Type: love in an elevator Example: Sheila Nicholls' Elevator
Like most of you, I first discovered singer-songwriter Sheila Nicholls on the soundtrack to the hit film High Fidelity. High Fidelity went on to become a not-at-all successful Broadway musical and Ms. Nicholls, despite high-profile praise from one Mr. Craig Kilborn, found herself thrust back into obscurity, her albums destined to forever rot in your local used music store's dreaded $1.00 bin.
Long before all of that, there was the song Elevator, my favorite track on Nicholls' debut album, Brief Strop. Like every other Sheila Nicholls' song, Elevator was equal parts beautiful and irritating. If you are not familiar with Ms. Nicholls' writing style, she is the kind of songwriter who seems to feel that if you want a good song it better rhyme. Always. And you should do whatever you can to achieve this constant rhyming no matter what.
Regardless, Elevator is a pitch black love song about two people who become stranded in an elevator and, I guess, fall in love, among other things.
Some lyrics followed by my own observations:
I'm on a boat, I'm in a lake, I'm with the water, I see the trees
I'm with the sun, I see the moon, I touch the sky
And I'm with you...I'm with you
These opening lines remind me of the old elementary school explanation as to why being called a "jerk" is a compliment rather than a relatively inoffensive insult: "A jerk is a tug, a tug is a boat, a boat floats on water, water is nature, and nature is beautiful, so, thank you for that beautiful compliment." I think Sheila is describing all this nature so she can contrast it with her upcoming stay in a broken elevator--open and free vs. enclosed and horny (keep reading).
And how long would it take
if we were trapped in an elevator after the earthquake?
Five stories under debris,
you and me, in the garden indefinitely
if we were trapped in an elevator after the earthquake?
Five stories under debris,
you and me, in the garden indefinitely
See what she's done there? The elevator has become a new Garden of Eden, with Nicholls and her stranded elevator mate cast in the roles of Adam and Eve. If that isn't brilliant, I guess I don't know anything about songwriting whatsoever. (Also, I found these lyrics online and whoever transcribed them at this particular site was one of the few people who spelled "debris" correctly. "Debre" means nothing, internet lyrics transcribers. Also, it's "dehydrated" not "dehidrated." Remember, there is no shame in using a dictionary to check your spelling. It makes reading your transcribed lyrics more enjoyable and it makes you look like less of a tool.)
After 10 hours were thinking about food.We lost our voices from shouting, and screaming
and crying and singing and being really crude.
My tummy rumbles, but there's no guitar, so we have sex instead and we go so far.
Three questions:
1) Why are you two being crude? There's no need for that. A guy doesn't want to take a potty mouth home to meet his mother. And what woman wants to be stranded anywhere with an obnoxious jack-ass? I know you're both in a life-threatening situation, but let's keep it classy.
2) You're hungry and you're complaining that there's no guitar? You've already lost your voices from shouting, screaming, and SINGING, presumably without stringed accompaniment. How's a guitar gonna help in this situation? You gonna eat a guitar, Sheila? Probably not.
3) What would be considered farther than sexual intercourse in this situation? Is there a preacher willing to marry the two of you stuck in there too? Probably not since you're being all crude or whatever.
And we do that [the sex] for days til we're knee deep in cum,
dehydrated , exhausted, insane aquarium
dehydrated , exhausted, insane aquarium
Do you know how much ejaculating has to be going on for you to be knee-deep in semen? A lot! I mean, you are filling an elevator. You've got to imagine that the first hundred spurts will simply soak into the carpeting. We're talking about some serious ejaculation, my friends. Clearly Ms. Nicholls does not understand the subtle nuances of the male reproductive system.
I do like that she describes the spooge-filled elevator as an "insane aquarium" though. Can you think of a crazier aquatic display than one filled with microscopic sperm? I can: an aquarium filled with jellyfish wearing strap-ons. Now that's apeshit crazy, amigo!
