So, if You're Lonely, You Know I'm Here Waiting for You
Week 13 of my Substack: Duchess of Rock
Hiya. I’m so glad you stopped by for week 13 of my Substack: Duchess of Rock, in which I choose a song just for you each Friday. We’re going to again time travel back two decades to when I was first the Duchess of Rock, writing about pop music in Boston. Today is the 20th anniversary of the release of one of my most beloved albums, which captures the sound and vision of the best alt rock of the early aughts.
Today’s pick: “Take Me Out,” by Franz Ferdinand, from their 2004 eponymous debut
I can’t remember how I missed Glaswegian alt rock band Franz Ferdinand play their first Boston show at T.T. the Bears in early 2004. I’m sure I had received an advance promo copy of their arty smarty eponymous debut, and I clearly recall being smitten the first time I played it. As per usual, I was hanging out in the Central Square neighborhood of Cambridge, and I ran into the lads after their gig. They were easy to spot in their mod duds and flash creepers — or as they laughingly called them “brothel creepers.” They were good fun, as smart and cheeky as their songs. Even with their arch humor, they had a perky enthusiasm, like a pack of puppies, curious and excited about this new creative adventure that had taken them all the way to America.
Their music, and that of their contemporaries, including the Strokes and the Hives, was the perfect soundtrack to our lives. Sonically, it nodded back to classic post-punk bands like the Jam and Gang of Four, with its angular guitar sound, and odes to nightclub passion plays with naughty meet me in the bathroom vibes. For Franz Ferdinand, all of this was personified in their undeniable first single, “Take Me Out,” which has the driving four on the floor beat of Rolling Stones disco-era jams like “Miss You,” and perfect self-control. After a taut instrumental breakdown, it builds up to a frenzy, with a sly, snaky guitar riff and call and response lyrics: “I say: take me out,” meant to be shouted at a prospective paramour across a packed dance floor.
A friend of mine had gone to art school in Glasgow with the band’s lovely bass player Bob Hardy, and we saw them every time they played Boston for the next few years. As a music writer who was building my career, covering and befriending many of the bands whose star was rising just then, it felt like everything we made and did was exploding into a great, vibrant mélange of art, fashion, flirtation, and self-expression. It was so fun to visit friends in bands when they first graduated to touring on a bus, or when they played their first arena show and the greenroom was now the size of the clubs where we’d started out together. Like when Franz played Boston University’s Agganis Arena. I was a regular contributor to a Boston Globe column, “Hanging With,” (the idea was to encourage people to show off their area of expertise, like when I took Mark Kurlansky out for oysters, or when I went record shopping with Chuck Klosterman.) I used my approved budget to treat Franz to pints and pool games at a dive bar, returning them late for sound check, much to the chagrin of their tour manager. The night Franz played the Orpheum, we took over the backroom at the bar Silvertones following their show, so they could teach us to drink whisky (Scottish whisky has no “e”). Unlike Morrissey once so eloquently put it, we did not hate it when our friends became successful. We were thrilled for them, in love with their gorgeous music that made us feel alive, and happy to hop on for a just bit of the ride.
Please sing along to a song that once provided the soundtrack to your nightclub flirtations. Love, the Duchess
In book news:
My debut novel, “The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers,” is due out NEXT TUESDAY, Feb. 13, from Flatiron Books. Celebrate my launch with me that same day at Skylight Books in Los Angeles. And come say hello on the road (complete book tour details here).