Cooley's been harsh on us lately. In case Primer Coat didn't do the trick, he gives us First Air of Autumn to make sure we all know just how much it sucks to get old.
Mid tempo, guitar picking, great bass line, takes you back to Perfect Timing. Not sure what's going on with the cross shaped swimming pools and schoolhouse hallways, but goddam, you glance away and the glory fades. Pray all you want that the horizon never comes, but it's gathering speed.
First air of autumn up your nose popcorn, heavy hairspray, nylon pantyhose please stand and bow your heads and pray you don’t get old
The nurture and the admonition of your kind the rules of only strong survive Cross shaped swimming pools, down in the blood and lifted up forever seeking favor from the light
Schoolhouse hallway like a prairie highway sprawls the drop off spins away the sun The getting there just proves it’s nothing but a ball Pray the horizon never comes
The hearts of the daughters of the men, Won by the softness of the sons of women’s hands To leave it up to love would leave it left to chance
Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
School house hallway like a prairie highway sprawls The drop off spins away the sun Like eyes that once could cut through candle power on autumn nights First air of autumn leaves me numb
Great song. I think one my favorites on the album.My suggestion for the alternative EO title (ref the ongoing thread). If there is a common theme to this album (I think there is) this song sums it up pretty good.
Zip City wrote:I don't have the post-grad English degree to decipher what the fuck he's talking about
Neither does Cooley, that's the beauty of it.
Seriously I love this song, the words convey the gist even if you don't dig too closely and the melody screams autumn whether that be literal or allusion.
We call him Scooby Do, but Scooby doesn’t do. Scooby, is not involved
This is one of my favorite songs on the album. I love the way that Cooley can use a few phrases to invoke a mood and a moment. Like Clams said, you may not be exactly sure what's going on at every point in the song, but you know what it means. The first verse makes me think of high school football games when I was growing up. In small southern towns (and probably small towns elsewhere) everyone goes children, adults, and of course, the high school kids. The hairspray and nylon pantyhose kind of place it back in time. And the announcer always asks everyone to stand for the invocation. So it puts you in a time and place you've seen as a child, a teenager, and now as adult looking back.
The second verse extends the growing-up metaphor with nurture and admonition -- that's what parents and teachers do. The cross-shaped swimming pools put me in mind of baptismal pools. I didn't grow up in a church that practiced total immersion, but many churches that do have a pool behind the choir that's just big enough for the preacher and the person being baptized. I've never seen a cross-shaped one, but maybe that's just to firmly place the pool in the church. Hell, I don't know; maybe the Salem Church of Christ had one. Anyway the last two lines scream baptism, referred to in more that one hymn as being "washed in the blood." And it's something most people do in late childhood or adolescence.
The verses about love, relationships and fading beauty just lay it out there.
As for that schoolhouse hallway, it puts me in mind of the feeling I used to get in high school that real life was out there waiting and I couldn't wait to get started. And the feeling I have now that makes we wonder how I got from there to here so damn fast.
Sorry to be so wordy, but I was an English teacher about a hundred years ago, so I've looked at that schoolhouse hallway from a couple of vantage points. The only common factor was that I couldn't wait to get the hell out of there either time.
Clams has some, seriously, smart friends. I too am a huge fan of this song, it's Cooley at his best, he's a true songsmith. I think it was at the Wilmington, Deleware show last March, Cooley explained what this song was about. Keep in mind this is a vague memory, so I'm open to correction or clarification. but, as I recall, it's about the principle or guidance counselor at his old high school who said he would never amount to anything. Cooley said, something like, this is a "fuck you" song to her. Whatever his story was, I detected a high level of hostility on his part which this particular song does not seem to convey. It's one of his most beautiful and thought provoking songs, not a hint of hostility. Maybe that's the point. Fucking Cooley.
OK this is my favorite song on the new record. I'm so much more of a music than a lyrics guy and the music carries the song's message fine - because the lyrics sure as hell don't make literal sense to me. The guidance counselor / principle thing angle really has me thinking now. Fucking Cooley.
Also thanks to Clams for reviving the SOTW thread. This is a good 'un.
