Surreal swirls of squids, snails, and hula girls

Posted on June 22, 2012 by Kris Nelson

Forget Inception, next time I’m in Paris, I’m reenacting Fiona’s latest video.

Quite honestly, if you’re after my heart, just throw in some Native American chants. I ❤ that raw, tribal feel on this song/album.

Although Jon Brion will be missed, I think the barebones production showcasing her vocals was long overdue.

Pure visuals aside (although I have to note the art nouveau ironwork — Kléber Métro I think — brilliantly mimics the cuttlefish-ish theme), I love how the invertabrate placed upon her head possesses a complex brain (brain highlighted in the lyrics), which the snails on her back lack. Both creatures, of course, lack a spine (think symbolism here with me). The longing to forget and forgive one’s own torturous regrets. When the head overrules the heart, and vice versa. And then boomerangs again. Because she wants to “feel everything”, the good, the bad. The hula girl (who remains “safe” on the shore), is just her own ruse-in-the-making; just all a routine poised and perched for an untouchable freedom, hence the marionette strings. Ironically (or coincidentally) filmed in Paris, the most romantic city in the world.

/psychoanalysis

Anyway, the sing along begins in 3..2..1:

Every single night I endure the flight
of little wings of white-flamed
butterflies in my brain
These ideas of mine percolate the mind
Trickle down the spine
Swarm the belly, swelling to a blaze

That’s where the pain comes in
Like a second skeleton
Trying to fit beneath the skin
I can’t fit the feelings in

Every single night’s alight
with my brain

What’d I say to her
Why’d I say it to her
What does she think of me
That I’m not what I ought to be
That I’m what I try not to be
It’s got to be somebody else’s fault
I can’t get caught

If what I am is what I am cos I does what I does
Then brother get back cos my breast’s gonna bust open
The rib is the shell and the heart is the yolk yoke and
I just made a meal for us both to choke on

Every single night’s a fight
with my brain

I just want to feel everything

So I’m gonna try to be still now
Gonna renounce the mill a little while and
if we had a double-king-sized bed
We could move in it and I’d soon forget

If what I am is what I am
cos I does what I does
and maybe I’d relax; let my breast just bust open
My heart’s made of parts of all that surround me
And that’s why the devil just can’t get around me

Every single night’s alright
Every single night’s a fight
Every single fight’s alright
with my brain

I just want to feel everything

About the Author

Kris Nelson will listen to anything once. Her favorites include Trip Hop, oldschool Jazz (Sonny Rollins), electronica (Drum n Bass, Dubstep, Glitch), Indie, Experimental, Funk, Punk, Folk, Classical (Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Chopin)… footfalls through November leaves, zipper pulls in the dryer, or ice clinking in a Summer glass… music is all around us!