I Wanna Be Terry Reid — Cellophane Jane

Long ago, late nights spent painting with my lil bby Tomkat. We’d stay up for days if we could. The night was always young. I’d get out of school and stick around drawing and painting until the wee hours, just around midnight. I’d reluctantly pack it in to go home knowing the drive would take about 40 minutes. 40 minutes at midnight gives you time to think. Think about what? Where you’re going. Why ice cream is not sustenance. Why a works-cited page from a blog made by a restoration historian at a museum doesn’t count as a credible source (still wondering that one. Thanks, David). Thinking about friends and lovers long gone. ‘Round the time you get back home, you’ve done so much thinkin’ that you just can’t turn it off. So now you get back in the car and go out driving.

For as long as I can remember, I’d drive as far as I could one way down a road. I never know where I’m going, but I’ll remember it and store it in the brain bank of roads traveled. On some of those rides I’d pick up old Tomkat and we’d listen to all sorts of things. Songs and artists that were new to us but older than anyone we knew. Back then the algorithms were kind and would take you along on a journey through these forgotten roads, stopping at the doorstep of one hit wonders that time forgot to talk about. On one such encounter, we happened upon Terry Reid.

For context, Terry Reid was someone that would always be on the edge of greatness, seemingly inches away, at times. Could’ve been in Zeppelin (instead he suggested Bobby Plant!). Could’ve been in Deep Purple (he didn’t suggest Jesus, and besides, he had “a good thing going.”) Could’ve been in the Stones (but they couldn’t find him!). There’s a documentary about him featuring key interviews from pretty much all these bands and so many more that he influenced and it will likely never be released. Even Aretha said there were only three things happening in Britain in ‘68: The Stones, The Beatles, and Terry Reid. He’d cascade effortlessly from a wail to a whisper, leather tanned vocals screaming out notes that felt superhuman. Superlungs, indeed.

There’s something to be said about the duality of ferocious sounds. You’re only as hard as you are tender. If you want to be the loudest band in the world, you better be the quietest, too. Otherwise, what’s the point? It’s all noise. When I sat down and wrote “We Used to Be,” I had that at the forefront of my mind. I’d spent the last five years screaming my guts out but I’d never tried my hand at writing anything remotely quiet; why not give it a shot? It’s probably my only attempt at something folky, or at least what I’d deem to be my “folk” side. A classic heartbreak, “sorry, we’re both better off if we just end this,” kind of song. The only twist is that these two were “perfect together” (what a cliché!). But what do you know when you’re 17, anyway?

There’s something about that song that’s still eluding me, I go back and forth as to whether or not it’s good enough. There’s phrasing I wouldn’t use anymore, and extra chords that I add whenever I play it. It’s always evolving and never completed, like it’s growing right along with me. Ain’t that the beauty of time.

Check out this wicked doc that never got fully funded. The world may never know!