By the time you drop them I'll be gone
And you'll be right where they fall the rest of your life
Gang Green wrote:Clams has some, seriously, smart friends. I too am a huge fan of this song, it's Cooley at his best, he's a true songsmith. I think it was at the Wilmington, Deleware show last March, Cooley explained what this song was about. Keep in mind this is a vague memory, so I'm open to correction or clarification. but, as I recall, it's about the principle or guidance counselor at his old high school who said he would never amount to anything. Cooley said, something like, this is a "fuck you" song to her. Whatever his story was, I detected a high level of hostility on his part which this particular song does not seem to convey. It's one of his most beautiful and thought provoking songs, not a hint of hostility. Maybe that's the point. Fucking Cooley.
Yes, I remember that as well. I think I recall him saying something along the lines of how his life keeps getting better and and he's not at all upset with how things turned out. I had a little to drink that night so it's kinda fuzzy now. But I clearly remember the "fuck you".
When the lights came up we all went home but never quite the same.
Gang Green wrote:...as I recall, it's about the principle or guidance counselor at his old high school who said he would never amount to anything. Cooley said, something like, this is a "fuck you" song to her. Whatever his story was, I detected a high level of hostility on his part which this particular song does not seem to convey. It's one of his most beautiful and thought provoking songs, not a hint of hostility. Maybe that's the point. Fucking Cooley.
This puts the song in a whole different perspective, thanks!
We got messed up minds for these messed up times...
Gang Green wrote:Clams has some, seriously, smart friends.
Smarter than me, that's for sure. Lots of food for thought in Deb's post, I think she's nailed a good chunk of the song. Btw Deb is a folklorist with the Alabama Folklife Association - she knows her music and she's also interviewed both Patterson and Cooley, so she knows whereof she speaks.
The lyrical imagery is just fantastic in this one.
Schoolhouse hallway like a prairie highway sprawls the drop off spins away the sun The getting there just proves it’s nothing but a ball Pray the horizon never comes
This verse just paints that image I've experienced so many times, driving west at dusk on an empty road. That feeling that you're going to drop off the earth when you hit the horizon is real.
As someone who has been criticized for overanalyzing lyrics, I find myself w/ the majority here who say this one's about the big picture, not obsessing over every word. I'm not sure why I think that, but the song has always struck me that way. Maybe it's the way the music, lyrics and mood just fit together so well, kind of painting a picture before you've even thought about it.
That said, there are some nice lines in this one. I personally lean towards "To leave it up to love is to leave it up to chance."
And in classic Cooley fashion the school hallways lines are beautifully ambiguous, evoking both the urge to get out and move on and the seemingly never ending length of those years w/ the rest of your life always remaining just out of reach. Either way, Cooley then sucker punches us w/ the be careful what u wish for caution of reminding us how fast it goes.
A highlight of the album.
What used to be is gone and what ought to be ought not to be so hard
Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
I think this verse is absolutely devastating to think about or (god forbid) say to a significant other and I often wonder what Mrs Cooley thinks of it.
Song in a nutshell (Long et. al. interpretation): How long does it take for teenage love to reveal its true nature? What if you "put a ring on it" and have some kids soon out of high school? How long does it take for something to happen that lets you KNOW what it is? Are you just there out of nostalgia and sense of duty? Are they? Or is it really what you hoped it was? To go way on down the line never really knowing....better pray the horizon never comes. Either pray you die before you ever have to ask the question or work out the answer sooner rather than later.
Never going back to Buttholeville. (Good luck with that!)
Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
I think this verse is absolutely devastating to think about or (god forbid) say to a significant other and I often wonder what Mrs Cooley thinks of it.
Wouldn't it be funny if she thought, "He knows just how I feel about him--but how could I ever tell him that?" Funny for values of funny that include sad, of course, and I offer this as a purely speculative "what if", having only met Mrs. Cooley that night I dreamed Mr. Cooley asked me to drive his family to Wal-Mart.
Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
I think this verse is absolutely devastating to think about or (god forbid) say to a significant other and I often wonder what Mrs Cooley thinks of it.
Wouldn't it be funny if she thought, "He knows just how I feel about him--but how could I ever tell him that?" Funny for values of funny that include sad, of course, and I offer this as a purely speculative "what if", having only met Mrs. Cooley that night I dreamed Mr. Cooley asked me to drive his family to Wal-Mart.
You know when you are talking about yourself and you are using the pronoun "you" to refer to yourself? I think that's what he's doing here... I think he's worrying about how being on his arm might be losing its shine...
He's both too kind and too practical to write that about another person, in my opinion.
