[MUSIC] Sarah McLachlan, "Possession"
Sep. 18th, 2008 04:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldI lost most of my interest in Sarah McLachlan not long after she hit huge 11-million-selling album international commercial success in 1997 with her album Surfacing. Some of this might be a bit of the upset fanboy in me renouncing the mainstreamed icon, part of it might (might) be a shift away from McLachlan's genre of music, but that's not all of it or even most of it. Kate Bush writes and sings in a similar genre, and I still find her work fresh right up to and including 2005's Aerial. McLachlan, I fear, has let her success--and her lack of a need to respond to critical or commercial criticism--sapped the spark from her work, easy lazy songs like "Adia" overpowering others. That's a pity, since she we could use more meaty songs like "Possession".
(Yes, this video was banned into the United States because of its use of religious imagery. Pity.)
With all of the haunting organs and the generally subdued guitars and the unsettling vibes of McLachlan's voice, one would have thought that an Australian music site would not have had to point out that "Possession" is not a love song, especially not with lyrics like the below.
The song's genesis can be traced to the early 1990s, At this time when McLachlan was starting out in Canada, she was having the serious problem with stalkers that one might expect that attractive young musicians in their 20s who write and performed intimately confessional songs would have, double-digit numbers of people sending inappropriate letters and trying to follow her every move. One in particular, Ottawa computer programmer Uwe Vandrei, claimed to recognize in these and other of the song's lyrics references to various letters that he had sent to her in the past since October 1991. In a September 1994 E-mail to the Fumbling Towards Ecstasy mailing list in September 1994 announcing his intentions to sue Sarah McLachlan for violation of copyright (the argument being by allegedly using his private letters to her McLachLan was violating his copyright), Vandrei said that he had been interested in McLachlan since October 1991. Vandrei wanted to express his appreciation for her music by "offering notes of appreciation accompanied by rather elegant flower arrangements offered at various concerts that I was privilege to attend[, confessing] that these expressions escalated to the form of rather confessional letters and perhaps inappropriately intimate expressions of affection." Elsewhere in the E-mail he claims that the matter of the lawsuit "can be resolved in a far more congenial, private, and economical manner if I were simply granted one conversation with Ms. McLachlan." This lawsuit raised interesting questions: How could McLachlan's safety in a court proceeding be guaranteed if the person bringing the suit against her was someone she had a restraining order against, particularly if--as some suspected--he might drop his lawyers and try to cross-examine her personally? The question became defunct when, later in December of 1994, at the end of a long period of psychologically disintegration, Vandrei killed himself.
"Possession," is, at least in part, one of the many stalker songs out there, its closest competition being The Police's awesome 1983 "Every Breath You Take". I'd still rank "Possession" of "Every Breath You Take.", That second song, for all of the awesome contrast between Sting's soft rasp ("Oh, cant you see/You belong to me/How my poor heart aches/With every breath you take") and Summers' guitar and Copeland's drums, it can be sung in a variety of styles, each style imposing a different meaning. I can imagine, say, Frank Sinatra in 1960s Las Vegas singing it in some sort of a jazzy swing version.
"Possession" can't be made to do that; "Possession" is certain about its meaning and its potential manifestations in the physical world. Cheery lyrics like "Kiss you so hard/I’ll take your breath away/And after I wipe away the tears" describe what will happen in the realm of the real, expressed by the singer who promises to do things to the listener and by the promises of what will come to the helpless listener. "Possession" does what the Police did not and complete job by imagining what the stalker's would like to do when he (?) wins his prize. It's creepy in a way that might well be especially familiar to a female audience--God knows I've happily walked in neighbourhoods that many of my female contemporaries would avoid for fear of being harmed--but the emotions of feeling trapped and subjected are hardly unique to women. "Every Breath You Take" describes the thought processes; For its audacity, I'd rank this song alongside her 1997 "Sweet Surrender" and claim that it went a long way towards making her 1993 album Fumbling Towards Ecstasy the million-seller that it was. As I said above, it's just a shame that she hasn't written many songs that come close to the achievement of "Possession."
(Yes, this video was banned into the United States because of its use of religious imagery. Pity.)
With all of the haunting organs and the generally subdued guitars and the unsettling vibes of McLachlan's voice, one would have thought that an Australian music site would not have had to point out that "Possession" is not a love song, especially not with lyrics like the below.
And I would be the one
To hold you down
Kiss you so hard
I’ll take your breath away
And after I wipe away the tears
Just close your eyes dear
Through this world I’ve stumbled
So many times betrayed
Trying to find an honest word
To find the truth enslaved
Oh you speak to me in riddles and
You speak to me in rhymes
My body aches to breathe your breath
You words keep me alive
The song's genesis can be traced to the early 1990s, At this time when McLachlan was starting out in Canada, she was having the serious problem with stalkers that one might expect that attractive young musicians in their 20s who write and performed intimately confessional songs would have, double-digit numbers of people sending inappropriate letters and trying to follow her every move. One in particular, Ottawa computer programmer Uwe Vandrei, claimed to recognize in these and other of the song's lyrics references to various letters that he had sent to her in the past since October 1991. In a September 1994 E-mail to the Fumbling Towards Ecstasy mailing list in September 1994 announcing his intentions to sue Sarah McLachlan for violation of copyright (the argument being by allegedly using his private letters to her McLachLan was violating his copyright), Vandrei said that he had been interested in McLachlan since October 1991. Vandrei wanted to express his appreciation for her music by "offering notes of appreciation accompanied by rather elegant flower arrangements offered at various concerts that I was privilege to attend[, confessing] that these expressions escalated to the form of rather confessional letters and perhaps inappropriately intimate expressions of affection." Elsewhere in the E-mail he claims that the matter of the lawsuit "can be resolved in a far more congenial, private, and economical manner if I were simply granted one conversation with Ms. McLachlan." This lawsuit raised interesting questions: How could McLachlan's safety in a court proceeding be guaranteed if the person bringing the suit against her was someone she had a restraining order against, particularly if--as some suspected--he might drop his lawyers and try to cross-examine her personally? The question became defunct when, later in December of 1994, at the end of a long period of psychologically disintegration, Vandrei killed himself.
"Possession," is, at least in part, one of the many stalker songs out there, its closest competition being The Police's awesome 1983 "Every Breath You Take". I'd still rank "Possession" of "Every Breath You Take.", That second song, for all of the awesome contrast between Sting's soft rasp ("Oh, cant you see/You belong to me/How my poor heart aches/With every breath you take") and Summers' guitar and Copeland's drums, it can be sung in a variety of styles, each style imposing a different meaning. I can imagine, say, Frank Sinatra in 1960s Las Vegas singing it in some sort of a jazzy swing version.
"Possession" can't be made to do that; "Possession" is certain about its meaning and its potential manifestations in the physical world. Cheery lyrics like "Kiss you so hard/I’ll take your breath away/And after I wipe away the tears" describe what will happen in the realm of the real, expressed by the singer who promises to do things to the listener and by the promises of what will come to the helpless listener. "Possession" does what the Police did not and complete job by imagining what the stalker's would like to do when he (?) wins his prize. It's creepy in a way that might well be especially familiar to a female audience--God knows I've happily walked in neighbourhoods that many of my female contemporaries would avoid for fear of being harmed--but the emotions of feeling trapped and subjected are hardly unique to women. "Every Breath You Take" describes the thought processes; For its audacity, I'd rank this song alongside her 1997 "Sweet Surrender" and claim that it went a long way towards making her 1993 album Fumbling Towards Ecstasy the million-seller that it was. As I said above, it's just a shame that she hasn't written many songs that come close to the achievement of "Possession."
