SHOUT SONGS

SHOUT SONGS

Basically, the definition of shout songs refers to the Gospel genre: a strongly rhythmic religious song in the African-American folk tradition, characterised by chants or shouts of response between the leader and the congregation.

Shouts of invocation, we can say of a joyful kind.

However, when I think of shout songs, completely different songs immediately materialise in my mind.

Songs that are irresistible to me, in the sense that when I listen to them, I feel strongly involved and find myself singing with an unequivocally liberating emphasis.

Shouts that drag out a load of emotions.

What is the quintessential shout song in your opinion?

Wandering around the web in search of answers, the song mentioned the most left me somewhat perplexed.

It is actually one of the songs in the index of my Heron Formula, so it has a special meaning for me, but for my vision it does not exactly correspond to the idea of a shout song: Won’t Get Fooled Again – Roger Daltrey – The Who.

What do you think?

Going on a sort of statistics of the most quoted songs, I realised that a high percentage of them are in my index

A fluke? Definitely not: obviously it all comes down to my vision of music.

What do you prefer to sing instead?

I know, I should use the verb to listen, but shout songs provides an additional level of involvement.

Speaking of involvement, I also take this opportunity to talk about Emily Armstrong.

shout songs

Her singing screamed a huge responsibility: to get on stage with Linkin Park.

Surely no one considered the thought of a replacement: impossible, but still a huge perplexity remained.

That’s why I appreciated Mike Shinoda’s sentence: the voice of Chester Bennington is you.

We are the voice of those who have left us.

In contrast to the shouting, there are those who have chosen silence, no less than a thousand artists: 1,000 UK Artists

shout songs

These 1,000 UK Artists have released a 12-track album entitled Is that what we want?

Here are the titles:
1. The
2. British
3. Government
4. Must
5. Not
6. Legalise
7. Music
8. Theft
9. To
10. Benefit
11. AI
12. Companies

These tracks do not contain any of the thousands of entries among which we can mention Annie Lennox and Kate Bush and represent the artists’ protest against the proposed change in copyright law.

The amendment would allow artificial intelligence companies to create their own products using rights-protected work: music, lyrics, etc., without a licence, effectively favouring the so-called training of algorithms without providing any remuneration for authors.

Silence to communicate.

Shall we also add our voice?

Or perhaps I should say let us also add our shout …

THREE by Valérie Perrin

THREE by Valérie Perrin

We had already chatted about Valérie Perrin about her previous book Fresh Water for Flowers

I have also read Three thanks to Valeria and her Mum.

As you know, I have a bit of a fixation on three, not by chance on the idea of three sides I imagined my Heron’s formula

And on the concept of three this book builds a real apotheosis.

You know I don’t like to reveal too much, but I want to tell you that there was a moment while reading when I felt terribly dumb for not having understood beforehand, so much so that I would have even gone back to look for the exact point where I was so blind.

However, it is no secret that Three by Valérie Perrin tells the story of three friends.

Friendship, the kind that survives suffering, the kind that heals disappointments, the kind that bridges loneliness, but above all Friendship of the kind that comes about quite naturally, because it cannot be otherwise.

Friendship almost as predestination and deeply felt choice at the same time.

Friendship as destiny and Friendship as salvation.

Friendship that lasts a lifetime.

Do you have friends who fit this description?

Or maybe you can describe your idea of Friendship even better.

The three protagonists get to know each other and grow up going through years that I experienced at about the same age myself.

Do your childhood friendships endure stoically under the blows of life or have the paths taken inexorably different directions?

Valérie Perrin very often quotes songs and song lyrics, which as you know I particularly love.

And so I discovered Indochine, which I did not know.

Here you can find a playlist with the songs mentioned in the book.

Another key element in the book is water

Even with reference to water, we can find Valérie Perrin’s ‘three’: pool, sea, lake.

A further metaphor for evolution: birth, life, death.

TWELVE NOTES

TWELVE NOTES

He says it is basically twelve notes: twelve notes that encapsulate everything.

That may be true, but without detracting from the music, it is the words that make the real difference.

So many words, a lifetime long.

Words that tell stories, words that describe emotions, words that stop moments, his, mine, ours.

Who doesn’t know the famous “outdoor café tables”!

Not to mention the guy who “carefully reads the instructions on the coffee machine” …

And again:

A hair-raising coffee
a packet of smoke
and the wind re-reading my paper
and tomorrow going out again, putting on a cheerful face
for the next carnival
a razor-cold pain
for another day that dawns
I die

Really coffee can make your hair stand on end.

A phosphorescent madonnina
and fake flowers above the dresser
looking for pantyhose distracted and indolent
and one more day in the mirror
the refrigerator snored from the kitchen
and you hummed making coffee
the long sadness of the morning

Do you hum when you make coffee?

A bustle of voices and faces the color of the streets outside
that loses some haste among the coffees and liquors
if your heart had windows I could jump in them
and have you find it all in pieces when you returned

I absolutely love the concept of “losing haste” with coffee!

And never again the chimneys
the sirens the city
the wet gates and warehouses
of mist and humidity …
and never again sit in the cafeteria
among melancholy and mashed potato
the chain the tape the days that go away
with the coffee cart ...

I could almost say it’s the Lomellina

Nights in the car talking
the low glass for smoking
nights of old songs still good to sing
nights as dark as an oven
sleepless nights before a great day
hard nights of illusions
long dark nights of coffee

Old songs still good to sing … it really is.

Songs I would say more lived than old, songs to sing together, during a concert.

Twelve notes were the birthday gift from my brother.

By a curious chance the number twelve recurs, he would surely make a pun of it.

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