Saint Etienne Therapy

Last night a woman who looked like a young Joan Jett threw me a Parma Violet and I caught it deftly in my hands, even with orange woolly gloves on.   “Not bad for an elderly woman!” she exclaimed as I did so.  I choked out a polite laugh, but inside I was recoiling in abject horror.  The word “elderly” was like a stab wound to my heart. 

Fortunately, it was just a very bizarre dream. The young Joan Jett lookalike was the girlfriend of a man who resembled a young Jon Bon Jovi and they’d come to my house to collect a massive box of records – about as tall as me - which I’d taken in for them.  I don’t know why she was throwing me a Parma Violet.  The writing on the record box said it contained Durutti Column albums and that it weighed 10 stone.   All so random and peculiar in the way that dreams frequently are (why Durutti Column?  Not as if I’d been playing any lately!)  But it was that ‘E’ word which stuck with me most when I awoke this morning.  Elderly.   It reminded me that one day, at least if I make it that far, I will fit that word.  I might be the elderly neighbour, the elderly customer.  The elderly patient.  Ugh.

I must admit, lately, I’d been thinking about how there comes a point in life, a while before the 'elderly' description, when we start to use the caveat “for your/my/one’s age”, e.g. “She’s not in bad shape for her age”, “Can I still get away with it at my age?”, “You’re still pretty healthy for your age”, etc.

Maybe that was what triggered the dream.

Anyway, where am I going with this?  Well yesterday, reading a post on Saint Etienne over at the ever excellent Charity Chic Music I remarked that Saint Etienne are the band who make me feel alright about getting old.  (Ah, that's probably what triggered the dream too).  

That really is exactly how I feel about them and I love them for it.  

Any time I get that unpleasant pang about the inevitability of ageing, I bring Sarah, Bob and Pete to mind.  We share some of that '70s past and attitude and the facial lines for which we traded our life experiences.  They've been around a long time and they're still innovative and cool, sorted and individual, real and unaffected and still doing what they do. Everything you could aspire to as far as I'm concerned. 

Lyrically, too, they know what to say to soothe my creeping unease at the ageing process, reminding me that it’s alright to be where we are now in the timeline of our existence because of all those great markers along the way which only those of us of a certain age can identify with.  I get that feeling: we’re all in it together.  You, me and Saint Etienne.

Take these two verses from Over The Border (Words And Music 2012)

In 1974, I bought my first single, from Woollies in Redhill

I started to memorise the charts, to memorise the leagues

Tuesday lunchtime at 12.45, Saturday afternoon at five o'clock

I didn't go to church, I didn't need to.

Green and yellow Harvests, pink Pyes, silver Bells

And the strange and important sound of the synthesiser

I was in love, and I knew he loved me because he made me a tape

I played it in my bedroom, I lived in my bedroom, all of us did

Reading Smash Hits and Record Mirror, Paul Morley and the NME

Dave McCulloch and Sounds, Modern Eon and Modern English

Mute, Why, Zoo, Factory

Cutting them up, sucking them in, managing the story on our own

And in the chorus, the straightforward acknowledgement of that creeping unease reminds me I'm not on my own either:

I'm growing older, heaven knows what's on its way

Then there's some simple philosophy which I think you can only really grasp fully when you get to a particular vintage, as in the words of Take It All In (Home Counties, 2017)

You've gotta stop and let yourself

Take it all in

Sometimes you gotta drop it all

And just take it all in

So smile and get it on

Just take it all in

Then you'll begin

To really see

No-one said it would be easy

No-one told you it would be fun

But you're gonna have to believe me

The party's just begun

Saint Etienne are not immune to a little wistful reminiscing either, for instance in 'When I Was Seventeen' (Words And Music, 2012)

When I was seventeen

My heart and head were full of brilliant dreams

Assembled in the light of a day

That seems so far away

Away

And now

When I was seventeen

When I was seventeen

I thought we knew everything

We knew everything

No responsibility

Endless possibility

What on earth could possibly hurt me?

I know that getting properly elderly is going to be pretty awful but - there's no doubt - I always feel a little bit better about it when I think of getting there with them.
I call it Saint Etienne Therapy.

Saint Etienne: Twenty Five Years