Jalylah Burrell

Hello, Babar

Seattle-bred, Brooklyn-based cultural critic Jalylah Burrell riffs on anything and everything.

Tu Vas Me Manquer

Posted 01/12/2008 at 8:11 PM | Comment?

When I was in the 8th grade, I visited France for the first time. My French teacher Madame Koban, a white-haired French woman from Morocco, took a bunch of us to Paris and Nantes. Paris was for sight seeing, Nantes was for homestays and a spell at a collège. I stayed with a lovely girl whose name may or may not have been Aurélie. I can't remember. I do recall that she had a bespectacled little brother, a boulanger father who layed a fresh loaf of brioche on the breakfast table every morn and a darling homemaker mother who slathered my lunch baguettes with an extra thick coating of beurre and pâté. I loved the brioche and I loathed the baguette sandwich but I smiled all the same. I was happy to be abroad. So one day the fam' was toting me somewhere, possibly the beach, and a song came on the radio that I have yet to fish from my head: Pascal Obispo's "Tu vas me manquer." It means "I will miss you" or literally "you are going to be missed by me" and it was inescapable during my time in Nantes. When I left, the thought of it made me sad. France was truly missed by me. I had gone there with my friends, including my ace boon then and now L'Erin Asantewaa. We got in a big fight on a tour bus through the Loire Valley involving my proscribed walkman, a tape with Immature's "Da Munchies" on it, L'Erin dancing in the aisle, and Madame Koban confiscating my walkman. Thanks to the intervention of our friends Jacobe, who all of France mistook for the Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and Josh, we patched it up by days end.

I only tell this story 'cause I've been kicking myself over missing some great records in my rush to submit my best of 2007 lists to the tabulators here and there. Of course, I wouldn't hear a few stellar songs from 2007 until the start of 2008. The chief of these is Benny Sings' "We'll Make Love Songs." You have got to have an ice box for a heart to not like this song. I heard it earlier this week on a year end wrap up podcast from Royal Groove Web Radio and it's so sweet it makes me want to stop posturing. Check it out on the Royal Groove Web Radio Podcast then buy it from Amazon or eMusic. Band of Horses' "Detlef Schrempf," also has me broken up and not just 'cause I'm from Seattle. It sounds like longing and the late eighties, like it could soundtrack the flashback sequence that resolves the murder on "Cold Case." I won't add "D.A.N.C.E.", which I hadn't heard until just now. I like it but not top ten like it.