Because the radio played
So Alyx previously posted about Hugh Dillon and his new album Works Well With Others, which I absolutely adore. But there’s been exciting news on the Hugh Dillon front that has me feeling nostalgic, and I want to take a moment to post about his first band, the Headstones.
The Headstones were a 90s Canadian hard rock band (according to Wikipedia, they were active from the late 80s to 2003), and they were AMAZING. They are probably my favorite band of all time. Out of six albums and a bunch of demos and live recordings, all of which I’ve listened to many many times, there are only 4 or 5 songs I think are kind of meh.
And they are reuniting in Toronto in February, and I have tickets!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOO! (If you are interested, I believe both concerts are currently listed online as “sold out” but that doesn’t mean more tickets won’t become available as the date nears so keep an eye out.)
Here’s my favorite music video of theirs. I hesitated about using it as my example because it’s about necrophilia, which honestly isn’t all that typical of their subject matter, but it really is a great song and the guitar part is AMAZING, and also the video is ADORABLE, with accordions and snowmen and lots of mugging for the camera and otherwise dorking around in an alley with a wind machine. Also, most of their other videos are somewhat questionable.
There are a lot of things that made the Headstones great. I’ll just focus on three.
1. My relationship to music is largely lyric-focused, because I don’t, honestly, know that much about music. Hugh Dillon, as Alyx said in her post, is a FANTASTIC lyricist. And one of the things I love about him is that he writes songs about a lot of different subjects: story songs, confessional songs, songs about addiction and self-destructive urges and anger and high school and relationships and friendships and feeling hopeless and feeling hopeful and loving music and criminals and suicide and changing your life and being poor and reading and not knowing where you fit in and breaking up and trying to be honest and on and on and on.
And each of his songs feels specific and (while obviously part of the same oeuvre) different from all his others. They all express something unique. They are about particular people or particular relationships or particular moods. And the songs are allusive and lyrically dense enough that after having listened to all of them a hundred times, I still catch pockets of lines I haven’t heard or thought about.
Relatedly, Hugh Dillon writes a lot about women. Which isn’t to say he writes a lot of love songs, because he doesn’t (the ones he does write, though, are fantastic), but he does write a lot about relationships. Specific relationships with specific women with specific personalities. He also writes songs about women that have no romantic content whatsoever. And the women in his songs, even the angry, cursing break-up songs, are not just there for him to have feelings about. They aren’t symbolic or objectified. They face the same struggles and inner demons that the male narrators and characters of his songs do.
2. I wasn’t surprised to discover that Hugh Dillon’s mom is a librarian. The man loves words. Listen to any Headstones song, and you see it. He loves playing with them, jumping from association to association, rhyming them, turning them inside-out, ringing changes, piling them on top of each other. He believes in their power. (Also, he has a really nice voice.)
3. For a band I think of as lyrics-driven, the Headstones are incredible musically. Maybe it’s because Hugh’s songwriting process was so collaborative–he sometimes dictated his lyrics to Trent Carr, the guitarist, and the band turned his words into songs together. Maybe it’s because Trent and Tim White (the bassist) and Dale Harrison (the drummer) are all so damn talented. Maybe it’s because the band really functioned as a unit, a team. Maybe it’s because Hugh really loves music, as you can tell from the songs he writes about it.
But the songs are a complete package–the lyrics weave in and out of the music almost as if the band is jamming, and even the most powerful words get half their power from the rhythm. The Headstones do amazing things with rhythm. Each song draws you in from the first bars and keeps you there, compelling and vital and intense.
I’ve linked to their Greatest Fits album, which I love, but really, you can’t go wrong with these guys anywhere you start.
You have a limited amount of time, so why spend it reading about things that suck or are only kind of okay? Favorite thing EVER is not a review site. We're unrepentant fans, and this is the stuff we love. Hope you like gushing, because we're about to embarrass ourselves.
Hugh Dillon… he’s so compelling, just walking around. I want a Headstones ring!
Also, enjoy the show in Feb!
I want one too! They’re sooo cool.