While there might not be a price on childhood memories with the advent of ITunes nostalgia costs $.99 to download. It was in one of those “late night/why not click” whims that I decided to purchase Colin Hay’s solo album of mostly acoustic covers of his old band, Men at Work.
Men at Work are one of those awkward bands in the history of rock; the ones that sound absolutely brilliant for a couple of months then taste like a red white wine hangover. Depending on your decade they were the Hanson or Black Eye Pea’s of their day. They were from Australia, and their lyrics had southern hemisphere coolness. In the pre-google days of the world there was no easy way to know what exactly a vegemite sandwich was without being clued in by a knowing older sibling or cousin. There was the tinge of sexuality to their words - my friends debated the subtext of “A Land Down Under.” Still it isn’t a sin to put sex into Rock and Roll; their mistake was to use an overproduced horn section that Huey Lewis + Phil Collins would use to ruin the rest of the decade.
So what I expected when I downloaded the album was a slightly overpriced smirk, the kind of laugh when you look your high school haircut and you are pleased of how much more mature you are even if you never will be hip enough to set up a myspace account. I put my headphones on and then clicked on the first tune, “Beautiful World” with cheeks fully ready to chuckle at more vegemite references.
What I got was completely unexpected. Colin Hay is actually really good. Stripped away from saxophones and down to just a guitar he is a talented lyricist. Not all groups can pull that off. Nirvana’s “a mosquito, my libido” is only a shade different than “a spider sat down beside her”. If only Humpty Dumpy had long blond hair and facial stubble we would talk about how much of an egg genius he was.
I like to think running as other sports stripped down, the acoustic set of soccer without the ball or cycling without the bike. George Plimpton’s theory of sports writing was the smaller the ball, the better of literature. And unless world class sunbathing makes the Olympics it doesn’t get much more minimal than running.
Cherish this yin. As my high school English teacher would write about my sentences – simplify, simplify, simplify. Enter the yoga mind state when you run. Work on that inner narrator. Reflect. But always check for cars.
For safety sake, we are going to start to run without IPods so the sounds of our runs will be traffic mixed with imagination. It gives you the chance to develop the mental mix tape of your life with footsteps and breath as the rhythm section and the occasional “go team” as a chorus. Take time to craft your own lyrics.
The last time I ran, I wondered about Colin Hay and how it must be to go through life overshadowed by genius of youth played too loudly. A New York Times article mentioned about how high school stars later in life stopped exercising, and what I appreciate about Colin Hay is how he avoided this fate and keeps returning to road even if they are smaller crowds. It is a marathoner’s philosophy, and one of the proudest things to take this season is the knowledge that you are out there trying as well. The daily soundtrack of our lives is neither applause nor rock, but heartbeats at a threshold.
Beautiful World Colin Hay
I like swimming in the sea
I like to go out beyond the white breakers
Where a man can still be free (or a woman if you are one)
I like swimming in the sea.
And still this emptiness persists
Perhaps this is as good as it gets
When you’ve given up the drink and those nasty cigarettes
Now I leave the party early at least with no regrets
I watch the sun as it comes up I watch it as it sets
Yeah this is as good as it gets.
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