Song 76: Jolene

I've mixed feelings about 'Jolene', to be honest, as I'll explain. I mean, I love it. It's a great song. I've always loved it.

Jolene

In particular, I loved it in 1999. 'Uncut' magazine still gives you a free CD with each magazine and it's still pretty decent, but, back then, they used to be fantastic, one of the highlights of each month. Not just a fairly random selection of new music, but a proper compilation tape which introduced me to so much fabulous new and old music, as well as just being a great listen all the way through.

One month, there was, along with some great new Americana, a wonderful Richard Thompson song called 'Dry My Tears And Move On', 'Sunday Girl' by Blondie, 'Ready or Not' by the Delfonics, 'The Concept' by Teenage Fanclub, Joy Division, Charlie Parker and Eddie Cochrane, De Niro and Minnelli singing 'Blue Moon' (from the 'New York, New York' soundtrack), the one-two, late on, of 'Sheena is a Punk Rocker' by the Ramones, and 'Jolene' by Dolly Parton.

Pure joy. You learn a lot about how to make compilation tapes from that kind of thing.

In 99/2000, in third year of St Andrew University, I lived with Alexander and John at 7 Baker Lane, a small, dingy flat on an idyllic paved wynd. Despite its griminess, lack of central heating, the fact me and Alexander were in bunk beds, we loved it.

We'd all sit in the front room (basically the house's only room apart from the 2 tiny bedrooms) and listen to music. I'm not sure any of us had discmen or walkmen then. Music was communal. There was a lot of B and S, SFA, lot of Dylan, all sorts, the KLF Chill-Out album, My Bloody Valentine, passing curios like Ooberman, and Alex tended to cotton on to a particular female singer-songwriter and listen to them over and over - I remember there was Lauryn Hill, Macy Gray, Nina Simone, Shelby Lynne, and we listened to Jolene a lot.

One afternoon, we'll have been listening to Jolene loudly, blasting it out. I can't remember exactly what time of year it was, but I've a feeling it was a sunny day, so my guess is around March 2000, as the long cold Scottish winter was coming to its end, so there were more and more reasons to feel joyous, to open your windows to the world and blast out the happiest music imaginable (yes, I know they lyrics to Jolene are not joyful, but, you know ...)

Well, maybe on that same day, or maybe the next, I'd already gone to bed, I think John had too, I can't remember if he was there or still out, it was probably 12.30/1ish, closing time, I think I'd already drifted off to sleep (it was the one year of my life I had pretty dreadful imsonnia, not surprisingly, so sleep was prized).

Alexander was still downstairs. I am hazy on the details of what happened next & what I was aware of. Loud male mocking voices singing "Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene". Some kind of disturbance, a door being kicked. Our door. Voices ... raised. Door shuts. Then Alex telling/showing me [and John] he's been attacked.

He tells us the details, the singing of 'Jolene', the door being kicked, him opening it to stop it being kicked in, to ask them to move on, one of them punches him, another one approaches him to apologise, to shake his hand, punches him some more times.

I feel sick. For various reasons, which I'll get to, but one of the reasons I feel sick is because I know the routine. It's happened to me. The same horrible routine. The previous year.

Alex and I were living with 3 others (in a pretty plush flat) on Argyle Street, the other end of South Street, one of St Andrews' main three thoroughfares. We'd been out, I'd got bored as I tended to, and wandered home at about 10.30. Then, in an unprecedented and not to be repeated move, I thought to myself "maybe I've missed something, maybe the night gets better".

Now bear in mind how ridiculous a move this was in that neither I nor my friends had mobile phones at this point (probably a few folk did, but not Alex, John or me, and I didn't know anyone's number).

I realised as soon I headed out that I didn't know where anyone would be ... I thought I'd try the Student Union, but without much hope. The important fact here is that I was wandering around without purpose.

I am a very firm believer that (I can only speak for men here, I know the risk is usually different and more multi-faceted for women) you are more likely in danger if you are somewhere you shouldn't be and somewhere you don't look like you belong.

