My older brother Brian had the single, the 7″ on vinyl, the yellow center with the slick red mouth-and-tongue logo and all. We put it on a lot, laughing at our inability to understand what Mick Jagger was saying. “Honest enough, I could shuck a duck / Boil it on after / and just slug a doff.” What? Almost as funny was the “pretty pretty pretty pretty pretty pretty girls” part. You didn’t talk like that about girls; you didn’t admit that. At least not when you were all of ten years old.
Funny, then, how fifteen years later I would recognize “Beast of Burden” as the Sexiest Song Ever Recorded by White People. (Sorry, Hall and Oates.) I was in a Raleigh bar called the Office Tavern (heh), fresh off a day of painting houses, trying desperately to keep up with my co-worker, Richie. We’d knocked off at four o’clock, and by a quarter to five, he was on his fifth beer. Talk about swimming with the sharks. (Side note: Once, during this strecth of employment, when I told someone at a party that I was a painter, she immediately shot back, “So do you drink a lot?” The reputation precedes. Sitting next to Richie, I could see why.) Some time that afternoon, I rolled over to the “Office” juke and saw Some Girls staring back at me. I made my contribution, redistributed my weight on the stool again, and waited.
A little while later, eyes loose and belly burning, I noticed that the dumpy bar lady looked, well, pretty. And damn if the cast of Beverly Hills 90210 didn’t look like goddesses beaming off the TV from behind her. And come to think of it, it was just fine to be spending the afternoon in a disrepuatble bar, getting good and sotted. So what if I couldn’t talk to the TV ladies because they were on TV, and that I couldn’t talk to the bar lady because she was behind the bar? Just then, the opening jangle–always a deep yellow in my mind–ushered in the sunny funk of “Beast of Burden.” Its three or four minutes tied it all together–the good will of the local saloon, the refreshment of cold beer at a reasonable price, and the pure aesthetic appreciation of pretty girls for its own sake. In a messed up way, I was fully alive.
From thereon out, whenever I had some spare change and was in a bar, I’d look for it on the jukebox. Between Some Girls and Hot Rocks, it wasn’t ever hard to find. (Still isn’t, actually. I just played it at the Time Out Tavern during a Cubs game a few weeks ago.) “Beast of Burden” is one of my standard jukebox songs, the kind of thing I’d never actually attempt to have in my collection, but it’s always a thrill to hear on these rare occasions. Other songs in this category come from such bowling-alley luminaries as Bob Seger, Tom Petty, Boston and REO Speedwagon. But a sad thing has happened. Or maybe just potentially sad: I’ve joined the revolution. I finally have a fast internet connection, and iTunes, and something less legal than this. A couple weeks ago, “Beast of Burden” popped into my mind. Five minutes and $.99 later, the song was mine. It was, as they say, quick and dirty.
So I’m not sure if I’m happy about this. The context is lost, the designation I’d given it as this song I’d hear exclusively outside my home, never in my headphones, is faded. As Aimee Mann said, Everything’s Different Now. Thanks to the “revolution,” music can now be crossed with consumption (or more accurately–and wink-wink literally–Acquisition) seamlessly. While most people who acquire and arrange their tunes this way are just glad to have a tidy interface and a pretty iPod, already-musically-nerdy folks like myself are driven over the brink into Total Musical Omniscience. What will happen to happenstance? Wherefore the random spin in the dusty bar? For the record, I think it’ll still happen; I can see thirteen year-old kids lighting up each others’ faces with what they’re already calling “swapped files.” But as for me, just in case, I’m going to think twice before effortlessly snatching up “Hollywood Nights” or “Take It on the Run.” And I’ll try to remember what my friend Art used to say: “You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?”
