the Zombies :: This Will Be Our Year
Imagine a world where wild optimism is a kind of currency. A place where all the flawed parts of who you are can be memories, not unsolvable obstacles. That love is not a pursuit, but something you want to give to someone. Someone whose skin is inches from yours. Imagine the world is constant, and doesn’t serve you the unpalatable. Imagine, that by some sort of cosmic miracle, the words you need to articulate this love, optimism, and solace with the past flow out of your mouth in some perfect melody.
Well, you’d have this song.
It makes me think of three years ago. I had this playlist I made after my brother died. Grief—like indescribable… epic and disastrous… like nothing I had experienced had flooded my life. The mix started with This Year by Mountain Goats, and ended with This Will Be Our Year by the Zombies. The mix, and forgive the sentiment, would make it so I could go to my job that I hated and not indulge in the dark parts of me that were creeping in. The songs, especially This Will Be Our Year made it so I could shoulder a terrible kind of pain. A reminder that things change for the good just as fast as they change for the bad.
I think when a song can fill your life with a sense of motion, it has done you a great service. We spend a lot of time letting songs that take you into cavernous places stand in the way of the ones that make your life better. But very few songs do that successfully without getting silly and saccharine. I can think of maybe two: Under Pressure definitely. And maybe Wilco and Billy Bragg’s California Stars. But these things are guided by a very sentimental taste… mine.
The Zombies do something remarkable… which is just tell a pretty and simple story. You have to admire the simple matter of fact nature of the lyrics. Devoid of artifice, not tempted to dazzle with vocabulary, it’s just a sweet song…a sort of quiet thank you… to someone or something that led you through a tempest.
If I could thank Chris White for this song, I would.
This Will Be Our Year (3MB MP3)
the Zombies (wikipedia)
tina said on wednesday, august 13th, 2008
hiram said on sunday, august 24th, 2008
This is actually one of my favorite songs ever so I’m kinda sad that you posted this, but very glad someone understands it so well. Thanks.
thank you. that was really lovely.