Apparently the American music industry holds strongly to the belief that any Valentine's Day compilation must be saturated with Elvis and Dean Martin tracks, or else it won't sell. Sadly, this makes for few options when trying to soundtrack the only holiday that more aptly divides the general population into the "haves and have-nots" than any economic policy ever could.
But as making a mix-tape is the ultimate way to say "I love you," musical compilations can be made for Valentine's Day that aren't the same old Sinatra-infused ten tracks. So if you're looking for something more artistic than a Crush can, but less fear-inducing than a singing candy-gram, try on the Arts Section's suggestions for the ultimate V-Day mix-tape, and burn a CD for yourself or that special someone in your life. You can thank us later.
- Big Star -- "September Gurls"
Back in the '70s, Big Star was the band that you put on at makeout parties when you were too white and suburban for Isaac Hayes. "September Gurls" was pretty much their only real hit, a jangly, melodic mid-tempo rocker with killer guitar riffs and infinitely hummable verses. The lyrics are bittersweet, but the vibe is cozy and affectionate. This song is the musical equivalent of every great slow-motion kiss you saw in a movie and wished you could experience in real life. I only wish one of you sweet scenester girls would put it on a mix for me.
By Brendon Bouzard, The Dartmouth Staff
- Beulah -- "If We Can Land a Man on the Moon, Surely I Can Win Your Heart"
I don't know how my crush feels about me anymore. It's a confused situation -- a common situation, I'd like to think. Alcohol can help things, so I drink a lot of that these days. I don't like to talk to her, or look at her directly, so I've been throwing a lot of parties. People help the situation. Despite it all, though, things are starting to get a little weird between us.
There's a bunch of different instruments in this song. There's a kazoo, a harpsichord, a bunch of horns, a bunch of strings, this heavy fuzzed out bass sound, and some handclaps. All in all, weird instrumentation for such a blissful, straight ahead, pop song. But post Winter Carnival, when the parties have died out, and the alcohol has dried up, I've run out of distractions. I'm pulling out the weapons: every instrument I've ever heard in service of the simple pop cause of winning your heart. And baby, I'll fight ... if you want me to fight.
By Don Stewart
- Gershwin -- "Bess, You is My Woman Now"
The version of this song I'm thinking of is obviously the Davis Porgy and Bess recording. However, one should never forget the lyrics of the song, which are lost in Davis' superlative performance. One must recall the disempowering ownership of love the song embodies. Lyrics such as "An' I ain' never goin' nowhere 'less you shares de fun" helps us understand how annoying people in love are, with their inability to be a real person by themselves (do you mind if I invite, "Mary ... No, ok, cool!"). Yes indeed "two is one now an' forever." So, tonight, when you are spending time with that special someone, think of all the friends that you've spurned. If you feel a tinge of guilt, you probably aren't actually in love. Love makes one blind to that sort of recognition.
By Brent Reidy
- Rufus Wainwright -- "Instant Pleasure"
All right, so it's not really the traditional Valentine's Day song we're all used to -- but isn't it just so, well, genuine? Yeah, sometimes we look for love, sometimes we find it, sometimes we lose it. But we've already heard all that before. This song is like that famous split-screen scene in "Annie Hall" -- when you're meeting someone for the first time, you're always saying one thing and thinking another. In an age when "want to be my pong partner?" means "want to hook up?" and "Heoret's having a pajama party" means "Get into your skimpiest sleepwear so you'll be too cold to walk back to your dorm and you'll be dressed to go to bed with me anyways," Wainwright's over-the-top ode to primal lust seems, if not romantic, at least relevant.
By Matt Hill
- Nick Drake -- "Northern Sky"
"Northern Sky" is my staple sweet-and-hopeful love song about a new love -- or the possibility of a new love. Drake's ambiguous lyrics are malleable to almost anyone's romantic situation, and as always, his music is charming, calming and melodious. But, for everyone who doesn't have a significant other or prospect (but is still longing for some sexual lovin'), Rufus Wainwright's "Instant Pleasure" says it all in the chorus (see the previous track): "I don't want somebody to love me, just give me sex whenever I want it." Sparknotes to the song: "I just want a hook up, dammit!" It's the anthem for those who are hopelessly single, impatient and/or just plain horny -- no shame attached!
By Meredith Fraser
- Jens Lekman -- "A Higher Power"
Stumbling out of bed on Feb. 13, an epiphany strikes my tired mind while pondering my valentine. She's taught me love can come from anywhere, including Sweden, and through many mediums, like suffocation, religion and Nietzsche. But, the most important thing today is the way you make me believe there is something wonderful in the world, maybe beyond us, but I can't wait till you get back from the shower to share it, like everything, with you.
