I Wanna Be Yours

I’ve often thought that if I had ever become an English teacher it would have been interesting to analyze the lyrics of songs as class assignments. So many songs are poetry in their own right (I’m looking at you Diamonds and Rust)  but will never be recognized as such; at least not in that respected canon of what really counts.

(And whilst I don’t envision Harold Bloom-esque academics excitedly rushing home to tease out the classical allusions buried within Gangnam Time the fact remains that song lyrics often evoke a personal, singular meaning for listeners that the original writer could not possibly have imagined).

And that is, simply part of the art.

I am a big fan of the Arctic Monkeys who were in turn influenced by the eccentric Brit Punk-poet John Cooper Clarke.

One song in particular from the AM album called I Wanna Be Yours is actually based on one of Cooper Clarke’s poems.

On first listen, it’s simple, straight-up courtship stuff yet somehow extremely sincere in that basic Northern England kind of way, where historically, men have not been known for saying much more than “Alright then?” as a possible declaration of interest; of course, with lyrics like “I Wanna be your vacuum cleaner, breathing in your dust, I wanna be your Ford Cortina, I will never rust”  you may not be finding yourself especially wooed but part of vocalist Alex Turner’s (considerable) skill is that he can build on layers of emotion. By the time he’s crooning “secrets I have held in my heart are harder to hide than I thought” I not only Wanna Be His but I believe everything he says.

Another fav for me, since you ask, is Cornerstone, which chronicles trying to start over again after the devastation of a break-up and struggling not to be haunted by the lover everywhere he goes:

I thought I saw you in the ‘Rusty Hook’
Huddled up in a wicker chair
I wandered over for a closer look
And kissed whoever was sitting there

She was close, and she held me very tightly
‘Til I asked awfully politely,  Please.
Can I call you her name?

I remember walking home in the steel grey chill of many December nights after work with my headphones on, listening to this song on repeat beneath the soft warmth of my hood, feeling as though there was a single spur within my heart that I was leaning on and genuinely wondering if the sadness there would eventually destroy me.

Somehow, hearing someone else (a poet, a singer) identifying that pain so brilliantly – oooh, look there, that feeling you have, it feels like THIS doesn’t it – is so helpful to me and I sometimes seek it out addictively.

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