Noget nyt

And now I have this nice new thing...

Something New has always been one of my favorite Oliver North Boy Choir songs, if not my very favorite. Why? I think it was the line ‘I hope I dream of you’ and the longing of it -- yet something about the delivery reassured me, told me it was all going to be okay.

There was always something optimistic -- it’s a sad song, but I never particularly thought of it as such. While I’ve listened to the words dozens, probably hundreds, of times, I’ve never thought of them as being upset or desperate; ONBC’s Something New strikes me as more of a paean to a perhaps errant lover; a song written not in doubt or desperation, but more of a happy reminisce. Yes, there’s longing, but it’s a longing for something that she knows will soon come to be. He’ll call her in the morning, the sentimentalist in me always thought. If he’s not there already.

And now there’s this cover, by Swedish soloist Bakers at Dawn. I didn’t like it when I listened to it first, because it destroyed the little safety net of 'oh, it's only temporarily delayed gratification' I’d allowed ONBC to build for me. I felt let down, not only by a less-than-stellar version of a song I loved, but because this new version very bluntly announced -- hey, everything you thought would be okay? It’s not.

ONBC sound hopeful, whereas the Bakers at Dawn version, on the other hand, sounds more like a suicide note, a last-ditch effort from a rejected, dejected lover. This guy has hit bottom. He knows she’s never going to call him again. The song is a wish, a dream, a hope, yes -- but he’s come to accept that it’s not coming true.

Lately, just as it’s starting to finally get sunny in Portland, people have been talking a lot about listening to the rain. I can picture staring out the window of a darkened room into a rainy night with Bakers at Dawn’s Something New in the background. But, paradoxically, it’s also Bakers’ almost-dead version, rather than ONBC’s more optimistic one, that I picture the knock on the door coming to.

I like this song more every time I hear it.

Listen for yourself -- I’m allowed to offer you a download of the Bakers at Dawn version, and you can preview ONBC’s at last.fm. Both songs will also be played (in full) on the radio show this afternoon.

--DL--
Something New (Bakers at Dawn)