However. I lived with a songwriter for six years and as much as you want to leave them to their inspirations, it's really hard not to wonder about some lyrics... So having had that experience, part of me thinks that there may have been a bit of a "domestic" over that lyric. I feel as though post argument, Mike Cooley may have stomped off only to emerge afterwards with "Natural Light," in response, as if to say, "What to you mean you feel that I think you've lost your shine?! Here's an awesome and beautiful love song entirely about how totally shiny you are. And it swings!!"
His facial expression is terrifying. He's basically the equine Chucky.
beantownbubba wrote:As someone who has been criticized for overanalyzing lyrics, I find myself w/ the majority here who say this one's about the big picture, not obsessing over every word. I'm not sure why I think that, but the song has always struck me that way.
Well whoever chastised you for being overly analytical is clearly a very bad person. Though on my way home from the farm, I often listen to Q and recently Boy George was on. You know, that guy can really sing... Anyhoo, Gian Ghomeshi kept asking him questions about the meaning of his lyrics and finally Boy George said, "You know Gian, it's a bunch of snippets that I tacked together. It's not a documentary..." This whole analyzing thing, which I am largely not a proponent of, did cross my mind at that point. (But here I am participating. I am aware that I am a massive hypocrite, so no need to point it out...)
His facial expression is terrifying. He's basically the equine Chucky.
Clams wrote:Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
I think this verse is absolutely devastating to think about or (god forbid) say to a significant other and I often wonder what Mrs Cooley thinks of it.
Wouldn't it be funny if she thought, "He knows just how I feel about him--but how could I ever tell him that?" Funny for values of funny that include sad, of course, and I offer this as a purely speculative "what if", having only met Mrs. Cooley that night I dreamed Mr. Cooley asked me to drive his family to Wal-Mart.
You know when you are talking about yourself and you are using the pronoun "you" to refer to yourself? I think that's what he's doing here... I think he's worrying about how being on his arm might be losing its shine...
He's both too kind and too practical to write that about another person, in my opinion.
However. I lived with a songwriter for six years and as much as you want to leave them to their inspirations, it's really hard not to wonder about some lyrics... So having had that experience, part of me thinks that there may have been a bit of a "domestic" over that lyric. I feel as though post argument, Mike Cooley may have stomped off only to emerge afterwards with "Natural Light," in response, as if to say, "What to you mean you feel that I think you've lost your shine?! Here's an awesome and beautiful love song entirely about how totally shiny you are. And it swings!!"
Bravo, PonyGirl! I like your interpretation.
“Excited people get on daddy’s nerves.” - M. Cooley
In a way this song kind of sums up the whole album thematically.
Starting with the title: First Air of Autumn -- It has a double meaning. On one hand it is that first breath you take where you smell the fallen leaves, the wood burning in the fireplaces (at least in my neck of the woods), and the familiar smell of the schoolhouse on that first day. You have been away all summer but when you enter it on the first day that smell hits you -- same as it ever was. More than any other of the five senses, the sense of smell triggers memory.
An "air" is also an English term for a type of song. I suspect that Mr. Cooley has been studying English folk songs these past couple of years, perhaps going to the library and checking out songbooks and records. "Made Up English Oceans" had much more of a Fairport Convention style feel to it when he played it on the solo tour. When the Truckers tackled it the song took more of a "Rawhide" or "Ghost Riders" feel. "First Air of Autumn" also has a British folk feel to it.
First air of autumn up your nose popcorn, heavy hairspray, nylon pantyhose please stand and bow your heads and pray you don’t get old
The nurture and the admonition of your kind the rules of only strong survive Cross shaped swimming pools, down in the blood and lifted up forever seeking favor from the light
This first image reminds me of the first day of Sunday School. In the Methodist tradition we called it Rally Day. There would be extra special things like popcorn and snacks on that first day. After dressing in shorts all summer the women are dressed up. They've bought a new church dress, had their hair done. The beginning of the school and church year is here. You can smell the hairspray, perfume and panty hose.
The second stanza is almost tribal in nature. Generation after generation repeats this ritual every year. New baptismal candidates. It is a ritual. In Cooley's neck of the woods your religious affiliation communicates more than just your parent's beliefs. It says a whole lot about who your ancestors were, your family's economic class and what type of work they are likely to do.
Schoolhouse hallway like a prairie highway sprawls the drop off spins away the sun The getting there just proves it’s nothing but a ball Pray the horizon never comes
These two lines, by my reckoning, are a very sophisticated literary allusion to the passing of time. Literally, time passes daily as the earth spins and annually as it orbits the sun. To a kindergartener a school house hallway seems huge. Your age is measured by which end of the hallway your class is in. To a child, each new school year he is further down the hall and that position marks the child's passage of time. The horizon? That is the end. I think it may be an allusion to death or the end of youth.