By Andy Sandoval
- Bright Eyes -- "Lover I Don't Have to Love"
While our not-so-single friends are all rushing out to buy "Crush Cans" and Convo Hearts, we indifferent have-no-Valentines should turn to Bright Eyes for a little inspiration. This is the anthem for those who are too heartless and badass to buy into all of this chocolate-covered doily crap. So as your roommate politely asks you to get out so she can set up her romantic, candle-lit non-DDS dinner, calmly remind her of the Fire Code, roll your eyes and sigh because it would really suck to have a lover that you'd have to love.
By Alice Mathias
- The Magnetic Fields -- "Papa Was a Rodeo"
Why do the most promising romances always seem to blossom right before you're set to leave town? That's the situation faced by the narrator, who confesses to his lover, Mike, that he'll be leaving the next morning and won't be back for a year. He explains that he's a child of life on the road: "Papa was a rodeo, Mama was a rock 'n' roll band / I could play guitar and rope a steer before I learned to stand." Long-term romance seems impossible with a guy who "never stuck around long enough for a one-night stand."
What makes the song great, aside from Stephin Merritt's deadpan baritone, is the fact that this sad, slow country number turns out to be a love song, not a heartbreaker. As hopeless as the couple's future seemed at first, it has a happy ending. It turns out that the two were made for each other: Mike's "papa was a rodeo, too."
By Carl Burnett, The Dartmouth Senior Staff
- Talking Heads -- "This Must Be the Place (Nave Melody)"
This is as quirkily-sweet a love song as you'll ever find. Over a bouncy little keyboard line and a steady beat, frontman David Byrne sings with an endearing awkwardness that's a departure from the sinister awkwardness of better-known and decidedly less-sunny Heads fare like "Psycho Killer" and "Life During Wartime." But what's truly remarkable about this track is that after thousands of years and billions of "heart/apart" couplets, Byrne found a new way to sing about love. Lyrics like "you got a face with a view" and "sing into my mouth" instead of "you're beautiful" and "kiss me" are what make this song a truly original way to say what might be the ultimate clich -- "I love you."
By Lindsay Barnes, The Dartmouth Senior Staff
- Damien Rice -- "Cheers Darlin"
Hate Valentine's Day as much as I do? Make sure this song finds its way onto your mix. Damien Rice is as morose and self-loathing as ever, brooding over another missed opportunity while drowning his melancholy the good old fashioned way: with lots and lots of liquor. Rice takes the three-beat signature of a waltz and slows it down to a somber, drunken elegy. The clinking of wine glasses and the ambient chatter around him provide a perfectly depressing atmosphere for his self-pitying toast: "Cheers darlin, here's to you and your loverboy." This is the ultimate anti-Valentine's Day song for the perpetually single, lonely, depressed and bitter. I think this song rules.
By Chris Mah
- Rodgers and Hart -- "Manhattan."
I'd include any semi-peppy recording of Rodgers and Hart's song "Manhattan" on a Valentine's Day mix. It describes a tempting regimen for two, including bathing at Brighton and eating baloney at Coney. There are numerous advantages to the song. For one thing, it's generic; it doesn't set any unrealistic expectations for the object of your affection. The lyrics are clever, if clever is what you want.
"The city's clamor can never spoil / the dreams of a boy and girl." (It rhymes if you use your New York accent.) "We'll have Manhattan, / the Bronx and Staten / Island, too" -- very Attila the Hun. "And tell me what street / compares with Mott Street / in July?" The answer is none. Certainly not Wheelock in February. All in all, if you pine for New York -- the idea, unsullied by all that "Taxi Driver" alienation -- and the concept of offering the whole city to your "valentine" as a playground, then listen to this song.
By Nick Desai
- Wilco / Woodie Guthrie -- "Remember The Mountain Bed"
"Mermaid Avenue Vol. 2" is often forgot by many in favor of the first, and slightly superior, "Mermaid Avenue" volume. But buried in the middle of the album is this little gem that was, not coincidentally, introduced to me on a mix-tape from a significant other. Like any great Guthrie song, it's not a straight-up love-song, and is pervaded by socially-conscious undertones, but mostly it beautifully conveys the admiration between two lovers without ever becoming syrupy or stifling. The simple sincerity with which Jeff Tweedy sings lyrics like, "Your shape and form is dim but plain, there on our mountain bed / I see my life was brightest where you laughed and laid your head" is perfectly complemented with Jay Bennett's lyrical arrangement.
I don't know what it is, but lines like, "Trees held us in on all four sides so thick we could not see / I could not see any wrong in you, and you saw none in me" make me smile whether it's Valentine's Day or not.
