fairpoint Convention Song, and I love the lyrics about wondering what's on someone's mind when they leave a book to be with someone nearby. The Teardrop Explodes coming in strong with a cover of the Echo & Bunnymen track I had also included. They're distinct enough in sound that I didn't notice this one was a cover - I left them both in because they're both wonderful versions of this track. Then XTC closing out my thought stream here with a very poignant reminder that, "Books are burning in the still air, And you know where they burn books, people are next."
After all this, its a good reminder to update my Good Reads app and knock off more of my book challenge for this year. 5 down, 18 to go!
00:00 The Sundays - Here's Where The Story Ends
03:45 Broadcast - The Book Lovers
07:10 Talking Heads - The Book I Read
11:10 Big Thief - Vampire Empire
14:08 Magnetic Fields - The Book of Love
16:48 Belle and Sebastian - Wrapped Up in Books
20:13 Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - There She Goes, My Beautiful World
25:27 Echo and The Bunnymen - Read It In Books
28:20 Bob Mould - Compositions for the Young and Old
32:45 Los Campesinos - We Are All Accelerated Readers
35:24 Her Space Holiday - The Ringing in My Ears
40:09 Caamp - Books
43:59 Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton - Reading in Bed
46:40 Camera Obscura - Books Written for Girls
51:41 Fairpoint Convention - Book Song
54:44 The Teardrop Explodes - Books
57:19 XTC - Books are Burning (live)
61:42 Reading Rainbow Theme Song
photo credit: found image
This must have been a harder one to do. Big fan of several of these bands and I probably would have chickened out and just gotten all songs with Book in the title. Anything with Echo and the Bunnymen in it is great. Some cool sounding other bands that I hadn't heard before. Have you heard the Jimmy Fallon version of Reading Rainbow? Would go well here.
ReplyDeleteYep, took a while to come up with all of these, and yes I did default to many just because of the word Book in the song title. I've not heard that Jimmy Fallon version, but I can imagine it is quite good - I'll check it out later tonight.
DeleteYou have posted some deep and thought-provoking themes lately! My brain immediately went to Elvis Costello's "Everyday I Write The Book" and "Chapter Twelve" by The Embarrassment (a band from the 80's who were recently the subject of a documentary called "We Were Famous, You Don't Remember").
ReplyDeleteI was on the fence with that Elvis Costello track. I should've included it honestly. And The Embarrassment are a new one for me, I'll have to seek them out, thanks for the recommendation.
DeleteEC may have been too obvious. The Embos (as their fans call them) also have a song called "Hip And Well Read", which you can listen to here:
Deletehttps://almostreadyrecords.bandcamp.com/album/death-travels-west
Thank you again, I'm enjoying that album and will certainly check out more from the Embos. I don't shy away from the obvious either, I mean, I included that Talking Heads track early in the mix as its a little too spot on for my theme.
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