Lyrically, Strangers has always fascinated me. When I first got the Nocturnes album, I'd never been in a real relationship, and now that I've had and lost one, I still can't quite connect to it, because I'm too angry with my ex to even consider "dancing like strangers" with her if I ever bumped into her, though certainly "I knew [her] so well" and "we used to hold our bodies tight." But I love that idea of happening to cross paths with an old love, and trying to reconcile the past with the immediate present. It's a bit Before Sunset, isn't it?
But I appreciate it most for its aesthetic appeal. Something about the backing track and the vocal production has always appealed to me. It's a bit dream-pop, but the sort of dream you wake up from feeling confused, like all the elements of the dream are twisting around you, like Winnie-the-Pooh in the Heffalumps and Woozles scene, and it feels a little disconcerting even though it was sort of a nice dream. I guess that's fitting considering the lyrics. It also sounds like the last song of the night played at a mildly seedy club, as almost everyone's filtered out and you've only stayed because you've nothing else to do and don't really look forward to going home to an empty apartment. (Surprisingly, this is not an experience I've actually had ... but only because I've never gone clubbing, lolz.)
I played Nocturnes a LOT driving to and from work my senior year of undergrad, meaning that I heard a lot of it on near-empty highways after midnight (I worked the night shift), which is totally appropriate to its lyrics and its mood. Strangers is the one that always felt like it fit that time best, along with All for You, and even more than Motorway.
The first time I really paid attention to it, though, was one night when I was driving around three different parking lots looking for just one open spot, and eventually giving up and parking in the lot a half mile from my dorm, so that's the night I always associate with it! I can totally still see the dining hall and rows of cars when I close my eyes during the chorus.
I've written commentary for a few songs that are really important to me over on Popjustice. I'm going to be posting them here for posterity. This one is from just last night.
When I first saw the song title Real Girl, my mind naturally leapt to the Mutya Buena song. But the topic of this song is quite different - rather than an affirmation that “I never pretend to be someone I’m not,” it's an outcry against the Manic Pixie Dream Girl stereotype and its ilk, and a warning and plea to a partner who is unable or unwilling to acknowledge that the speaker is a real human, with all the messiness that entails. To quote Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: “I’m not a concept. I’m just a fucked-up girl who’s looking for my own peace of mind.” And that... really hit home for me, way more than Mutya’s song - which I related to enough to put in a recent selfmix.
I have talked at great length about my recent breakup from my ex-partner, and guess what motherfuckers, you’re going to hear about it some more. But I have deliberately kept very quiet on PJ up till now about another part of myself, because I’ve seen more than a biT of bigotry on here around the topic. But some people here already know it or have deduced it, and I talk about it at length on my Twitter and Tumblr and my “identities” essay linked to in my signature, so I may as well open up about it now.
I say in my signature that I’m PJ’s token lesbian, which is true. But the part of that I've never explicitly stated - though I’ve talked around it in a plug.dj session or two - is that I am, specifically, a trans woman.
I’ve been on hormone replacement therapy for about nine months now, and though I have breasts, and my legs have changed shape, I still mostly look like a boy, which is a real blow to my self-esteem, because I've always hated the way I look, and I think if I could just look more like the girl I really am, I’d be happier about it. Moreover, as a consequence of that, I still present as male at work and in most face-to-face situations (and for my classes, even though they’re online, as they're tied to my name on record). In other words, I’m treated as a boy when I’m anything but, and I’m always afraid that people who do address me as female see me as less female than a cis woman, when I’m truly as much a girl as any other. “All I really need, I wanna stop pretending ... Could you treat me like a real girl? Won’t you tell me that I'm worth more?”
That lyric goes double for my ex. By the time we got together, I'd been questioning my gender identity for a while, and at the time I identified as genderfluid: occasionally male or female, but usually agender. (Looking back, I think that was a period I had to go through to arrive at who I was meant to be.) About two months into the relationship, I realized that I was much more of a woman than a man, and I needed to chemically and socially transition. She was the first person I told, even before my family or my counselor. And for a very long time, she was my #1 supporter. She treated me like a girl even more than I did, at times catching me off guard when she casually referred to me as “she” when I was still correcting myself with my pronouns.
Then that began to unravel as I came closer and closer to my coming out on National Coming Out Day, this past October. She’s panromantic and refuses to come out of the closet (or even to open the damn door), and was terrified about being with me as a woman. And I believe that, on top of our other problems (miscommunication, differing life goals, wanting different levels of emotional intimacy, different priorities...) was what led her to leave me just over a week after I came out. Although we’d been talking about breaking up for four months at that point, it was really abrupt, just forty minutes after she’d asked if we could spend the weekend together as we often did, and with no prior warning the days leading up to it. I’d thought we were doing great and starting to overcome our problems.
