PHOTO by DOUGLAS HARPER

A few days ago, I  revisited a dark comedy from the 80’s: ” After Hours”.  After a night gone completely wrong, the lead man is slow dancing with a sad, weary lady to the song ” Is that all there is?”

This song  has stuck in my head as an ear-worm, for several days now. It has  catchy orchestration, clever use of brass, and supreme starkness.  It was sung by Peggy Lee,but it could have been Kurt Weill/ Lotte Lenya.  It is stark, melancholic, and bereft of any hope for the future.

The depth of the emptiness is startling, and really growing on me.  I  am thinking this is potentially even more dangerous  than violent music, because of the way it eats at my mind.

Negative thoughts creep in, unannounced, and set up residency.  I need it to leave. Out, out, damned sound!

Time for the cure: “the boys of Summer” ( by the Porrka Playboys) followed by Claude Debussy’s  ” La Reviere” Herbie Hancock/Wayne Shorter’s ” Aung Sun Su Chi”, and Pharoah Sanders ” love is everywhere” .  And/ or so many others.  What music do you listen to drive away earworms?