I Wait, I Wait, I Wait

Fugazi: 'Waiting Room ' + Election day open thread

Sending something for your ears on this jittery day.

And… asking for YOUR favorite Waiting Songs.

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It’s another jittery day in America. So I’m sending out my own favorite “nervous waiting” song:

It contains multitudes. Musically, it’s itchy, nervous, raring to go. But the lyrics are mostly about … waiting.

I am a patient boy
I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait

I think the accepted lore on the song is that Ian MacKaye wrote it about the band he was in before Fugazi, which didn’t last very long. He wanted Fugazi to last. To increase the band’s odds of lasting, he wanted to make smart choices. He didn’t want to rush things. He wanted to wait when he had to wait. And he wanted to wait in the right way. There’s sluggish sleepy waiting — and there’s patient scheming, energized but constrained, waiting for the right moment to move, and move fast. I’m gonna fight for who I wanna be! ✹

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If my Substack Dashboard is to be believed, the overwhelming majority of Tracks on Tracks readers are reading via email. Which is great! The simple intimacy of an email was what got the newsletter boom going in the first place.

The only downside — or possible downside, anyway — is that some readers end up unaware of the cool conversations that now and then bubble up in the Comments Section.

As a longtime reader of online publications — and longtime writer of pieces published online — I never expected to be plugging comments. On most of the web, comments sections are cesspools. When I started Tracks, I meant to turn comments off. But then I forgot, and I was pleasantly surprised to see people using the comments to share their own memories and thoughts about all the ways music flows through our lives. (See, for example, people sharing breakup songs in the comments for Marianela D’Aprile’s essay on “Farewell Transmission.”)

Maybe, I started thinking, Comments could be … good? I noticed that the comments on a lot of my favorite ‘Stacks were fun and interesting, and I started getting curious about the role they might play in the Tracks project.

On that front, here’s a start: If you have a favorite song or album that you use for or associate with WAITING … let’s hear it! You can check what your fellow Tracks readers are saying in the comments. Maybe as responses comes in, I’ll bundle the songs into a playlist. Maybe I’ll send that out too!

Until soon:

In the waiting room
I don't want the news
I cannot use it
I don't want the news
I won't live by it
Sitting outside of town
Everybody's always down
Tell me why?
Because they can't get up
Come on and get up! ✹

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