Somebody Kill Me Please

You know, sometimes I think this is the most profound song ever written about the whole thing between men and women.



Of course, he was listening to the Cure a lot when he wrote it.

Some years ago, after the acrimonious demise of my last serious relationship to date, I actually conned a guy I knew who ran a small but viable indie record label into agreeing to release a solo album (by me) that I planned to call More Songs About Anger and Embittered Self-Pity (a title that should give you a clue to my emotional state at the time). It was going to be a Ramones-ish pop/punk record of cover versions of little known songs about girlfriends from hell, hideous breakups, and bad relationships generally. The Sandler thing was going to be the lead track, and I seem to recall that I was also going to do an obscure Willie Nile tune called "Sorry," Harry Nilsson's "You're Breaking My Heart," comedian Henry Phillips' "The Bitch Song" (an MP3 of which can be found here -- it's on the right of the page) and Tonio K.'s "H.A.T.R.E.D," which features the immortal line "Well I wish I was as mellow/as for instance Jackson Browne/But 'fountain of sorrow' my ass, motherfucker/I hope you wind up in the ground."

I actually had committments from a bunch of semi-famous musicians to play on it, and we rehearsed a couple of times, but ultimately I had a personal crisis and the ten grand I had stashed to cover the recording costs had to be diverted to less frivolous purposes, so it never got made.

Which I'm kind of glad about, karmically, since I walked around for years referring to the woman who inspired the project as "my ex-girlfriend, may she rest in peace as soon as possible." Then out of the blue she got leukemia and died. And on an irrational level, I still feel like maybe it was my fault. Guilt, people.

She was barely 40...