Bent Out of Shape

When we were discussing the J.D. Salinger short story "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" back in high school, the teacher was talking about the way Salinger used color as metaphor throughout the story. I found this to be utterly specious in a "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar" sort of way, even though I probably wouldn't encounter that actual phrase for years. Essentially, I thought the teacher was full of shit and that you could read almost anything you wanted into any piece of art.

I, of course, was almost certainly wrong, and Salinger was absolutely utilizing color in a coded manner, among many other literary techniques. What's more, in retrospect, for many reasons, that teacher was one of the best I would ever have. (Shoutout to Dan Marcus!)

[The collection of Salinger short stories was, of course, called Nine Stories and was, of course, the inspiration for the title of Paul Westerberg's first solo album, 14 Songs.]

Being full of shit is something the Replacements know all about. They dealt their entire lives with people who were full of shit, from when they were growing up, to their time in the band and, undoubtedly, afterward. What's more, if you read enough interviews, they themselves have admitted over the years to being full of shit in various ways and at various times. Pretending to be hardcore punks on the first two records, for instance, or pretending to be mainstream rockers in some of their final videos in ways that are transparently uncomfortable...and yet they're doing it. Kicking Bob Stinson out of the band for substance abuse, when the other members were very nearly as bad and, in fact, had encouraged his drinking in at least one famous and heartbreaking example. And obviously any time they had to deal with a record label they were likely getting yet another unpleasant experience of dealing with someone full of shit up to their eyebrows and beyond.

All of which is to say: prepare for what is an analysis likely chock full o' shit.

 "Bent Out of Shape" is, on one level, another good—perhaps even very good—but not great Replacements song. I'm a hardcore 'Mats fan, so when it comes to them, "good but not great" is generally more than good enough for me. But when looked at objectively, given just how transcendent they could be, "good but not great" can also translate into serious disappointment. When you're capable of winning the Super Bowl, merely making it to the conference championship just isn't enough.

And that's what this song seems to be. It's got some of the trademark Westerberg wordplay,  such as "you wanna be a dancer and I'm on my last leg." It's got some nice examples of the narrator clearly lying about how they feel, talking repeatedly about missing their face, about not feeling good, that their friends can all see it, and yet then claiming they've never felt better—meaning the narrator's either bipolar or lying, and my money's on the latter.

But there's another possibility. Not that the narrator's not lying, that seems obviously the case. It's that the narrator of the song isn't Paul Westerberg or even a fictionalized version of him. I think it's most effective and affecting if the song is written from the point of view of a woman who's just been in a relationship with another woman and is shattered by the breakup.

If so, it would be highly unusual, but not without precedent. The Bruce Springsteen song "Car Wash" is written from the POV of a woman named Catherine. And as Westerberg himself showed with "Androgynous," he wasn't afraid to focus on sexual orientations which in the 80s most songwriters, even in the alternative rock world, would shy away from.

There's popcorn for dinner, last night it was cheesecake
A little sleepy-time tea spiked with another heartache
I smell your hair on the clothes I wear
I miss your face
Can't you see I'm bent all out of shape
You got me bent all out of shape

I couldn't lie if I tried
Yeah you kept me straight
It don't feel so good
But it made me feel great
Bent out of shape

You wanna be a dancer and I'm on my last leg
Call but you don't answer I call again tomorrow
I call again today
I smell your hair on the clothes I wear
I miss your face
Can't you see I'm bent all out of shape
You got me got me bent all out of shape

I couldn't lie if I tried
Oh you kept me straight
It don't feel good
But it's gonna feel great
Bent out of shape

I don't need no lover
I don't need no more friends
They tell me to forget her
They tell me to forget her
But I never felt better
I smell your hair on the clothes I wear
I wear your face
Can't you see I'm bent all out of shape
You got me bent all out of shape

Well my friends all say it shows, it shows
Now I don't care who knows
And that feels good
It made me feel great
Bent out of shape
Got me bent out of shape 

Lock me up

The way Westerberg transmogrifies some of the repeated lines ever so slightly, so that "it don't feel so good but it made me feel great" morphs into "It don't feel good but it's gonna feel great" and finally into "Now I don't care who knows and that feels good—it made me feel great" is a deft touch. And the very last line ("lock me up") is interesting in its incongruity—it reminds me, tonally, of the "take it, it's yours tag" on "Bastards of Young," and adds a layer of desperation to the song which raises the entire thing a notch or two.

Musically, the song is like too many on the last two 'Mats LPs (and subsequent Westerberg solo albums), sounding like generic if good mainstream rock. I mean, if not for Westerberg's vocals, this song could pass for Bon Jovi or even Ratt. However, special note must be made of—and major props must be given to whoever's playing—the lead guitar obbligato running throughout the piece, which resembles nothing so much as Lee Ranaldo or Thurston Moore trying to sound like Robert Fripp's Wimshurst machine guitar on Brian Eno's "St. Elmo's Fire." It's pretty extraordinary stuff, and not quite like anything else in the Replacements repertoire.

In the end, it's either a groundbreaking experiment in genderbending, or it's another enjoyable Replacements song with moments of brilliance but which never quite cohere the way it needed to in order to achieve top-level 'Mats. And there are certainly worse fates for any song than to be a good but not great Replacements track.