Now and Then.

Who the...?

Harendra Kapur.
Kyra Mathews.
Tejas Menon.



I have mentioned before that I can't sing to save my life. This isn't entirely true. I can't sing like Tejas can, or like Harry can. I can't sing like Norah Jones or KT Tunstall. I can't sing for other people, I can't sing to play the fool into karaoke machines. But I can sing, when I really really need to, when it seems like the right thing to do, and when my voice chooses to ignore my brain telling it that it's a terrible voice and not to humiliate me.

Carly Simon and Dusty Springfield have/had voices and wrote music that most current female artists can only dream of having/writing. When they sing, the emotion and the rawness, blares through and heals wounds, and you know, that if you have emotion and rawness, and wounds that need to be healed, then you can sing too. These women are/were brave, are/were independent, are/were magic from the moment they opened their mouths. Their music is/was the kind of music that you can imagine old men sitting on park benches and nodding their heads wisely over, saying "They dont make voices like that anymore" And they don't. They really don't make voices like that anymore.

For the past month, I have let Carly and Dusty save my soul. Imitating Brittany Murphy in "Little Black Book", I lie on my bathroom floor and belt out Carly Simon. Im alone at home, and I sound good, because Im singing my soul out, letting the wounds heal. In my room, at night, I snuggle up to the words of Dusty, crooning her words softly to myself. I lie spreadeagled on an empty beach and sing about clouds in my coffee and the son of a preacherman, while watching the clouds above me rearrange themselves and float away, leaving me cleansed and clear.

I am now wishin' and hopin'. I have fewer clouds in my coffee. I look forward to the look of love. I have no secrets. I can tell myself that I haven't got time for the pain. I close my eyes and count to ten. And, I am anticipating, that little by little, I'll know just what to do with myself.

So, thank you, Carly & Dusty, Simon & Springfield. For giving me the strength to sing, and for letting me know that my soul is worthwhile enough to be saved by both of you.

"You know when you take the paint off an old canvas and you discover that something's been painted underneath it? That's what I feel like - that part of the old is coming through the new" - Carly Simon
"I just decided I wanted to become someone else... So I became someone else" - Dusty Springfied

9 responses to "Clouds in my Coffee: How Carly & Dusty Saved My Soul"

  1. Naice. I've only ever heard a bunch of songs by Dusty Springfield. And only ONE song by Carly Simon, the one that you suggested to me. But I likes them muchly, and agrees that there is some strange satisfaction in belting them out on the top of your lungs.

    Mehvash

  2. To Simon & Springfield and forever music like theirs.
    Very nice post!

    Laralils

  3. Mehvs: You disgrace of a singerface. Only ONE carly song, you has heard, and that too, because I suggested?! How about, "You're so Vain" That is a legend of a song! Shame on you. Now listen to MORE. This is the woman who inspired ME of all people to sing, you must want to listen to more of her. Plizz.

    Laralils: Thanks yous muchly =D And I both second and third that, "To Simon & Springfield!"

    Kyra

  4. Well, waddaya know? I HAVE heard "You're so vain"! I just never knew who it was by. I is very much so sorry. Plizz to be forgiving me.

    Mehvash

  5. What rubbish.
    Not the post, that was good, i totally get it. Michael buble more or less taught me how to sing.
    But rubbish about you not being able to sing, you sing fine, Kyra, I KNOW. we totally harmonised in Jaipur. you remember...follow me?
    I have spoken.

    Tejas

  6. Dusty Springfield wrote her own songs?
    Love her voice, but did she write her own songs?..news to me...
    as for Carly Simon well--of course she wrote most of the songs she sings.
    If you only know one of her songs..get up, get out and get with a legend in her own time. Carly's entire catalogue is amazing.

    B_4

  7. Mehvs: Forgiveness will become once you listen to MORE Carly. And more Dusty also.

    Tejas: That was a fluke! It happened once! Whenever I tried singing after that, I ended up making you sigh and cringe and whatnot. There is recorded footage of this! I managed to drain you out, you with the infinite patience of a turtleface.

    B_4: You're right about Carly's catalogue. It is amazing. And that is one freakishly hard voice to imitate.

    Kyra

  8. harry cannot sing too

    anish

  9. Hahahahahhaha!
    Harry is a tryer though, and thats important and will always give his best, so respekt for that, I mean he is the lead singer of The Civil Cats!

    Tejas

The All of us.

The All of us.