I've been listening to a fair bit of soul music lately and it's made me weirdly optimistic. Most of the songs are professions of love, not wanting love to end, regretting when love did end. Men singing their way back into their ladies' hearts. Ladies wishing their men didn't treat them so bad. This is the kind of shit I love.
Apparently I should have been around in the '60s because men seemed to want to get and keep the girl. I could stand to be gotten and kept. (Not in a prostitutey way, though; just in a being wanted way.) When men were a bit more straightforward with their feelings. Like, "girl, I want you and I gotta have you" and "baby, I wish you were mine" and "honey, I want to hold your hand and make you mine forever." (I also appreciate that people dressed for a night on the town, that being out was worthy of effort. But that's a whole other post.)
The only parts that break my heart are when he pleads for her to change her name. Like unofficial proposals, spilling out set to horn sections and backup singers. It almost makes me want to get married and change my name. Sometimes I consider it when riding on the train and the pleading in my ears starts up. But then I remember: there's no one singing these songs to me. There isn't even anyone making mix tapes for me, hoping I'll read between the lines based on the song selection and order.
Cripes, Jackie Wilson was the bomb. Listen to any one of his songs and it will make you long for somebody to sing one of his songs to you.
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