Tone deaf

My name is Karl, and there’s no music in my head.

I realize it may not seem like a problem, but see that tune you were humming in the bathroom this morning? Remember that song you drove home singing last night? Yeah, I have none of that.

The best writers, I hear, write effortlessly; as soon as their hands touch the keyboard their fingers dance to the music only they hear, and weave pieces of their lives, dreams and that obscure art they saw while stumbling into the trash-bins drunk, on Friday night, into great literature. Or if you’ve watched painters tackle a canvas; they too have rhythm and grace that I can’t quite catch – all I see is an angry artist stabbing a cloth with a brush.

But even everyday people have a beat, something they walk to, talk to, dance to and have thumping, rhythmic sex to – I suppose.

I walk into walls, trip over nothing and simply cannot dance, not if it would save my life. And when I write, my head is absolutely silent.

But this is the month of parties, festivals and, above all, music; and in that spirit I’ve decided to keep my media player running in the background. As a result, I’m completely drained of inspiration.

This last paragraph was written to Dire Strait’s Brothers in Arms.

Even if I could wrap my head around the song I’m listening to, I’ll either start singing along, or instantly hate it and need a break. Music tends to skew the voice in my head – here I refer to the narrator that tells my fingers what to type, not the sociopathic clown that keeps telling me to hurt myself. Dire Straits for instance prompted me to ask my girlfriend for inspiration:  ‘Write about exam stress.’

Nonsense, while her presentation may be due tomorrow, Leonard Cohen’s Tower of Song is now playing, and stress is the very last thing I could possibly write about.

‘Or about puppies!’

Thinking back, I have quite a few anecdotes involving puppies. Most of these generally dealt with some supremely emasculating act I committed as a result of sudden burst of ‘awww.’ A man my size, and with my chest hair cannot be seen in ‘awww’ situations; it’s unnatural.

But puppies would have to wait five minutes and 38 seconds for the talented Cohen to shut his… see that? That was Metallica’s fault. So metal is out, and soft rock is out; time for Gorillaz: ‘I’m happy, I’m feeling glad I got sunshine…’

Or wait, was it ‘I ain’t happy?’ There goes my groove again.

‘Write about puppies, and how they positively contribute to lessening exam stress!’

‘Yes dear.’

Time for a whiskey.