Last year's troubles is about images of the past that weren't nice at all, but are idealised now. Will the images that are violent/troubling nowadays be idealised in the future???

I wonder if Suzanne got inspiration for the "pirate" in the song "pirates" of Ricky Lee Jones (which kind of idealises pirates). Suzanne said that she listened to that album a lot.

Spikey

the video that suzanne and tim vega produced for "last year's troubles" clears the meaning of the song a little more, in my opinion. it is not so much about idealizing a past but more about present's relativeness.

the past and all its images have received the sculpting of time and in a way acquired the same stripped down quality of a good photo, able to freeze the essential and the whole of a moment. in the present that whole escapes us because it's still being sculpted and because it defies that action by being so much faster than it ever was.

and that's what the video alludes to. we see the band playing the song, suzanne singing the song directly to the camera in various outfits and backgrounds, and images of new york city shot in high speed. the imediacy of the band playing is interspersed with the shots of suzanne - which have the transient feeling of a polaroid - and with the city's fast forward buzz.

when suzanne is singing the words there's a playfulness in her eyes especially that seems to be saying: "all comparisons are games or exercises of the mind so beware all absolute conclusions". and from this questions arise: how can we really compare past with present if we can't have any sort of perspective of the "now"? no real clue of what the essence of today is? no sufficient distance to see clearly? so any conclusion should be relative.

all we can do is guess: "measure for measure it's the same would be my guess". and that ties everything together again, past and present, around the idea of relativeness (and in the shots with the band suzanne is wearing a long sleeve shirt with an icon of the past and present, BB).

and finally just one more thing: there's an handmade quality to this video that is so telling. suzanne has described herself as "handmade", and throughout the video we can sense what she means. plus there's the eye we know to be behind the camera, tim's, and we feel how in-sync their vision is. no reason to compare this video with any other. no need, either. this is just a video of suzanne and tim's telling us about that, the limitations of comparisons. and it's so very moving.

I was pointing at what Suzanne said about the pirates here:

http://www.acousticguitar.com/issues/ag110/feature 110.html
"It’s about how you see these romantic images of pirates and stuff, and how exciting it is. But really they were just troublemakers, just nasty guys. Why are those pirates so entertaining? Are people more evil now or were they more evil then?"

I didn't mean the song in general, just the pirates. I read somewhere in an interview about that she listened to "Pirates" a lot.

Great point you make though, Fatima.

Greetz,
Spikey

i know you didn't mean the song in general, spikey, although, even if you did, the idealization idea would still apply. anyway, thanks for the quote, and i too remember suzanne referring to rickie's "pirates" as one of her favorite albums.

my post was not intended as a reply to yours, although i did start by your thought of idealizing the past as a way of keeping the thread going. i just wanted to expand on what i feel the meaning of the song is through the video. i had just seen it for the first time and liked it so much that i felt like sharing why i think it is such an interesting and touching visual approach and comment to the song.

with affection,
fatima

Hi Fatima and Spikey,

I always thought this song had a very straight forward meaning, that is exactly that of idealizing of the past. This idealization, on the other hand, is, of course, a consequence of the relativeness Fatima talks about.

Though I totally agree with Fatima's second paragragh, I think the song takes a different position, telling us that the "sculpting of time" in some cases (the troubles) makes us see things as something romantic, nice, exciting, while our present involvement in the events makes us be much more passionate about them, and in the case of troubles seeing them as something very dark without anything positive about.

For the song it doesn't seem to me a matter of being able to capture the whole, but of judging things with distance.

Making up my own example. Today everybody thinks of a historical character like Julius Caesar as a great and admirable man. What did he do to get his place in history? He subjugated his own nation destroying the last traces of the Roman republican institutions, and destroyed all the civilizations around him, killing or enslaving complete nations. What would we call today to a man like him?

Distance makes us look at things in a more condescendent way, but if we have lived on those times we would not feel them more or less romantic than what we feel our present. That's to me what Suzanne is saying in her song.

