Song of the Day – Mendoza Line – Idiot Heart
When The Mendoza Line’s “We’re All in this Alone” came out in 2000, they were indie darlings. Now, as SXSW christens a new hot artist every hour or so, I think of this band and the odd calculus of what makes music indelible and what makes it fade away. For me, these guys are as fresh as they were on the day I first heard them over ten years ago.
I read today that 2000 was when CD sales reached their peak. I can’t help but think that being on a disc that demanded a listen from beginning to end cemented my love for The Mendoza Line. I spent time with them. I wasn’t onto the next big thing, I was just onto them.
Click, click click. Today, more than ever, we seem to be collectively obsessed with what’s next, not what’s now. I love a catchy single, but so often I don’t even know what band I’m listening to until I look down on the screen of my ipod. So, I’m nostalgic this morning not just for the long playing album – which obviously still survives – but for the long-playing experience, which increasingly is being lost in our ADD-interrupted lives.
There’s a paradox with The Mendoza Line, they were always somewhat fatalistic, but they lasted for ten years. From their name itself (the benchmark of baseball offensive futility, batting under .200) to their album titles “We’re All in This Alone” “I Like You When You’re Not Around” and “If They Knew This Was the End,” this is a band that had a grasp on, well, our inability to have a grasp at all.
actually my career batting average is .215, thank you very much
The husband-wife team that was at this band’s core would split up in 2007. When Tim Bracy left his wife Shannon McArdle a note in their apartment saying “I’m gone,” he instantly made so many of the band’s proclamations turn into prophecies. As of 2008, when McArdle released her solo debut, she had not seen him since.
It’s a terrible thing, I suspect, to be remembered for leaving your wife a note like that. We all have such idiot hearts, skipping so stupidly through the world. Maybe Tim Bracy figured it’s better to be remembered for something awful, than to be remembered for nothing at all. Mario Mendoza, who had a great glove and is in Mexico’s baseball hall of fame, would know and, for what it’s worth, reportedly he isn’t such a fan of the benchmark that bears his name.
lonesomebeehive 