Song of the Day: Evening Prayer (Jens Lekman)

I had often entertained the idea of the aftermath when the libretto of the Requiem is set to the jibing synthesizer opera of the 80s from the likes of Vangelis. It isn’t THAT the melodies would conflict with the ultimate goal of the text. The sheer imagery of a titanic clash between two quintessential ideas of their times would give you hibbie-jibbies that resonates across 300 years. When I heard Jens Lekman’s Evening Prayer, it brought that same sense of delight – some one had finally put 1.50814 and 8.49186 together! “So that’s what it would feel like if I listened to someone’s battle against a tumor as the back-up singers belted highlights more fitting to open a 90s sitcom”. It is just interesting and even refreshing. Like having Confucius reciting the Analects in the rhythm of Gangnam Style. Yes, I felt no immediate sense of guilt, taking pleasure in a song about suffering. In fact, the lyrics were set from a time when the tumor had been removed and made material by the plastic grace of a 3D printer. “It looks lunar”, Lekman writes. Perhaps. Or perhaps it was just the lyrics reflecting on how awkward, uncomfortable, and foreign the whole situation was.