E.S.

"Playing things too safe is a popular way to fail. Dying is another."

Why is that when raw talent and tragedy collide, a seductive story is almost always born? Think about it—Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain. The list is long. But somewhere wedged between Jimmy Hendricks and Jeff Buckley is Elliott Smith (who’s incidentally quoted above). For those who don’t know, Smith was a singer/songwriter who came into the national spotlight after composing most of the songs on the "Good Will Hunting" soundtrack in 1997.

Now I'm not going to lie, when it comes to Elliott Smith, I'm a little late to the party. (When he died in ’03, I only vaguely knew of him.) But I don't care. This is music that deserves an audience. Many of his melodies are Beatlesquely tinged and his lyrics are visceral. Hell, in each song Smith swims to the bottom of his emotional pool, grabs something lying on its floor and then returns to the surface with it, for all of us to see. His lyrics wind up reading like this:

"It’s 2:45 in the morning, and I’m putting myself on warning.” Or, "I'm burning every bridge that I've crossed to find a beautiful place to get lost."

Aren't those heartbreakingly elegant? Again, I won’t lie—knowing that Smith killed himself colors my take on these lyrics. They’re of course freighted with doom. But, in some strange way, isn’t that what makes them great? Isn’t that why we like these dead rock stars, or why tragedy allures us? It reminds us how delicate and ephemeral life is. How blessed—and sometimes tortured—we all are. What could be more seductive?

Here’s a Smith line that’s played on repeat in my mind for the past week or so. Enjoy.

"Nobody broke your heart/you broke your own, ’cause you can’t finish what you start.”