track 55: me

Paula Cole, who I had seen open for Melissa Etheridge, had a new album out. The first single was "Where have all the cowboys gone?" I liked it. But I had no idea what to expect from the album, This Fire. It was leaps and bounds better than her debut, Harbinger and remains her finest work. "Cowboys" and the other well-known single/Dawson's Creek theme, "I don't want to wait" aren't the best bits. The best stuff are the darker, soul-baring songs like "Tiger" or "Throwing stones." I remember singing along with "Throwing stones" one day at home by myself and surprising myself at the strength of my voice and how much I felt that song. And awkward once I realized that the men who mowed the lawns in our neighborhood were right outside as I was belting out "call me a bitch in heat and i'll call you a motherfucker and we'll throw stones until we're dead!" The highlight of the album for me is called "Me." It's something I identified with completely, one of those songs that is so close to who I am that it's almost as though I could have written it myself. Here's a video of Paula performing the song earlier this year:



it's me who is my enemy
me who beats me up
me who makes the monsters
me who strips my confidence
and it's me who's too weak
and it's me who's too shy
to ask for the thing i love

Story of my life. To this day This Fire is an album that feels like home to me. I had been lucky enough to see Paula play at a free festival in Miami during January. My mom and I went to Coconut Grove on a cold (for Miami) day. We found out that Paula would be playing much later on and went to see Portrait of a Lady with Christian Bale. We came back and saw some of Duncan Sheik's set, then Paula played, freezing her ass off on the stage. I remember being distinctly annoyed with the people standing near me who talked through the entire set, only to be quiet when she played "Cowboys." Then we went to Denny's and had mozzarella sticks & chicken fingers. It's one of my favorite days ever.




Paula came back to Florida for a proper show at the Carefree Theatre in West Palm Beach, where I had seen Tori Amos and E a few years earlier. Lisa came down to see the show with me on March 28, 1997. Walking from the parking lot to the theatre, I saw Paula walking down the sidewalk, her headphones on and people oblivious to the fact that it was her. I attempted a wave and a "Hi Paula!" but she was in a zone.
The next track will share the story of Paula's opening act, but here's an excerpt of an e-mail I wrote after the show with details of Paula's set:

When Paula took the stage it was her and Jay [Bellerose, the fantastic drummer who has also played with Holly Palmer and countless others], they played "Happy home" together and then the band came out for "Throwing stones." I have to say that I think it was a really different experience seeing Paula with a band. They rocked, of course, but what always amazes me about Paula is that seeing her on the piano, with only Jay accompanying her doesn't rock any less- you know what I mean? And while there are a few songs that I prefer without a band (tiger, i am so ordinary, hitler's brothers) it was amazing nonetheless. Paula introduced "I don't wanna wait" as the "next smash single" from the album and did the mask thing on "Where have all the cowboys gone?" [She had this masquerade mask that she'd perform with] She used the finger-cymbals on "Road to dead" which was cool. That's probably my least favorite Paula song, but I was mesmerized by the fact that she could handle singing AND those finger-cymbals- It was pretty good! "Carmen" was one of the songs she did in the encore. She played guitar and Holly Palmer joined her to sing along. Very cool- I think that's the first time I've seen Paula play guitar, and Lisa, who saw Paula last week in Atlanta, said that she didn't play it then. It was the best "Jolene" I've ever heard, and Paula urged us all up to our feet for it so we could uh, "shake our booties together" or something."

I saw Paula perform one more time, at Midtown Music in Atlanta a year later. Her follow up album was called Amen and while it had a couple of songs that I liked, I never found myself as entranced as I was with This Fire.

next time: wide open spaces, i'm falling • you think i'm crazy, i'm not