Same wheel, new angle.

You know that list of seven women I’d happily shag, the one that has Pink?  It has a new addition.  Even better, a new number one.  I am officially head over heels in love with, and in lust for, this woman...

(I don't know how to stop this from playing automatically, dammit! You might want to press pause, or turn down the volume...)

It’s not often I stumble across new music that takes my breath away.  More often than not, when I discover something 'new' I find out it’s actually old, sometimes even older than I am (stop sniggering), and worse still, the old is almost always better than the new.  That makes me sound like a geriatric music snob, no?  I’m not...well, not entirely, I am geriatric (really, stop sniggering), but I’m definitely not a snob.  I am truly open to the idea that someone somewhere will one day wake up and figure out how to reinvent the wheel.  Only, as with all things wheel reinvention, that’s damn near impossible to achieve.  These days what tends to happen is someone comes along and reveals a previously unseen angle to said wheel; a close up of a worn tread, or a microscopic look at the molecules of rubber.  Same wheel, new angle.  That’s what today’s artist did.  She’s allegedly a soul artist, but a quick listen to her second album proves she’s much more.  She’s closer to the eclectic purple end of the spectrum, which is to say I can’t quite figure out where to place her in the grand scheme of things.  And I love her all the more for it.

The video up top, the one I know you haven’t played, is a live performance of her cover of Cee Lo Green’s ’Fool For You’.  That’s the first time I saw/heard her and let me tell you, I was flabbergasted.  Yes, she gasted my flabber.  I was sitting there mid morning, in my pyjamas, drinking masala tea and scrolling though headlines on my phone, generally paying no attention to the show playing in the background on TV.  Then she started singing and my world came to an abrupt halt.  See, I had never heard the song before, original or cover, which as is turns out is quite shameful considering the original won Mr Green two Grammy’s in 2012.  I know, I claim to know these things, but I don’t, not really (in my defence, I was on a Grammy boycott that year after they denied my man Raheem in 2011, but that story has already been told, I shall not detour).  This was one of those instances when my ignorance was bliss, and oh what bliss it was...

Sweet sugar, I surrender, I don’t want no other man,

Baby, you win,

And you ain’t never got to worry, ever got to worry,

You’ll never be alone again,
There’s nothing, there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do,
Girl, that’s somebody there, everybody know who I’m talking to,

I’m a fool, such a fool for you...

I know the lyrics aren’t hers, but she sings this the way Cee Lo, quite frankly, never can (his version is in the soundtrack thingi).  Hell, if I didn’t know better I’d be convinced she’s Kenyan, the way she’s grabbed the song from the man, complete with genuine fake title and ef’thing.  Seriously though, this performance is everything a classic performance should be, tight as fuck with a climax that leaves you drained.  Ahem.  It is therefore inevitable she ended up on this page, and at the top of my list, displacing Ms Tina.  Don’t look at me like that, yes, I would shag Tina Turner.  Have you not seen her legs?  And her glorious lion mane of a wig?  Haven’t you heard her sexy, sexy growl of a voice?  Come now, of course she was at the top of the list, she sniffs haughtily, offended that you have the audacity to question her dubious fantasy shag choices.  Again, ahem.

You know how I said I wouldn’t detour?  I lied.  All that was one long detour.  Apologies, but I needed to introduce my Alice to you before I could proceed with the tale I came to tell you.  This post began life with (what I not so humbly consider) the best song on the album 'She', 'Another Love', a most addictive 80’s pop sounding track that, on first listen, crawled into my that corner of my brain reserved for important information and refused to leave.  I admit I got derailed by the fool song, but only because I was avoiding my tale. Stop feigning surprise, I do this deflecting thing all the time, no?

The last three or so months I’ve been dealing with love and loss, and loneliness, a fair bit of which is not mine.  I’m not sure if it’s the season (winter/cold, discontent, all that jazz), or that I’m attracting like minded individuals by virtue of the constantly melancholic vibes I’m sending out into the universe, but I seem to be having this conversation more often than usual.  Lovers leaving and leaving lovers, lovers who won’t come back and going back to lovers, lovers we want to replace and irreplaceable lovers...

You said I was what you wanted, liar, liar,
You never wanted me that way,

If you don’t like it right here, why would you stay here?
Just to be taken all I did, babe, everything...

The end of a relationship is never an easy thing to talk about. In between apportioning blame for failure, real or perceived, and pretending that everything is fine only to slip and fall flat on your face again, then waking up and pretending even worse, all this in the middle of the never ending analysis in your head, seems putting coherent thoughts together is an almost impossible task.  How do you talk about someone you never had leaving you without sounding like an insane would be stalker?  How do you mourn the end of a relationship you’re secretly glad is over?  How do fill the gap he left in your already too empty life?  How do find your way back to that woman you lost and hope to find again?  How do you get past betrayal and repair a relationship that may just irreparable?  How do you finally let go and start over?

I tried to be what you wanted, but I’m tired, I’m tired,
I don’t really need you anyway.

There’s nothing here to fight for, baby, be on your way,
You can’t be taking what I give, babe, all I give...

I don’t know what it is I may have said on these pages that gives the impression I have the answers to these questions.  Reading through old posts I’ve done on break ups, make ups and everything in between, I think it’s safe to say I do not have this shit figured out.  At all.  It’s okay, you can laugh at me, I just had a wee chuckle myself.  My lovelies, if ever there was a person not to talk to about relationships, it’s me.  Then again, the fact that I know how fucked up I am may be why I am the right person to talk to, no?  No, dammit.  Either way, I’m always happy to listen to someone else’s tale, figuring perhaps their tale may have the answers to my own.  My tale right now is not so much loss as it is inevitability, I’m having one of those irritating 'stranded in some vague limbo of neither here nor there' moments, reluctant to go back, but scared to move forward.  I can’t really explain it better right now, I’ve been trying to put it in words for months with absolutely no success.  Short of drawing you a picture, literally...she throws her hands up in defeat (that bit is not literal, obviously). 

Transition.  That’s the word.

If you don’t like it, baby
Find another love, another love
You don’t have the right to take it
I’ll find another, another, another, another...

To anyone out here who’s currently dealing with loss, of any kind, take comfort in the knowledge that there are quite a few of us dealing with it too, and just as horribly as you are.  I know that’s cold comfort, but you need to take what you can get, my friend, and all you’ll get here is vague affirmations and useless clichés, such as I tend to spew when lost for words.  Some relationships end, some don’t.  Some can be repaired, some can’t.  Sometimes they come back, sometimes they don’t.  Sometimes you move on to bigger and better things, sometimes you end up with another idiot.  Such is life, unfortunately.

If you don’t want me, baby
I’ll find another, another, another love
You don’t have the right to break me
I’ll find another, another, another love
You don’t have to stay

You don’t have to stay...

On the up side, and there is always an up side here at Kai Ni Kii?, I have a new woman, Alice.  Alice Smith.