You might expect a song entitled It's A Wonderful Life to be an upbeat ditty but it's anything but. "I'm a bog of poison frogs," intones Sparklehorse frontman and songwriter Mark Linkous, on this 1999 track from the album of the same name. "I'm the dog that ate your birthday cake." And he'd know, I guess. A couple of years earlier, a valium/alcohol/heroin combo very nearly killed him. Even though he survived, he was in a wheelchair for six months and needed dialysis for kidney failure. Don't do drugs, kids.
Whatever demons were eating at Linkous, no amount of critical acclaim sated them. Neither did the respect of his musical peers, as collaborations with the likes of PJ Harvey, Cracker, Tom Waits and Nina Persson were a constant in the life of Sparklehorse. In 2009, the band teamed up with Danger Mouse and the late David Lynch on the album Dark Night of the Soul; it turned out to be one of the last things Linkous did, as he took his own life in March of the following year.
I am the only one Can ride that horse, th'yonder I'm full of bees who died at sea It's a wonderful life, it's a wonderful life I wore a rooster's blood When it flew like doves I'm a bog of poison frogs It's a wonderful life, it's a wonderful life I'm the dog that ate your birthday cake It's a wonderful life, it's a wonderful life
I wouldn't expect anything by Sparklehorse to be an "upbeat ditty"
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point.
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