[Another time, in 2007, I was in New York (first time I'd been there), agreed to go to a gig in Brooklyn with some friends, they told me to meet at one of their apartment at the bottom of Manhattan, down under one of the bridges. I remember him saying to me "just, it's fine, but it can be a bit dicey so keep your wits about you". But because a) so far i'd found New York completely threatless and b) I'd noticed that Americans often had a pretty idealised and naive view of what London was like, as if there were no inner cities or poor people, unless they were lovable chimney sweeps, I was pretty careless. I walked past where he'd told me his apartment was, realised I'd gone too far, turned around and, a bit nonplussed and clueless, starting faltering back the way. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a guy crossing my path with his hand inside his jacket and a look on his face. As he crossed me, he drew the hand quickly out, said threateningly "Not now, bitch!" and shot his finger at me. Hilarious. I guess, a lucky escape, but I know it was my loss of direction which made me most vulnerable].

Well, back to St Andrews. I'm shambling along, I remember seeing the guys, four of them, they didn't particularly put me on edge, they looked like rugby players, they were big, but I don't suppose they fitted my stereotype, whatever it was, of who would commit random acts of violence in the middle of a busy town.

One stood in front of me. "What are you looking at?" ... oh come one ... a couple of punches ... then the other one, bigger "Sorry, pal, sorry about my mate, let me shake your hand." Takes it. Three precise blows to the cheek. What I remember is he knew what he was doing, was making sure he didn't damage his fist, didn't feel like he wanted to destroy me, I didn't feel in danger, like this was some free-for-all that would never end. After the third punch (five in total, all to my right cheek), I said "Right, that's enough" .... and walked on.

In the coming days, I think I dined out on it rather. A solid shiner. My diffident response, I think, amused people. Easy to sweep under the carpet.

Then, a few days later, in the bathroom, looking at myself in the mirror, I suddenly felt scared, violated, changed. I cried. The feeling passed, but I remember the feeling. That's what violence, however brief and meaningless, will do to people.

Well, these lads (I'm sure it was the same lads) clearly got their kicks out of punching students. Who knows how many they punched, how many they got away with because they never did it badly enough for victims or the police to give enough of a fuck.

So they did it to Alexander a year later. We assumed they'd heard us blasting out 'Jolene' that day or so earlier, that had set off some masculine avenging fire in them, they'd made a note to come back later, half-cut and ready for violence.

How I felt after that was complicated. I felt upset for Alex, and I felt guilty. I'd been upstairs in bed while he'd been getting punched. I'd heard it, hadn't I? I still don't know how it transpired. I think most likely is that when the door was being kicked, I assumed no one would open the door, and by the time he'd opened it, it was too late. But in the aftermath, I wished I was a guy that immediately sprung to action to defend his friend even if he didn't know his friend needed defending, whatever the circumstances.

You don't really know how you're going to respond to threat, nor what the right response. I haven't been around it all that much, but a few times, and on a few occasions, I've kind of frozen, which is the sort of response which makes you feel a bit guilty, but may actually be the best response quite often.

Then there have been a few other times, when angry men have been in my face (in sport, on railway platforms, buses, at parties, streets) where I've felt strangely invincible, and talked back to them fearlessly and facetiously. Most of the precursors to violence are pure ridiculous - ridiculous posturing and cliched words, and on a few occasions, I've felt perfectly at ease pointing out that ridiculousness. It's probably complete luck that hasn't gone badly for me so far, or maybe I was able to gauge that these people were all talk. Who knows?

Above all, though, if there's ever a time where instinct and judgement need to work as one and I need to leap to defend myself or someone I love from a serious threat, I dread freezing then, letting it happen before I've gathered myself. I'm not one for all the male stereotypes, but equally, there's a time to fight, isn't there? Who knows?

Weirdly, when I was young, I used to imagine getting in fights quite a lot, fancied (as a lot of idiots do) that if it came to it I might handle myself fairly well. Thankfully, when, at the age of 28, I had to start taking blood thinners and was told to stop playing contact sports, that flight of imagination disappeared. Getting hit, in any way, is not a great idea for me.

Anyway, so those pricks ruined Jolene for us a bit, to be honest. It's quite Tarantino-esque, isn't it? Mindless violence to a beautiful country music soundtrack ...