My love for you is not a game

My love for you is not a game

April 7, 2014

Written by:

Maria Balabas

Share article:

Little pleasures

Recently I received a CD with recordings of the people who live in the sewers, by the North Station. It was a project developed by some Italian photographers, and Annina, a German student that accompanied them, who wanted to write.

Little pleasures I'm rediscovering: morning chats over coffee, gently moving from philosophy to movies, sounds and personal aspirations. A relaxation of the spirit that I should foster more often. Annina told me about people's voices, how she felt sorry she didn't know Romanian so she could understand what they were saying.
“There's a power of the sound, of the voice, to instantly open all emotional channels that have been numb until then.”

Annina

One of the mornings we spent together, she told me about the music that the people living underground were listening to. I told her to record everything. By listening, she could recall better and then truly write about these people. Annina talked about the specific perception of time that she discovered through them, and she wanted that the text she would write to carry with it this state of existence at the edge of any society, time and desire.

A few months after our meetings she sent me a disc with recordings. Listening to that I remembered I was afraid to go down in the tunnels with them, that I wanted, somehow, to remain outside of the story. But these people's voices, their music, their fugitive words, moved me more than any song I had listened to lately. There's a power of the sound, of the voice, to instantly open all emotional channels that have been numb until then.

In the same way, I realized recently what is the most powerful thing in my memory when I come back to the apartment I grew up in. The deepest, strongest and most soul-penetrating memories are the neighbors’ voices. Iordache, Lăzărescu, Iorgoveanu, Covrig. They have all grown old now, but their voices are the same. When I hear them, the regression back into childhood and all the adolescence swirls completely absorb me.

Outside

Another powerful feeling comes from the music made by the people dearest to me. I was far away, in another country, and I received some recordings from a show. I cried all night long, listening to music that my closest people had made. Nothing matters in that moment: not the childhood heroes, not the tastes, the dramas. A pure emotion that takes over your body, membrane by membrane. Because of that, in moments of sadness, I can't even listen to these sounds...my whole being aches.

One of Annina's recordings is called "Outside". In this one, you could hear two or three boys spending their time. Movie quotes (Have nice day, Harry Potter), a "cunt", some italian words, asking for a cigarette from who knows who (you can't hear any passer-by, only cars) and over all of these, a song, melismatic, clearly spoken: "I heard stories with faith and princesses... My love for you is not a game/ If you are not with me...Then it's cloudy" (a new comment "If you pick up on her, Bruce Lee will mess you up"), and then, louder, "My love for you is not a game". Nothing more, nothing less.


Maria Balabaș is a Romanian musician, part of the Avant'n'Gard music collective and radio journalist for Romanian Cultural Radio station.
Next Article
FESTIVAL REPORT

The New Adits festival in Klagenfurt - Austria

What a relief and a celebration: to be back in total lack of control.

Andrew Choate
More Articles
THE EASTERN BLOC

Renata Lewandowska - the Soul Voice of the 70s Polish music

The story of Polish soul singer Renata Lewandowska, a lost-and-found jewel of the Polish music from the 70s.

Kornelia Binicewicz
AROUND THE WORLD

Beyond The Dancefloor: A Brief History of Electronic Music in Tbilisi

Electronic music in Georgia established itself as a lasting cultural phenomenon in the '90s.

Jan Chudozilov
AROUND THE WORLD

A Look at Contemporary Ukrainian Music

Tracing the underground and experimental in Ukrainian music.

Ivan Shelekhov