Call me crazy and maybe shun me until my taste returns, but I’m not hating Peter Bjorn and John’s ‘Lay it Down’. It might have something to do with the fact that I’m sitting on my couch in mismatched knee high socks and a tartan mini, and I expect the hangover is adding to the decision. But there’s something about this song that’s really getting to me.
Maybe it’s the fuzziness of the bass that’s calling to my hung-over and TV melted brain, certainly it’s got me reminiscing my high school days, the badly tuned speakers blasting out static music as we drive around pitch black street on a Wednesday night. It kind of makes your eyes go out of focus if you listen to it too closely, like the fuzz has actually entered your brain and switched all the wires, but in a good way.
Then there are the vocals, what’s not to love about the minimalistic approach to harmony, sung by a guy who sounds like he’s suffering from his own hang-over, or maybe just can’t be fucked getting into it. You know, when you’re slouched on the couch finishing up watching an all day Simpson’s marathon and it’s like, well I could get off my ass, go outside and salvage some of today, or I could watch the next show that comes on. What’s that? Tune in for three episodes of King of the Hill? Sure why not.
And that’s all the better when it comes to the lyrics, because if the band had actually any desire to put a lot of effort into the whole song, it could have turned out very in your face, but they’re slackers so its cool. I have to admit the first four lines of the song got stuck in my head pretty quick, not surprising since they’re basically the entire song, but I wasn’t angry, I was singing along. “Hey, shut the fuck up boy, you are starting to piss me off, take your hands off that girl, you’ve already had enough.”
And that’s what I think is so cool about this song, it’s actually impossible to get worked up about it in any way. You’re not jumping for joy every time it plays, but you’re not ranting either. Because it’s basically the musical equivalent of a Sunday afternoon. There’s no energy, no effort and no caring either way. Sure we could have made it all crisp, and the vocalist could have got off his ass and maybe drank a few V’s prior, but why bother? This song is the ultimate boredom song, designed to feed off your apathy as you recover from a night out binge drinking; not that we’re supposed to do that anymore.
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