The Chime of Silver

There's no easy way to get through a breakup, but every cloud has its lining. The silver lining of breakups is that they make music sound fantastic.

Did you leave those mopey, angst-ridden bands of your youth behind? Does that magnum opus no longer sparkle with the immediacy you remember? I'm here to tell you to take them for another spin in the midst of a breakup.

Talk about power. It's like there's a twisted monster crawling through those once-too-familiar chords making them seethe with new and dangerous life.

And if, after awhile, the music recedes into normality as you slip into the comfort of denial, just think about the person you've lost and all the things you'll miss about them and how you'll never have them again until your eyes begin to prick with tears.

The music will perk right back up. It will sing to you symphonies of life and love and pain. It will tell you stories of anguish like caverns and thorn bushes, of loss like the ocean and you, the boat on its storm-harried surface, flying through space with the deftness of the waves that chase you. And when those waves catch you, as they inevitably and repeatedly will, it will feel so good and right and the sky will open up and every star will burn so brightly that heaven will buzz with electricity and sparkle like the sea.

While a good sad-song mix cd has its charms, there's nothing like a depressing or just thoroughly perturbed album to set a mood and carry you through it in beauty. Here is the list of albums that have done right by me:

Radiohead - OK Computer and The Bends
Radiohead - Kid A and Amnesiac
The Beta Band - The Three EP's
Sparklehorse - Good Morning Spider
REM - Automatic for the People
Wire - Chairs Missing
His Name is Alive - Mouth By Mouth
Big Star - Third/Sister Lovers
Catherine Wheel - Ferment
Lady Gaga - The Fame Monster
The Smashing Pumpkins - Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
Weezer - Pinkerton
The Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers
-round 2-
John Lennon - Plastic Ono Band
Old 97's - Too Far to Care
Sunny Day Real Estate - The Rising Tide
Finn - s/t
Emmylou Harris - Wrecking Ball

Ever since the breakup I've had an appreciation for love songs that I've never really had, happy and sad ones both. I've long been a fan of songs about "new love", but the ones about old love finally speak to me. Also, I think I've been paying more attention to lyrics.