The hearts of the daughters of the men, Won by the softness of the sons of women’s hands To leave it up to love would leave it left to chance
As a songwriter Cooley keeps getting better and better. This line alone is pure poetry. Keats. It is so profound. Fathers are the ones who prepare their daughters for marriage. We dote over our daughters and that love teaches a girl her value. If a father loves her and spoils her she will accept nothing less from a potential suitor as she grows older. Likewise, boys learn the sort of tenderness necessary to win a girl's heart from their mothers. "To leave it up to love would leave it left to chance" Wow! Such a thing is too important to leave it to chance. But in a way we do. We have no control over who our children fall in love with and carry on the family legacy with. However, things like church and community are part of the social contract. We trust that our neighbors are raising their children to be good husbands and wives for our children. Traditionally, in the Bible belt, children who grow up and stay local tend to marry others who were nurtured in the same church. Good God, these two lines slay me.
Memory only shows the promise beauty broke of beauty ageless in it’s time Light attracts the same, you glance away and the glory fades and being on your arm has lost it’s shine
A reference to aging and death. We fall in love and marry a woman for her beauty and that beauty is ageless. However, time passes. The promise of everlasting beauty is broken. We will all get old. Our life partner will not always have her youthful beauty. Elderly couples rarely walk arm in arm unless they are trying to keep the other from falling. Public displays of affection are for the young and beautiful.
School house hallway like a prairie highway sprawls The drop off spins away the sun Like eyes that once could cut through candle power on autumn nights First air of autumn leaves me numb
Repeat the chorus. This time the narrator realizes the full consequences of the passing of time. In our youth our eyes were strong. We didn't need a light to read by or glasses. But now? We realize we are aging. Our youth is gone. Our days left are few. This realization leaves us numb. The first air of autumn is now that first whiff of old age or even death. Death may still be far off. But we have lived more days than we have left. Our glory days are never coming back. The school house hallway looks and smells as it always did but we are closer to the drop off, closer to the end of the corridor than we realize. We are now dropping off our children in the same hallway we were dropped off in. Our youth is gone and that first air of autumn -- that first whiff when we realize summer is gone and autumn is here -- leaves us numb.
This is one of Cooley's greatest lyrics, IMO.
Last edited by RevMatt on Fri Aug 08, 2014 7:15 pm, edited 4 times in total.
I have nowhere else to go. There is no demand in the priesthood for elderly drug addicts
Most days I think Shit Shots Count is my favorite song on this record. But this song makes it hard to be sure. At worst it is a very close second.
Nice job on the write up Rev. I don't have your knowledge of English folk etc so I'll have to take your word on that but the rest of it seems spot on even if I never thought it all out line by line like that.
I've always known it was about getting older and what comes with that. Like Rev Matt said that seems like the theme of the record. Using fall (never heard anybody down here call it Autumn but that works better in a song title) as a metaphor for that works well. But my favorite part is probably the imagery in the opening lines about a football game (popcorn, heavy hairspray etc.) as that puts me right there and I can feel the cooler air, smell the popcorn, and see the leaves.
Cooley really outdid himself here I think.
And to Clams' friend Deb, welcome. I'm really glad you're here anyway but especially so I can tell you personally that I really, really enjoyed the interview you did with Cooley. Probably my favorite interview he has ever done. You did a great job and it obvious he felt really comfortable talking to you which is saying a lot considering who we are talking about. I've listened to it several times. I'm from South GA and you have a great Southern accent.
Thanks so much, Cole. It's one of my favorite interviews that I've done, too. I'm glad it came across that way. I enjoyed interviewing Patterson as well, but we did that one over the phone. The one with Cooley could be a case of "third time's the charm." We'd scheduled the first one at a museum in Birmingham and I gave him some confusing information about where to meet, so I missed him. We rescheduled for the next day. I was on the way to Birmingham when he called and had to cancel. When we finally ended up in the same place at the same time, we'd talked enough to be comfortable, I guess. As for Southern accents, I made a conscious decision to keep mine when I was in college and many of my friends were working hard to lose theirs. It paid off for me a few years ago when I was playing a board game with a group that included a woman who had moved South because her husband had taken a job in Mississippi. She had been bitching and moaning all night about how ignorant and backward everyone is here. By the time it was apparent that I was going to kick her ass at Trivial Pursuit, my accent had gotten thick enough to spread on a biscuit.
