Jack Johnson - 'If I Had Eyes'
Mmm, I love cheese, don't you? I love it on pizzas, I love it on crackers, I love it in a sandwich with pickle, I love macaroni cheese, parmesan on spaghetti, goat's cheese salads, blue cheese dressing, brie and tomato sandwiches, cheese fondue, chunks of cheek-piercing chedder and sharp Granny Smith apples...cheese is definitely one of the things that make this sad, sorry world worth hanging around for.
So you'd think I'd be cock-a-hoop to come across Jack Johnson's latest, which boasts an opening line cheesy enough to open its own shop, specialising in cave-matured versions of itself and nothing else. And it would be a massively successful shop too. People really love cheese.
Don't believe me? OK, here's a test. Ladies, how flattered would you honestly be if some guy tried a line like this on you?
"If I had eyes in the back of my head I would've told you that you look good as I walked away"
I mean leaving aside for a second the fact that the tenses are all wrong (it should be "if I had eyes in the back of my head, I would tell you that you look good as I walk away", and even then he's telling you you look good and strolling off before you can reply, in which case he doesn't really need eyes in the back of his head, he needs lessons in good manners), what difference does it make to claim you can appreciate someone's hotness while you're facing the opposite direction? It's irrelevant.
You might as well say "if I had two extra arms growing out of my hips, I would still fancy you, while doing impressive juggling tricks in the precinct", or "if I had the gift of telepathy, I would tell you I think you're hot using mind messages, while I'm on a train to Stockport".
But then, when it comes to cheesy chat-ups, it's all in the delivery (and the way the chatter-upperer looks). If you're a Greg Rusedski-lookalike surf dude with a velvet pillow voice and proper organic wooden homegrown real music, you can probably get away with stronger varieties of cheese than if you were an asthmatic, waxy-skinned toilet attendant with a hacking cough and no real music to speak of.
And before I rush off to dig out the emmenthal and rye bread, can I just point out that the proper recording of this song is also blessed with handclaps, tambourine and vocal "hoo-whoo" noises. Tasty!
Released:January 14th
(Fraser McAlpine)
Comments
Mmmm, emmenthal and rye bread! It would be even nicer with a dab of Dijon mustard and some little cherry tomatos.
The song is pretty good too!
what if he was writing in the past tense...if i HAD eyes in the back of my head...i WOULD'VE told you that you LOOKED good as you WALKED away.
i think you have the grammer problem!
[He doesn't sing LOOKED, he sings LOOK. Either your way or my way the tenses don't match up. And if it's in the past it would be "if I HAD HAD eyes in the back of my head" because he clearly doesn't have them now or he wouldn't be fantasising about it. Oh, and MrX? If you're going to insist on spelling grammar like that, you're right, I DO have a problem! ;-) - Fraser]