I love music. I love music more than I could (in all likelihood) ever love a spouse. Sometimes statements like that make me think I love music a little too much.
One problem with loving music so much is that absolute crap slips through the cracks. Where a completely rational person would go "that song is fucking rancid. I think I'm going to listen to something that doesn't make me want to hatemaimrape" I say "hey, I kind of like that."
One of those songs is the following:
Yes, a song about a fucking cathedral sung by a proto hipster through a Rudy Vallie megaphone. 'Winchester Cathedral' was one of the biggest hits of 1966, yet I have no idea why. The sound of young America was Motown and British Invasion, and the old folks were still bumping Elvis and Sinarta. How did this spend time at #1, along with 'You Can't Hurry Love'?
My big theory is that the intro sounds like a commercial for Diet Pepsi, so people had a Pavlovian response to the song. Pepsi was juuuuust starting to take off, so the Pepsi Generation subconsciously took this piece of dreck to platinum status. Or it could be the whistling...
The embarrassing part of all this is while I could skip 'Winchester Cathedral' when it comes on my iPod, I choose not to probably 100% of the time. I have a weakness for stupid Vaudeville songs. Yep, 'I'm Henry VIII I Am' and 'When I'm 64' never get skipped either. I often wonder why I have this proclivity. I guess sometimes it's better NOT to wonder why we like the shit we do. Just whistle a happy tune and think about the bells, like my nephews in the New Vaudeville Band.
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