Clams's friend Deb wrote:Thanks so much, Cole. It's one of my favorite interviews that I've done, too. I'm glad it came across that way. I enjoyed interviewing Patterson as well, but we did that one over the phone. The one with Cooley could be a case of "third time's the charm." We'd scheduled the first one at a museum in Birmingham and I gave him some confusing information about where to meet, so I missed him. We rescheduled for the next day. I was on the way to Birmingham when he called and had to cancel. When we finally ended up in the same place at the same time, we'd talked enough to be comfortable, I guess. As for Southern accents, I made a conscious decision to keep mine when I was in college and many of my friends were working hard to lose theirs. It paid off for me a few years ago when I was playing a board game with a group that included a woman who had moved South because her husband had taken a job in Mississippi. She had been bitching and moaning all night about how ignorant and backward everyone is here. By the time it was apparent that I was going to kick her ass at Trivial Pursuit, my accent had gotten thick enough to spread on a biscuit.
I love it!
We could probably completely high jack this thread or start a new one on that subject. Isn't it weird how some people decide to lose their Southern accent because they are afraid it makes them appear inferior in some way? I too know people who have done the same thing and I can't quite describe how I felt about them after they did it. A touch disappointed I think. But mostly I catch myself kind of laughing at them. My wife and I were eating at a local hot dog/burger joint here in town and a girl that we both graduated high school with stopped by our table to say hey. We hadn't seen her since graduation (seventeen years) and I could hardly keep my jaw off the table when she started talking. She sounded like she had never even been near the South much less born and raised in a small town in GA. What cracked us both up after she walked off was that she told us that she had gone to college at the University of Alabama and had married and settled in Mobile. It wasn't like she had been living in New York since we had last seen her. I've caught some grief over mine in my life. When I was in the military I got it pretty bad even though most of it was good natured. But I got it the worst from other Southerners who had decided to talk theirs down. I stubbornly kept mine. It's part of who I am. And like you said, any time I have to deal with some jerk mine tends to get even thicker. To the point of being exaggerated.
At Homecoming last year there was one particular guy who was getting on everyone's nerves. Just way too drunk etc. I tried to talk to him and get him to settle down a bit. He asked me if I was on 3dd. I told him I was. He asked who I was on the board. I told. He said, "what's the first name again?" I told him. He says, "Cowell? Call? Cal?" I finally just told him my real name.
I guess we could bring the thread back around full circle by saying that if you want proof that a person can have a Southern accent, be intelligent, and have an excellent command of language, look no further than Cooley, Patterson, and Jason Isbell,
I grew up in NJ and never believed people with southern accents were ignorant. Probably because my first grade Sunday School teacher was from Alabama as was my sixth grade teacher. We also had several neighbors who were from the south. I always associated the various southern accents with education and good manners. Also, the guys in DBT who have southern accents strike me as very "neighborly". Jay is neighborly too but his neighborhood is The Bronx and Yonkers.
I have nowhere else to go. There is no demand in the priesthood for elderly drug addicts
Cole Younger wrote:At Homecoming last year there was one particular guy who was getting on everyone's nerves. Just way too drunk etc. I tried to talk to him and get him to settle down a bit. He asked me if I was on 3dd. I told him I was. He asked who I was on the board. I told. He said, "what's the first name again?" I told him. He says, "Cowell? Call? Cal?" I finally just told him my real name.
Was it that asshole Pork Pie Hat Guy? Hope he skips this year.
Turn you demons into walls of goddamned noise and sound.
Clams's friend Deb wrote:I guess we could bring the thread back around full circle by saying that if you want proof that a person can have a Southern accent, be intelligent, and have an excellent command of language, look no further than Cooley, Patterson, and Jason Isbell,
Okay stop everyone, you're all making me self conscience of my watered down Brooklyn accent. My Mom was from Brooklyn and My dad was a New Englander, it's all his fault. But, please, I want to hear this interview. The link above is just the song performance. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong.
It wasn't like she had been living in New York since we had last seen her. I've caught some grief over mine in my life. When I was in the military I got it pretty bad even though most of it was good natured. But I got it the worst from other Southerners who had decided to talk theirs down. I stubbornly kept mine. It's part of who I am. And like you said, any time I have to deal with some jerk mine tends to get even thicker. To the point of being exaggerated. 
