I think the most overlooked part of any song is the completely agnostic silence before the song happens. That full silence, those few moments after the laser or needle hits substance, but before a single sound is made, forces us to sit with our highly developed expectations as listeners (since even the most provincial of us (i.e. me) have heard countless hours of music spanning centuries of history). Like fighters at the beginning of a match, we nervously wonder what kind of (in this case aural) punch is about to hit our ears. That silence can be broken in many ways, of course, from a gentle musical build-up, instrument by instrument, to an immediate blast of sound, and the way it's broken can be awful (surprising in a bad way), completely average (which is to say, expected), or amazing, if it's, like all good art, both appropriate and surprising.
Which is all to say that I don't think "Ellen and Ben" could begin better than it does, in our tired age of history, than with a rather sheepish synthesized trill that bursts into a too-shrill attempt at joyful transcendence. It creates a humbleness and irony that is extraordinarily attractive as a song beginning. The irony, which is at first purely musical, gets even more tasty when you hear the first lyrics and find out that this is a straightforward narrative song; the friction between the technological, grandiose posturing of the synthesizer and the simplicity and off-handedness of the lyrics is fucking fun, and essentially drives the song. (If the lyrics were paired with, say, a standard guitar strum, the song would be completely limp, and lack the extra level of meaning that this one has.) We find out it's a narrative in the very first lines, when Travis Morrison introduces his characters about as simply as possible:
"Ellen and Ben
They met at someone's housewarming party
They didn't like each other at first."
It sounds like a typical short story opening. But songs (at least contemporary ones) don't often start this way; they're more given to declarations or abstractions, or, even if they're trying to tell a story, in-media-res-ish stuff. The frank simplicity of the opening lyrics is arresting and, well, cute. What's additionally arresting is that the song dives into first-person narration with the next line, "I was still there"; rather than an omniscient narrator (as we have in, say, Stephen Malkmus' eerily similar narrative song "Jenny and the Ess-Dog"), we have a personally involved narrator, a Nick Carraway from The Great Gatsby. Which brings the song even more down to earth; this is not an artist with invented characters, the song convinces us, but a friend shooting the shit with us. (In the middle of the song, by saying "They'd show up at shows," and thereby suggesting the narrator is in a band, Morrison goes further and blurs the line between his narrator and himself, making you think it's actually Travis talking to you about his personal life. Which it may actually be, I guess, but that's not the point.)
The story itself is lovely in its specificity, and its inconsequence. It's a kind of satire of epic love stories like Romeo and Juliet; at the same time, in its unromantic sloppiness, it resonates more with everyone's messy, real-life experiences than a classic love story could. Two people don't really like each other, then suddenly can't take their hands off each other (in a way that seems "rude" to the narrator), and fall into love so deeply that they completely disappear from the social scene (in a way that seems "cheap" to the narrator), then summarily break up. That arc has a humor and poignancy to it, even without the musical accompaniment. Some highlights include "A sunny Sunday watching John McLaughlin" and "I had stopped by / cause Ellen had my copy of Nebraska" (glorious in their specificity). And
When Ellen got home she made a snack
and went up on her rooftop
and didn't think about Ben at all
She stayed up for hours just watching all the drunk folks find their taxis
cause all in all it was a good night
is a great picture of someone standing unknowing (as we all do) before an event that will remake her entire life (and interestingly complicates our initial perception that this is not an omniscient narrator--how does he know what Ellen is doing when he's not there?). The way the double pulse of the synthesizer and Morrison's voice crescendos at "good night" suggests that despite the tranquility and faint sense of happiness in the scene, there's something more to this story that hasn't yet been articulated. During each verse, much the same drama between the music and the lyrics unfolds, as the singer, synthesizer, and drums fluctuate in urgency from mellow to earth-shaking, while all the while the actual lyrics (and the plodding bass) are relatively flat and conversational. This is a fucking odd song, we're thinking. What's the big deal about this story?
We get our first inkling in the bridge:
"When I was ten I had this book of modern fighter planes with F15s and MiGs
And headed for a brighter future with...(I can't quite understand these lyrics)...the Ocean City girls on the boardwalk"
Whatever the exact lyrics, this complete, mumbly, and somewhat shocking digression tells us that something is on the narrator's mind other than Ellen and Ben; he is by no means a disinterested storyteller. We don't know exactly what, but given the reminiscent tone, it might have something to do with the narrator (with and through Ellen and Ben) sensing the difference between the bright magicality of beginning something (whether it's life or a relationship) and how things turn out, when the humdrum everydayness of life kicks in.
In fact, the story is more about Ellen and Ben before and after their relationship than anything else. What's interesting to the narrator in this song is people either on the cusp of a life-changing experience or floating off emptily after that experience is over, not the experience itself. And that's interesting to me too, so I suppose that's one of the reasons I love "Ellen and Ben".
When I return, I'll deal with the brilliant ending of this song, which deserves, and will get, its own post.
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