To finish, just one more thing. I think Suzanne is comparing when she sings: "measure for measure it's the same would be my guess", actually I think that what she's saying is that people usually make a wrong comparison, but if we could make an objective one (and that would be by having the chance of living in the past) we would probably see that things have always been the same, and it's only our relativeness of perspective that attributes the "romantic" character to the past.

But I haven't seen the video, and there might be much more than this...

Your friend,
José Carlos

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Ah, you replied so quickly after mine, so I did interpret it like a reply. It was very nice reading some of your thoughts again.

In Acoustic Guitar, February 2002, No. 110, Suzanne said on LYT:
"We tend to idealize the past. You see these romantic images of pirates, for example. There are still pirates today; they just don't seem the same."
This is why I said "idealizing".

I was going over the lyrics of the song "Pirates (So long lonely avenue)" and I remembered reading somewhere that Suzanne listened to that a lot in some period of time. Those lyrics reminded me of the pirate from Last year's troubles.

Here are the lyrics to that song (for people who don't know it):

---------------------------------
Pirates (so long lonely avenue)

come on - joey get out of school
we got places to go
a '67 lincoln you got a radio that hurts
and the girls like to touch it
just to find out if it works
It wasn't me
don't look at me

joey live on the edge of the corner
of living on the run
i like to ride in the middle
i'm just tryin to have some fun
until the pirates come
until the pirates come to take me

and i won't need a pilot
got a pirate who might sail
somewhere far away i heard
you answer me
so i'm holding on
to your rainbow sleeves

well, goodbye boys,
oh my buddy boys,
oh my sad-eyed sinatras
it's a cold globe around the sea
you can keep the coat that I bought ya
and i know you'll get the chance to make it
and nothin's gonna stop you
you just reach right out and take it
and you'll say - so long, lonely avenue
yeah you'll say so long lonely avenue

---------------------------------

Because of last year's troubles, I thought of the pirates.

Spikey

I hadn't read your post yet when I posted mine, JC. Nice example you make out of Julius.
The image of Julius immediately brings up an image of Cleopatra in my mind, which is far too romantic, too.

Spikey


P.S.: Answer to your e-mail is coming, JC.

hi JC,

my second paragraph was written in general terms and i never meant to imply that in the song it's a matter of being able to capture the whole. i think that what the song underlines is that it's precisely *because* of the impossiblity of grasping the elusive essence of the present that we tend to idealize the past, to make of its whole an ideal that we lack.

in the present our vision is fragmentary and documentary while our view of the past is panoramic and romantic. time does its sculpting slowly and meticulously. it is *we* who choose to compare, conclude and pass judgements, often hastily. it's true that suzanne is comparing when she sings: "measure for measure it's the same would be my guess". but her conclusion is a guess, not a certainty. actually we could look at the song as a series of comparisons with the quote above as a punchline.

i agree that what suzanne is saying in the song is that distance changes our perception. and in the video this is more emphasized because all we see are images of the present, imediate, transient, fast ones. the only images of the past are in the words suzanne sings, but she does it with a wink in her eye, as if she's telling us that all, past and present, is relative.

and so are these thoughts of mine. sometimes i'm told that i see too many things in between images, as i seem to be doing now with this video. your turn to agree or disagree when you'll have a chance to see it.

with affection,
fatima

Dear Fatima,

Once again, it seems we were saying the same. Now I must see the video to find another way of disagreeing with you

"sometimes i'm told that i see too many things in between images"

I don't think you're the only one...

José Carlos

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Hi

I think, idealizing the past is a phenomenon, caused by the way the information about the past is delivered. There were stories told by talented storytellers, nowadays there are entertaining movies, but I never idealize the past, it seems. I can feel emphatic for everyone in the past or present, it depends only on this, how many details is told in the story and of course what the story is about. Present and past are for me as if I were in a room (present) and observed the landscape through the window (past). No matter how hard I try, I can only imagine how it is outside. But it doesn't mean, that the scary landscape, with casualties in sight, can be entertaining for me and that I couldn't feel distant from something what is happening in the room.

