TOUCH ME, I'M SICK: THE 52 CREEPIEST LOVE SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD
Review by Andrew Blackie, PopMatters.com
August 2008
Have you ever asked yourself, is all good music depressing or unflinchingly honest (that is, depressing)? Have you ever actively pursued music that you know will lower your mood? And if listening didn’t satisfy your masochism, ever wanted to read a book about depressing music?
Apparently there is an audience for such morbid contemplation, as Tom Reynolds’ first book,I HATE MYSELF AND WANT TO DIE: THE 52 CREEPIEST LOVE SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD became something of a cult success. To be fair: why wouldn’t his glorified list in pocket-size format be a hit? He hates the Doors’ augmented 9th chords! Christmas songs by Christian Contemporary bands suck! The Smashing Pumpkins’ singer has an unusually nasal voice!
This is why those songs are depressing! Reynolds’ prose was lightly-handled, humorous, and made a topic that could have been poorly-handled enough to compound the oppressive nature of the original material actually fun to associate yourself with.
And that’s the point: anyone can write a book full of depressing music. The love song is a more sensitive issue. Exactly what kind of sentiment, for example, crosses the fine line between romantic and slightly crazed; at what stage is it appropriate to start gushing lines from a smitten Shakespeare sonnet to a partner? Tom Reynolds addresses this more challenging question in TOUCH ME, I'M SICK: THE 52 CREEPIEST SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD, the follow-up to I HATE MYSELF AND WANT TO DIE. His casual justification arrives in the former book’s introduction: “It seemed like the perfect follow-up, a volume about obsession to complement one about depression.”
A collection of songs in the height of ecstasy might have been a better counter to a countdown of suicidal intent, but who wants to read about shiny happy people holding hands, anyway? Continuing in his introduction to TOUCH ME, I'M SICK, the author portrays himself as lone soldier in his devoted quest to find obsessive stalker anthems. People were only too happy to help him locate the downers for his first novel, he bemoans, yet they run for the hills as soon as he looks for a creepy love song outside of “Every Breath You Take”? Reynolds wants the unnerving, gregarious, and perverse; the ephemeral, conditional, narcissistic, and ‘whacked’ musical gestures of our iPod generation.
Inside these pages, he writes as duplicit personalities, as a rock historian, as a spectator to a sexual act between a lesbian couple (to the music of Melissa Ferrick’s “Drive”), as an exasperated man on the receiving end of a CHAI (Chicks Holding Acoustic Instruments) rant, as a ‘Beatles expert’ investigating the murderously bitter “Run For Your Life” and, when the occasion calls for it, as the artist themselves. (Author’s note: Reynolds doing Fergie is hilarious)
Which is why Reynolds is as qualified as anyone else to be writing on the creepy love song.
His everyman analysis, dripping sarcastic sense of humour and readiness to throw personal experiences into his writing makes TOUCH ME, I'M SICK an easy, enjoyable, immersing read. My copy alone has convinced four others to get one since I bought it at Christmas (and I’m still counting).
TOUCH ME, I'M SICK: THE 52 CREEPIEST LOVE SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD begs you not to take it seriously, and is just too exuberant and light-hearted not to be enjoyed. Besides, as is the glory of the mixtape, it’s a great way to discover new music.
Review by Andrew Blackie, PopMatters.com
August 2008
Have you ever asked yourself, is all good music depressing or unflinchingly honest (that is, depressing)? Have you ever actively pursued music that you know will lower your mood? And if listening didn’t satisfy your masochism, ever wanted to read a book about depressing music?
Apparently there is an audience for such morbid contemplation, as Tom Reynolds’ first book,I HATE MYSELF AND WANT TO DIE: THE 52 CREEPIEST LOVE SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD became something of a cult success. To be fair: why wouldn’t his glorified list in pocket-size format be a hit? He hates the Doors’ augmented 9th chords! Christmas songs by Christian Contemporary bands suck! The Smashing Pumpkins’ singer has an unusually nasal voice!
This is why those songs are depressing! Reynolds’ prose was lightly-handled, humorous, and made a topic that could have been poorly-handled enough to compound the oppressive nature of the original material actually fun to associate yourself with.
And that’s the point: anyone can write a book full of depressing music. The love song is a more sensitive issue. Exactly what kind of sentiment, for example, crosses the fine line between romantic and slightly crazed; at what stage is it appropriate to start gushing lines from a smitten Shakespeare sonnet to a partner? Tom Reynolds addresses this more challenging question in TOUCH ME, I'M SICK: THE 52 CREEPIEST SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD, the follow-up to I HATE MYSELF AND WANT TO DIE. His casual justification arrives in the former book’s introduction: “It seemed like the perfect follow-up, a volume about obsession to complement one about depression.”
A collection of songs in the height of ecstasy might have been a better counter to a countdown of suicidal intent, but who wants to read about shiny happy people holding hands, anyway? Continuing in his introduction to TOUCH ME, I'M SICK, the author portrays himself as lone soldier in his devoted quest to find obsessive stalker anthems. People were only too happy to help him locate the downers for his first novel, he bemoans, yet they run for the hills as soon as he looks for a creepy love song outside of “Every Breath You Take”? Reynolds wants the unnerving, gregarious, and perverse; the ephemeral, conditional, narcissistic, and ‘whacked’ musical gestures of our iPod generation.
Inside these pages, he writes as duplicit personalities, as a rock historian, as a spectator to a sexual act between a lesbian couple (to the music of Melissa Ferrick’s “Drive”), as an exasperated man on the receiving end of a CHAI (Chicks Holding Acoustic Instruments) rant, as a ‘Beatles expert’ investigating the murderously bitter “Run For Your Life” and, when the occasion calls for it, as the artist themselves. (Author’s note: Reynolds doing Fergie is hilarious)
Which is why Reynolds is as qualified as anyone else to be writing on the creepy love song.
His everyman analysis, dripping sarcastic sense of humour and readiness to throw personal experiences into his writing makes TOUCH ME, I'M SICK an easy, enjoyable, immersing read. My copy alone has convinced four others to get one since I bought it at Christmas (and I’m still counting).
TOUCH ME, I'M SICK: THE 52 CREEPIEST LOVE SONGS YOU'VE EVER HEARD begs you not to take it seriously, and is just too exuberant and light-hearted not to be enjoyed. Besides, as is the glory of the mixtape, it’s a great way to discover new music.
