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Week of Waller: Day Seven
This Is So Nice It Must Be Illegal (1943)
Seven days of 70-year-old music! I may have lost some readers, and then I’ve gained a few. In the process of writing this week’s blogs, I’ve listened to Fats Waller over 300 times (according to my Last.fm account). Admittedly, it is a little indulgent, but then is there anything more indulgent than a blog? (Answer: Yes. Family photo albums and Twitter.)
While I’ve tried, in just seven songs, to paint an accurate portrait of Fats Waller, I think I may have ended up painting a better portrait of myself. This happens whenever we try to write about someone else admiringly. It is really ourselves we keep seeing on the page. And that’s okay. I’ve been listening to Waller’s music for fifteen-years now. Fats Waller, long dead, remains frozen in time. It is I who has changed and grown, hearing new notes and interpretations each time I summoned his spirit from a set of speakers.
And so we end at the end. Fats Waller’s final recording session for V-Disc. The sessions that depressed me so much that I once vowed to never listen to them again. Well, things change. I’ve come to enjoy the bittersweet taste of these recordings. Especially this one. Waller’s slow, slurred introduction, addressing boys at war, is a little unsettling, like he’s going to break down in drunken tears. But he quickly bounces back and gives us a delightfully whimsical song – a great song! A Waller original and, as far as I can tell, his only known recording of the song. Listen closely and you can hear people talking and laughing in the background.
And so here’s the Rorschach effect. I’m endlessly drawn to remainders, leftovers, afterthoughts, outtakes, rarities, and underdogs. But especially, especially, things that are simultaneously two opposing forces at once. Funny things that make me sad. Sad things that make me laugh. Things that aren’t funny, but elicit illicit laughter.
