Album: The Sound of Music
Year: 1987.
if you wanna narrow it down, side two of The Sound of Music is why it’s one of my favorite albums of one of my favorite years. Side one is great, but I literally could have chosen any one of the six songs (and I’m definitely choosing more than one) on side two about which to write. Every single one of them means something different and something special to me.
And so it’s impossible to choose a favorite song on this side — or this album — which is really rare for me, but if the aliens came down and forced me at laserpoint to choose it, I’d probably go with “Think Too Hard.”
“Think Too Hard” starts with three chords just kinda lazing around for a few seconds, already invoking the title, and then the full band builds until Holsapple sings:
You think too hard, you blow yourself in two
It can happen to you
It can happen to you
You wish too much, your wishes will come true
I wouldn’t wish that on you
Oy. All I’ve ever done my whole life is think too hard. And even though he’s not addressing me specifically as the audience in the song — the “you,” of course, is another person — in 1987, it felt like he at the very least addressing a person like me, over-worrying about everything, and if not going crazy, at least making shitty decision after shitty decision.
You think about the past
And how it didn’t last
You think of what’s to come
And the battles to be won
You’re thinking all the time
And you’ll probably lose your mind
In the same way
In the same way
In the same way
As you did before
Musically, “Think Too Hard” isn’t much deeper than that catchy riff, and some big drums by Will Rigby, and a fantastic sing-along (at least for me) ending where Holsapple sings
You thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnk
Too haaaarrrrd
Too haaaarrrrd
You thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnk
Too haaaarrrrd
Too haaaarrrrd
In the chaotic late summer of 1987, where everything was completely falling apart, singing this song at the top of my lungs while trying not fall apart completely while driving my car to god knows where was pretty much the only non-drink or drugs antidote to thinking too hard I could come up with.
Video for “Think Too Hard”