Moby, dick

Wednesday is about books. And writing. Here's two stories about Moby written many years apart and now working together to tell one story. (Inspired by reading his memoirs).

Play

Earlier that day I had taken acid. And the night hadn’t gone as planned.

There we were just dancing around in the kitchen, listening to Moby, stirring together leftover spirits and cocktail ingredients in a saucepan on the stove. The element wasn’t on – but we needed some way of mixing together all the bits and pieces of Chartreuse and Schnapps and Midori and Brandy and whatever else.

The bar we’d been hanging out in had closed, shut down, we’d been good customers. They gave us the last of their stocks in exchange for – I don’t quite know what?  But possibly we helped dismantle the place – I mean after trading hours were over. Anyway, keen for the party to continue the flat now hosted whoever was left from that crew of regular bar-goers. It started off as a wake, a chance to mourn the loss of a favourite drinking hole. It ended up with no chance of ever being not awake. A very deep dark hole. And Adam Fuckin Duritz singing, “it gets harder every time/She is leaving here tonight/Take a breath, take your time/Spread your wings and rise”.

This girl was crazy – right. Like fucking batshit party-girl. But after too much Moby and not enough acid or probably too much acid and not enough Moby she was convinced we needed to go to the hospital. She was dying. We had just enough money for a taxi there. It was pouring with rain. We got there and were given a clipboard. Half way through filling in the page she threw the pen in the air and leaped over the chair, cowering behind it, yelling “make it stop!” I picked up the pen and decided I would be the straight man, the guy that could fill this all in and work this all out. I carried on with the admission-sheet, noticing right away that all that had been filled in was a circle-swirl of scribble across any and all of the questions and instructions.

I asked for a fresh sheet.

A second toss of the pen when she was asked to try again. And this time I remember seeing her eyes flash as I stumbled to keep it all together and be on top of things. She really was nuts. This was a game. But we were there. At the hospital. And it raged in my mind that the cops would come if we admitted to being not unwell and to not requiring the hospital’s brand of help. The hours seemed interminable, but she faked her way through several tests and moaned with pain when prodded – then winked at me when the doctor would turn his back. Or did she? I had no fucking idea. She switched beds and rooms and complained about this and that. Treatment, lack of treatment. And I could still hear Moby going, “here we are now going to the east side/I pick up friends and we start to ride/right all night, we ride all day/some may come, and some may stay” even though the hospital wasn’t playing Moby.

She told me she needed cigarettes. And I was sure that I did too. So I ran from the hospital out into the rain at 5am or 6am or something like that. It was bucketing. And I ran, soaked, to the Basin, to a service station. I bought a pack of Strikes. Tried to light one in the rain. It turned to mulch. And I threw it in the bin. And scratched together the last of my coins to get a taxi back to the hospital – all of 500 yards I suppose – because Moby had been switched off temporarily. And all that was transmitting now was, she’s dying! She’s dying! 

I convinced the cab driver to take me to the hospital entrance – gave him $3 – and then stumble-ambled to find her. She had bludged a smoke from anyone else and I was panting and soaked. And stupid. But my tears were just laughter.

After telling me she had cancer (the doctors in the A&E had determined that with no blood tests, no serious examinations, only ever just managing to put up with her shit) we walked free from the hospital as the rain stopped and a bit of sun started to show.

“I need Counting Crows! I need Counting Crows!”

 I was sure that’s what she said. So, I bought the new album of the time. This Desert Life. And turned up later that day with it as a gift. For her ordeal.

I bought a copy for myself – people had been saying it was different, a vast improvement. Their best. Something new. I spent a few weeks listening to it – trying to see influences from The Byrds and The Band and the things I obviously wanted to hear.

It turns out she had actually been asking for Clean Clothes – not Counting Crows.

I gave my copy of the album to anyone else.

And when I had returned to my room that night – or the next day, as it was – there was a pot of green booze-slurry lurking on the stove. And Moby was still playing in my room.

“I’m gonna find my baby before that sun goes down…”

Repeat

I didn’t expect to be listening to Moby in 2022. But then again, when I was listening to Moby in 1999, I probably didn’t quite imagine being alive still 23 years on. So much was happening. And not much of it was good. And then there was the first real threat of the end of the world. The computers were going to turn off and we wouldn’t be able to fill up our cars.

We survived that of course – now we can’t ever seem to turn our fucking computers off and can barely afford to fill up our cars. And Moby cancelled himself a couple of years ago by being a perv and a creep in his book; by claiming he dated a famous person when he was only really staring out the window at her, and also she would have been underage. It was hella creepy man. Big time suss. But back in 1999 I thought Play was the greatest thing ever. It was a revelation to hear those old blues samples, to know they’d been lifted, but to see it as shining a light; to start hearing those versions everywhere – in movies and on TV.

Moby was unlistenable for a whole lot longer than he was ever listenable – for me. Until just recently. I’ve started in on the whole catalogue. I’m stripping the baggage. Because I’m still here and so is his music. And some of it manages to make more sense now – he gave a heart and soul to electronica; his strange, sad way with a synth line or little trinkle of piano – it’s uplifting still, it’s anthemic. He’s still here. And I am too.

And this probably sounds like the struggles of two privileged white men – and maybe that’s exactly what it is. But I can’t be anyone different from who and what I am. (Though I doubt I’ve given it much of a go). I just find that life goes in circles – and it’s best to enjoy that, not fight it.

So right now, I bargain-bin hunt for Moby CDs. And it’s much easier to not be disappointed than it is to feel wound up and hurt and wounded over nothing.

And the best of his music still hits me somewhere deep.

Postscript:

Last year, I finally read Moby’s two memoir volumes, back to back. The second is not as good as the first, and of course he got himself all cancelled by outing his pervy-creep vibes. Which is what made me not rush towards reading the book at the time. But the first book is great, an amazing story of his rise from nowhere, and his desperation to be famous, and his inability to really fit in, or be happy.

In reading the books, I got right back into the music, going through his catalogue. There are lots of bumps on that road, as well as my own personal baggage. I really enjoyed the journey.

There are whole albums he’s made that I can’t hear, or do not like, but there’s gold in them there hills. I’m sure of that.