Something can happen today or in the past (in my room or outside window), but it is enough I know that that situation doesn't have direct effect on my life, I feel that this is distance event and the emotions are different, less personal.

I have in my mid first of all all evil from the past. It seems, I don't agree with what you said about idealizing the past. Maybe I have seen not enough comedies which deal with the past....

Be well

Anna Maria K.

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"like a shadow, I am and I am not"

Hi Anna and all,

"It seems, I don't agree with what you said about idealizing the past. Maybe I have seen not enough comedies which deal with the past...."

First of all it was not me, it was Suzanne who said it though I totally agree with Suzanne here. Your point just proves that not everyone does that idealization, but I believe anyway that it's a very common tendency.

But notice we were not talking about our own personal past, but a distant one, the one from the swashbuckling blouses, Dickensien England, etc.


While reading your words I remembered the imortal words of Oscar Wilde that I should have used instead of mine They say it all...

"the one charm of the past is that it is the past"


be well,
J.C.

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dear anna,

as JC has pointed out we weren't talking about our individual past. you stretched the thread into a tangential area, the personal past, and i understand your feelings. "the one charm of the past is that it is the past". yes, only sometimes the past doesn't remain the past, it stays with us, for better or worse.

forgive me if this is too personal, but when you say you have in your mind "all evil from the past", you seem not to be looking at things with the distance you say you feel, because surely you must be excluding all good. one can't exist without the other. and you can't recognize one without the other. and this is something that's there in "last year's troubles": nothing is all good or all evil.

with love,
fatima

Hi,

Thanks for talking to me! So nice, although you criticize me. The truth is
that I was in a bad mood while writing my previous post.

Sorry for being not communicative enough. I was considering the the same past
as you, I reckon. I have in mind Inquisition, all the ignorance, poverty and
dirt when I think about Europe and it's past. I am not into history, but all
I know, made me sick. Only good I know from that past is our knowledge,
equality of rights, women rights. I know situation is not perfect, but it has been many casualties to achieve "only" this. This is painful for me. I know we enjoy looking at pyramids and I am sure any nation would build something like this nowadays with such effort, but it was paid with many tears, sweat and blood. This is painful for me! I can ask you the same about terrorism now. So situation is not perfect, not perfect. But I think many people (I guess 35 %?) live better then anywhere in the past - running water, central heating, sewage system, nice apartments, internet, up-to date information, medicine! I know, the key is money, what is awful. I know, there are developing countries, there is "strange" democracy of money, terrorism. It is still a lot to do, a lot. But it is better then ever in the past. Talking about past (not my past) I see really mainly bad things, what doesn't mean that people weren't happy those days. Enough to say - I don't want to live in any other century! Just my point of view, maybe because of my ignorance.....

On the contrary, I idealize my personal past for sure .......

Thanks!

Anna Maria K.

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"like a shadow, I am and I am not"

Dear Anna,

I couldn't agree more with what you say. Ask me in which period of world's history I would prefer to live, and I'll surely answer this one.

And I think the Oscar Wild quotation I wrote works on different levels, being this one of them.

I agree with you, it takes a lot of imagination to see the past times as better than our present. That's what the concept of "idealizing" means here. Not bacause people accept that the past was a paradise, but because despite all the things you mention people are still able to see some romanticism and glamour in it.

You can simply take Suzanne's example, and think what the word "pirate" recalls in our imagination: adventure, gallantry, etc. while we are really talking about thieves and murderers.


Your friend,
José Carlos

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dear anna,

i didn't mean to criticize you at all. please don't take what i wrote like that. it was only meant to remind you of something i was sure you knew but seemed to be forgetting. your words now are the proof and i agree with you.

i'm glad you're in a better mood and much more communicative. and thank *you*.

with love,
fatima