Sunday, September 21, 2025
all i remember is sitting beside you
all i remember is sitting beside you
I flew the red eye to Toronto last month, so I didn't bring my Switch with me. I figured I'd be trying to sleep on the plane on the way there, so it meant I'd be toting a console around for days just for the 5-hour ride back home. But I did want something other than my phone or watching a movie on the tiny seat back screen for the return flight, so I finally picked up a copy of Hanif Abdurraqib's There's Always This Year at a little bookstore on Queen West. I read it a bit when I was waiting to meet friends at various times over the weekend and got through a chunk on the plane, but I finally finished it this week.
On it's surface, it's a book about basketball, but it's really a book about love. And not just love of the game or romantic love, but love in all its forms.
There are so many beautiful moments amongst the 300-odd pages, but near the end, there's a section on game 7s that made me think of all the Canucks game 7s I've witnessed. There are, of course, the two where they lost the Cup. And there was that one where Matt Cooke tied it shorthanded with 5.7 seconds left, just so the Canucks could lose minutes into the overtime.
But the one that's always front and centre is that Burrows overtime goal against Chicago.
Maybe most sports fans feel this way, but being a Canucks fan, it always feels like this team finds a way to let you down. It sure seemed like they were going to find a way to do it again in the 1st round of 2011 after blowing a 3-1 lead in the series and a 1-0 lead in the game. And then it happened. 5-minutes and 22-seconds into overtime: Burrows slays the dragon.
I know the details of the game now, because I've read about it in the years since. And I know the call, but I couldn't tell you if I would've remembered it, had it not been for the fact that I've watched the video about a thousand times. I don't really remember much else about the actual game.
But I remember the feeling. I almost typed "of elation," but it was really a feeling of relief first. For a moment, it felt like all those years of failure were lifted off of Vancouver's collective shoulders.
The other thing I remember is that it was standing room only at my friend Nathan's place, so I was in the kitchen of his tiny Commercial Drive apartment watching the TV from across the counter next to someone I was having a bit of a... I think the term would've been "situationship" if it existed.
And I remember celebrating the goal by wrapping my arms around her and--in my mind--kissing her like we were in Casablanca. And I remember feeling like, if only for a moment, everything was going to turn out alright.
Her and I did not. And we all know what happened to the Canucks in June.
I've thought about that Canucks season over the years, usually when the current season's already on the rocks before the playoffs even start. But I haven't thought about that kiss much. When I have, it's been fleeting and it's more, considering the situation we were in, that it would have been more considerate to not have done that.
But I still remembered it pretty vividly and never really put much thought into why.
With sports and romance, sometimes things take a predictable path. But a lot of times things surprise you.
On paper, my beloved Canucks are even worse than last year. They're not contenders. They don't even have a legit 2nd line centre right now.
But also sometimes something wonderful can pop up out of nowhere. Don't expect it and certainly don't bank on it, but hey, you never know what's going to happen.
It's almost time to dust off those hockey jerseys again.
There's always this year.
Album of the week
Wednesday - Bleeds
Even though I complain that it seems like every second new rock band is a shoegaze band these days, I love shoegaze. I love My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive and Loop and I just love the sound the guitars make on so many of those great shoegaze records (and even some of the mediocre ones). I also love country, especially country music that tells a story and also has those one-liners that make you crack a smile out of nowhere. So, of course, I was going to love Wednesday.
On Bleeds, they could've turned in anything short of a stinker and chances are that I'd love that too. Instead, it feels like they've found the perfect balance between their noisy, discordant half and their twangy, nu-Americana half and those arrangements sit behind Karly Hartzman's best songwriting to date.
The songs on Bleeds are buoyed by Hartzman's rich storytelling about the South, brimming with too many clever couplets to count, and the guitars--whether their sliding or drowning in distortion--are always in perfect harmony.
"Elderberry Wine" only has to hold on 90-days or so to easily be my favourite song of the year, but "Townies" might be the song on Bleeds that really captures everything Wednesday. The verse--that borrows a melody from GbV's "Bulldog Skin"--wouldn't sound completely out of place on one of the last two Waxahatchee records, but the chorus explodes with sludgy, overdriven guitars.
Elsewhere, there's a minute long hardcore song (hardcore summer continues, baby), a guitar and vocals only ballad, and lines that compare a Phish concert to watching Human Centipede.
Perfect album.
Song of the week
Anna Von Hausswolff - Facing Atlas
The first two singles for this record were both duets: one with Iggy Pop and one with Ethel Cain. And, listen, I would've led with those too, cause it's got to be good for the ol' press cycle. But this beautiful, slow building number that ends with Von Hausswolff absolutely wailing is the real gem of the bunch.
Classic of the week
Mariah Carey - Dreamlover
This could have been a bunch of songs, but the video for "Dreamlover" is the first Diane Martel video that I saw.
If you had even a passing interest in rap and R&B in the 90s and 2000s, you've seen a bunch of music videos that Diane Martel directed. She did this one (plus seven more Mariah videos), a bunch of Method Man videos, "Mass Appeal," "Most Beautifullest Thing in This World," "4, 3, 2, 1," "Grindin'," "Case of the Ex," "Money, Power, Respect," "Lapdance," and many, many more.
I still kinda "watch" music videos, but most of the time that means I'm just pressing play to hear a new song and the clip ends up in another tab. I used to watch music videos obsessively though, pleading with my dad for control of the TV when certain shows were on Much Music and tuning in to Rap City basically every day after school when it was on a 5-days-a-week schedule in the 90s. And because of that, Diane Martel's creations are synonymous with so many songs that I love, because it was a time when the video and the song felt like two halves of a whole.
More heat
Cardinals - Masquerade
Not the guys that used to have to back Ryan Adams. And also a very good lil' indie rock song.
Agriculture - Dan's Love Song
Dan Meyer is usually screaming on their songs, because Agriculture is a black metal band. This one's got distortion, but it's soft and soothing and atmospheric and not at all what I expected. These guys are experts at what they do, but that just happens to not really be my thing. This sure is though.
Madi Diaz - Heavy Metal
More "Heavy Metal" that doesn't sound like heavy metal, though this one was expected. My favourite of the three advance singles from Fatal Optimist so far.
now playing: Samia - Bovine Excision
