Fighting the Sunday night heebs through the power of Eluvium

Meh, there's not much in life that wearies me like the Sunday night heebs. I'd happily trade them for a bucket of Monday morning jitters and a few dark Tuesday afternoons of the soul thank you very much. Its the impending early rise that wrecks me. I keep second guessing the alarm on my phone and waking up every hour on the hour (a bit like Sky News) from about 3am waiting for the fuckin thing to bleep. I don't even know what it sounds like. That's because I'm so afraid of alarms my body has developed some sort of militarily precise psychic early warning system that repeatedly wakes me up before they go off.


Nyehuurgh its sunday night.

Each time I wake up, my tummy sinks a little deeper into the pit of inevitability with the realisation that I am 30 minutes closer to Dublin Bus hell. I'll soon be cold, crusty-eyed, sadly chewing a rubbery Centra rasher sandwich, and wedged between all those spiny haired office dorks with Jack Johnson turned up too loud on their ipods (if its a 9am start).Or in the vodka fug exuded by our eastern European counterparts if its a 7am start. The eastern European dudes also tend to have their ipods turned way up. Every morning they all seem to be listening to the same song. Its a sort of a jinga-jinga-jinga techno beat that runs at a similar bpm to a hummingbird's heart and its overlaid with a female vocal going doorshkie-doorshkie-doorshkie. That, or death metal. I always thought listening to death metal was one of those things like drinking whiskey where its not socially acceptable to indulge before 3pm. Not in eastern Europe its not. Over there breakfast must consist of a nip of vodka accompanied by the agonized demon-yelps of Burzum turned all the way up to 11. Anyway, no matter what bus I'm on, it appears that nobody is happy. Everybody looks bleak, ruined, broken. Jaysis, Monday mornings on Dublin bus eh? They're like personally starring in a less fun version of the collected works of Ingmar Bergman.


Fun and games!

I developed various coping strategies to combat the Sunday night heebs. The one that's works best for me is a good dose of ambient music. Stuff to wash gently over your gnarled and cowering stump of a soul and smooth out all those knots. The best is the sort of music that makes you feel like your drifting off in warm water or under a dome of balmy sky where the stars are actually visible. Like Brian Eno's 'music for airports' or my recent deep obsession, Stars of the Lid. Currently, its the sublime sounds of Eluvium that ferry me into the land of nod. Some of it is quite like Stars of the Lid, all gliding monochromatic drone effects and wide open spaces. But a lot of it veers close to minimal classical music too, recalling the repetitive tumbling piano motifs of Philip Glass's solo piano stuff. Its always beautiful. Also, they have super song titles. I love an evocative song title, and in 'indoor swimming at the space station' Eluvium have one of the best ever. If you too suffer from the Sunday night heebs, these MP3's are my gift to you.

MP3: Eluvium-an accidental memory in the case of death
MP3: Eluvium-thoughts for pachelbel