1. aardvarchaeology
  2. All Her Favourite Fruit

All Her Favourite Fruit

By aardvarchaeology on February 16, 2008.

i-f44b4b391646cb9984ccc39c3a1a755c-Persimmon.Photo.jpg

Here's a particularly fine song lyric from Californian 80s indie band Camper Van Beethoven, off of their 1989 disc Key Lime Pie. The song is a folky number in march time with violin, and David Lowery's singing is exquisitely pained and raw. Following this, they released no new material until 2004.

All Her Favorite Fruit

By David Lowery

I drive alone, home from work
And I always think of her
Well late at night I call her
But I never say a word

And I can see her squeeze the phone
between her chin and shoulder
And I can almost smell her breath
faint with a sweet scent of decay

She serves him mashed potatoes
And she serves him peppered steak, with corn
Pulls her dress up over her head
Lets it fall to the floor

And does she ever whisper in his ear
all her favorite fruit?
And all the most exotic
places they are cultivated?

And I'd like to take her there,
rather than this train
And if I were a civil servant,
I'd have a place in the colonies

We'd play croquet behind white-washed walls
and drink our tea at four
Within interventions
distance of the embassy

The midday air grows thicker with the heat
And drifts towards the line of trees
Where negroes blink their eyes,
they sink into siesta

And we are rotting like a fruit
underneath a rusting roof
We dream our dreams
and sing our songs of love, fecundity

Of life and love
Of life and love
Of life and love

Update 25 April '08: I really like the way he reverses "sweet with a faint scent" and gets "her breath, faint with a sweet scent of decay".

[More blog entries about , , ; , , .]

Tags
Poetry

More like this

Lucifer Over London
Dear Reader, have you lately heard much merry folk rock with apocalyptic lyrics about the coming of the Antichrist over London? My dear friend Asko is, among other things, a war gamer, a geocacher, an antiquarian amateur, a fiction writer and a musician. Hear him play the bass on releases by 90s…
Swedish Ethno Groove
I'm a big fan of Swedish-Finnish ethno band Hedningarna ("the Pagans"). Centred around three musicians working with a series of very fine singers, the band released five albums from 1989 to 1999. Their method was to go for the most primitive acoustic instruments known to Swedish ethnic music and…
La Vice Anglais
When I was twelve I bought my first LP, a synth-pop creation by a British band popular with middle-class teens at the time. Here are snippets of Martin Gore's lyrics to two of the songs. You're feeling the boredom too I'd gladly go with you I'd put your leather boots on I'd put your pretty dress…
The Songs We Know Best
Behold her, single in the field, Yon solitary Highland Lass! Reaping and singing by herself; Stop here, or gently pass! Alone she cuts and binds the grain, And sings a melancholy strain; O listen! for the Vale profound Is overflowing with the sound. No Nightingale did ever chaunt More welcome notes…

While Camper released no new material 89-2004, each individual band member did. David Lowry with Cracker, Jonathan Segel solo and with Hieronymous Firebrain, Victor Krummenacher solo and with Monks of Doom. All worth checking out, as is David Immergluck's pre-Camper work with The Ophelias. It's a very prolific band family tree.

I was a huge CVB fan in high school and was fortunate to see them a few times in concert. The Monks of Doom was by far the greatest product to spin out of CVB - much more so than Cracker in my opinion. Listening to CVB in "New Roman Times" is like getting re-acquainted with an old friend, only to find that thankfully they haven't changed a bit.

"And does she ever whisper in his ear
all her favorite fruit?
And all the most exotic
places they are cultivated?

And I'd like to take her there,
rather than this train"

Embarrassingly, the above lyrical image has consistently made me well up in tears since the first time I heard the line years ago.

The whole song has such a romantic, bittersweet ache, but this line (the narrator imagining his lover's [obligatory?] intimacies with her husband) just strikes a chord with me.

It is a good song! Though harassing her every night on the phone is pretty nasty. And I wonder how he gets from his car (verse 1) to a train (verse 5).