So along with everything else I lost when she left me – my best friend, my “life” partner, my surrogate family, my confidante – I lost the person who had given me the most support and affirmation around my gender transition. “Could you treat me like a real girl? Isn’t that what you're here for?”
But somewhat ironically, in other ways – many of the ways the song describes – she hadn't treated me like a real girl. She admitted that part of why she'd wanted to get with me had been to prove to the world that someone could find her attractive. “I’m not a fantasy, I’m not some kind of Holy Ghost.” She had assumed that I wanted just what she wanted and thought just the way she thought, because she thought everyone did. “I didn’t promise I’d be perfect, didn't promise that I’d play the game.” She had thought we could avoid ever having a fight, because she expected the relationship to be perfect, and was totally unequipped to have to put in any work. “Were you hoping I’d be flawless? Were you wishing on a movie star?”
Now, I finally got around to listening to Working Girl two or three weeks after the breakup, as I recall. And there was Real Girl, packaging up all these troubles in one song - and it was a bauxp to boot. It was, and is, exactly the right song at the right time for me.
Purchased: Some time in 2013 from Amazon MP3, when it was on sale for $2
First Thoughts: I've always really liked this one. I had heard of Tegan and Sara before, but never heard them, not being much of a rock fan. (I still haven't managed to listen to any of their other albums. Oop.) I group it in with Ellie Goulding's Lights and Nicola Roberts' Cinderella's Eyes as slightly left-of-center, arty, but still radio-friendly pop.
Playthrough:
Closer - I believe this is their biggest hit to date? Understandably so. It is a bit of a choon, though not as high-octane as it could be. I'd like to hear an Almighty-style remix of it. (I have the limited edition, stupidly expensive 12", and all the mixes are dubstep and shit.) It's really catchy and sort of an '80s throwback, but not in the obvious way a lot of recent-ish songs are. Goodbye Goodbye - This keeps up the tempo and the mood of Closer. Even though it's a breakup song, it's quite energetic and even happy - the careless "fuck you, I'm too pretty for this" sort of breakup song, rather than a sad or angry one. I Was a Fool - Whoa, the tempo drops way down on this one. It's a beautiful song, though not one that really keeps me coming back like the first two, and badly positioned on the album since it interrupts that energy. That being said, the lyrics are heartbreaking and wonderful. I'm Not Your Hero - A very good song about keeping your expectations for someone realistic. This would have followed on marvelously from Goodbye Goodbye sound-wise. I wouldn't have chosen it as a single, but it's not bad or anything. Drove Me Wild - The closest we get to a real banger on here. It would have been a great single. I like to imagine driving down a highway on a nice sunny early-summer day listening to this with the top down or the sunroof open (regrettably, my car is not a convertible, nor does it have a sunroof) and a special someone in the passenger seat. Actually, better for them to be driving and me to be the passenger. Yeah. How Come You Don't Want Me Now - If Goodbye is the carefree breakup song and Fool is the sad one, this is the angry, sort of spiteful one. The sound stands in contrast to those lyrics, though - it's just as sing-along-able as Closer/Goodbye/Wild. Very Icona Pop, actually, only with totally different production obvi. I Couldn't Be Your Friend - One of the less memorable songs on the album. The lyrics are about a relatable (especially for me) situation, but don't quite hit home the way Fool does. Love They Say - This is kind of sad for me, because I associate it with my troubled relationship with my ex, and how in love with her I was ("The first time I saw your face, I knew that I was meant for you"). It's about that kind of relationship - challenging but still loving - and how it can still grow and flourish, and in that way it's a great counterpart to the breakup songs. Musically, it's one of my favorites. The verses are lovely, and it's impossible to not pay attention to it when that chorus comes in. Now I'm All Messed Up - This definitely sounds like the start of the coda to the album. I never really remember it past the chorus, but it's serviceable. Shock to Your System - This couldn't have served as anything but the last track on the album (at least the standard version). It's quite basic and fades into the background, as opposed to the attention-grabbing Closer/Goodbye/Wild/Say. I don't even remember anything about it beyond "you got a shock to your system" and the closing "what you are is lonely."
Final verdict: It suffers a little bit from sameyness, but it's still really enjoyable. Very much a spring or autumn album. I really hope they develop and continue to go in this direction for their next album, because if they fixed the flaws here they could give us something really incredible. Let's say 8/10.
Highlight: Closer is my real favorite, because despite being a little insubstantive, it's so easy to listen to, but since everybody knows that one: Love They Say.
I have just sat down and made a list of my favorite albums - mostly ones that I consider my favorites now, but also some old favorites that I still enjoy, and not just nostalgically. I restricted myself to one album per artist (a rule I broke for Madonna, because she's Madonna, and bent for solo acts out of a group), and didn't consider compilations. Some have some great personal meaning for me; others just have great fucking tunes.
I ended up with sixty-fucking-eight. (Could have ended up with more; that was me being strict! Left out some gems like the Princess Diaries soundtrack.)
