I Can't Make You Love Me by Bonnie Raitt - 020
I Can't Make You Love Me by Bonnie Raitt - 020
in the shadow of the ending, we see the whole story
What is up everyone! Happy Friday!
Welcome Back to the Music Appreciation Club!
The only club that not only sends you a song straight to your e-mail every week, but now (probably) the only club that has also made a Spotify playlist to keep track of all these songs. Have a peak at the playlist in the NEXT WEEK section!
HOWEVER, this week, we have an emotional song. I think this song tells a story in an interesting way. The point of view is unique. Most love songs or heartbreak songs happen in a sort of past tense. They happen in response toward something. This song does that, but with a slight twist, it tells a story as it is unwinding. Have a listen-
The SONG:
The LYRICS:
How it Relates to STORY - Endings:
All stories have a beginning, a middle, and an end.
Think what you might to think out of this one, but it’s pretty solid and hard to refute. If any of those are without the other, more likely than not, that’s not a story, but instead a “moment” or a “scene.” Stories are a succession of these moments and scenes and represent causality and consequence. Things happen which caused other things to happen. However, just because something is a scene or a moment, doesn’t mean that it can’t infer a story. That is, sometimes we can get a piece or a glimpse and based on that, even though we don’t experience it, we can sort of feel the rest of the story.
Keeping that in mind, this song is a snapshot of a particular story right as it is ending. This is a love story. Or I should say, this was a love story.
The song’s lyrics take place as the singer is in her final embrace of her lover as she comes to terms with the fact that what they had is now over. This song doesn’t take place during the falling out, nor does it take place after the fact, it is happening while their love is ending. This is the love-apocalypse in real time.
What makes this really powerful is that the whole time, the singer is lucid and self aware that this love is ending. Her word choice is subtle, yet heartbreaking.
I'll close my eyes // Then I won't see // The love you don't feel when you're holding me
She is directly saying that she doesn’t want to acknowledge this fact that she already knows, this fact of her lover not feeling anything when he’s with her. This isn’t the part of grief that is in denial, or anger, or bargaining, in fact, it’s not even sadness. This is already at acceptance. It’s important to note that although sadness is being conveyed, these words that are spoken aren’t necessarily sad ones. She’s not lamenting a loss, she is saying she doesn’t want to observe it. This is different than denial. True denial would give hints or tinges of non-truths. Her words would reflect an obscured version of reality in which there may still be some hope. Here, it’s the opposite. It’s unpleasant but sobering.
Last WORDS:
Where this is all really cool is that by capturing this scene of this love-star dying, the audience/listener is able to infer within their own minds, how awesome this thing was when it was originally burning with life. A negative space sort of thing. We only get a peak at this particular relationship coming to a close, but we are allowed to wonder why this person has such a hard time letting go. And based on that, we get a glimpse of the beginning and the middle casted as a shadow of the end.
Really profound use of the what isn’t there. The song effectively lets the listener think about the beginning and the middle, while only really giving the end.
That’s cool.
Music is incredible in that it allows for a highly efficient and relatively quick transfer of information. And the information that it delivers is really complex. Things like emotion, love, relationship, heartbreak, those are all really big things that typically one needs to experience first to understand. Despite this fact, this song can give a hint and taste to all of these things in under five minutes.
Again, that’s cool.
Thank you to Bonnie Ratt for the music and the vulnerability expressed in this song!
Thank you to AF for the song recommendation!
NEXT Week:
I’d like to thank everyone for reading and submitting songs and keeping this project floating and flying. Every song that we’ve listened to so far has been a necessary link in the chain all the way here. This playlist is for anyone that wants to look back on the songs that have been done.
In the spirit of changing things up every 7 weeks, the Season 3 Finale is right around the corner. Week 21 is knocking . . . . What song is behind that door?
Maybe I already put it on the playlist . . .
Until Next Week,
MYKAAAAAA
BONUSES:
Alright! Two Bonuses.
The first bonus is a song that energetically feels like a relative to Bonnie Ratt’s song. One More Time is one of my all time favorite songs. To me, it’s representative of passion, bliss, ignorance, and a little bit of denial. There is a certain magic that exists on a dance floor or a party. It’s a space where everyone is having a great time seemingly ignorant of the stresses of the world. Nothing last forever, but in the moment, you think to yourself, maybe we can do it one more time. Maybe, we can listen to one more song . . . to the Hawaii peeps out there, you know the feeling, it’s HANA HOUUUUU.
The second bonus is an easter egg of a sort. So! The singer of that was sampled in One More Time did an unplugged/non-dancey version of the song. It’s more blues/R&B sounding. While One More Time normally is this blissful song that wants to keep the party going . . . this song is sort of like Bonnie Ratt’s. It’s more yearning. It’s understanding that things are coming to an end, but still asks for sake of it, please, one more time?
It’s really neat how all three of these songs can be observed as things that are in observation and conversation with the other. In many ways, they’re like three different angles all focussing on the same thing.