BRIEF HISTORY OF LOVE

THE RETURN POLICY

by Clemency Grave | Staff Cynic & Vinyl Apologist

Record Rack, Thursday Afternoon

The bell over the Record Rack door flicks like a cat’s tail. I’m mid-argument with Miles (vinyl lifer, part-time philosopher, full-time parental disappointment) about the new Fontaines D.C. — ferocious or just tired? — when she walks in. Jeans, jittery energy, a 4AD bag clutched tight. I clock the record she pulls: A Brief History of Love by The Big Pink. Yesterday she spent an hour flipping bins, the ritual of someone searching for a lifeboat. When she grabbed that album, I almost nodded.

She’s back, and I smell trouble.

Her: “Hi… um, can I return this?”

Miles: “Was it defective?”

Her: “No, just… I didn’t, I don’t know. It wasn’t for me, I guess.”

You would have thought she’d just tried to return a copy of Sgt. Pepper because the band looked “too clean-cut.”

Me (voice dropping): “Did you even listen to the whole thing?”

Her: “I tried! Once, maybe twice…”

Me: “Three times minimum. Lyrics in hand. Alone. Dim lighting. Full attention. It’s not a hobby. It’s a ritual.”

Miles (ever the pleaser): “Want me to spin ‘Dominos’ for her? It’s the single—”

Me (shooting daggers): “Don’t you dare try to hook her with the single. This is not a Gateway Album. This is a threshold. Cross it, or walk away.”

She looks uncomfortable. I almost feel bad, but not enough to let this crime go unpunished.

Without another word, I snatch the album from her hands, peel a crumpled $20 from my wallet, and shove it at her.

Me: “Take it. Get yourself something you’ll actually listen to. Or don’t. But you’re not returning this.”

She scurries out, no idea what she’s just witnessed.

Miles shakes his head.

Miles: “what’s up Clem, you gonna tell me what that was about? You don’t even work here and you got all worked up.”

Me: “Maybe someday.”

The Walk Home: Memory, Soundtrack, Heartbreak:

Seattle, 2009. Gray skies. A boy with a German motorcycle, a head full of bad poetry, and a grin reckless enough to believe in forever.

The soundtrack: A Brief History of Love.

We played it on repeat, two earbuds split between us, riding the coast, the Olympic forest rolling past, the Pacific yawning out ahead. At Ruby Cove, we sat with the album spinning between waves breaking against the sea stacks. Every beat was ours. Every lyric a secret code. We were young, fevered, and everything was possible. Well, for about as long as side one lasted. If I had only listened closer, all was foretold. 

I never saw him again after he met that blonde waitress. The record, though, still haunts me.

TRACK-BY-TRACK: THE BRIEF HISTORY ACCORDING TO CLEMENCY

1. Crystal Visions
   
   Hazy, drowning in reverb, like memories behind frosted glass. The soundtrack for slow-motion first kisses, windows fogged with your own breath, moments when you’re close but not touching. If you haven’t made out to this song in a rental Corolla outside Tacoma, reconsider your youth. “She held lightning in her hands / She’s been cornered by the man / I pretend no answering riot /As we hid it on the hill we ran / Fuel the mission /With our passion /Fighting still we ran”
2. Too Young to Love
   
   It’s chaos, it’s a spark, electric and a little sloppy in the best way. This is what you play loud when you’re diving into mistakes headfirst and calling it ‘love’. It’s the kind of thing you scream into empty spaces just because being young means you don’t know better, and sometimes you don’t want to. “Once, now and then and never again / All night we turn and turn / It makes sense to turn again / All night we turn and turn / Innocence, too young to love / Alone / Alone alone alone / And you’re too young to love”
3. Dominos
   
   You already know it. This is the big one. Unapologetically huge, almost stupid in its catchiness. “These girls fall like dominos, dominos…” Yes, I missed the message and fell like a domino. I missed the message because his song is for the believers who treat heartbreak like a workout routine. Maybe that’s all heartbreak is anyway. “As soon as I love her it’s been too long. / And I really love breaking your heart / These silver apples will shine on I was wrong / The hottest love has the coldest end”. Crap, the warning signs were there all along.
4. Love in Vain
   
   Raw feedback and longing rolled together. Perfect for those nights you’re left stacking empty bottles and sorting through whatever’s left after the lights go up. “And with that I was gone / And after all that was said / Was it meaningless / When you danced with me / To “walkin’ in the sand”? / And I’d like you to know / That my love is love that you can be sure of /So tell me now and I won’t ask again” After all these years, the wound feels fresh.
5. Velvet
   
   This is the heart of it. Shoegaze made for people who’d rather not be rescued. “I found her in a dream, looking for me…” If this line doesn’t rattle something loose inside you, check your pulse. “I can see the end, of what I’ve become / A tale of a love, come and gone / But now my love, no promises / I won’t go, falling in love”
6. Golden Pendulum
   
   Everything moves, everything circles back. Some people just show up to teach you something you didn’t want to learn. “It’s the feeling that can’t be lost / Its another that you can’t explain / It pulls on strings like falling in love / Instant love instant love”
7. Frisk
   
   Grimy, catchy, just a bit cruel. For anyone who’s ever loved someone they knew they probably shouldn’t have. This is that song. “If this is love / Then I might just leave it / Inhale and give you what you want / If this is love / You forget to answer / The day of my birth, my death begins its walk / Am I in love? / Alone in a cruel world / But this time I know you’re on your own”
8. A Brief History of Love
   
   The title cut. Total release. This one’s for every “we could have been” you’ve ever nursed, the anthem for every hypothetical you can’t quite let go. “I dreamt we were sleeping and we floated away / And we shone like a star and we blinded who stared / We listen to the heavens at the silence above / Never ask the devil to help the one that you love / You said to me baby that you want to feel love / Babe we gave it our all but its never enough / It’s all over tonight”

I can’t take any more, I’ll let you listen for yourself.

Epilogue:

Walking home, my phone buzzes: my niece. Fifteen. Heartbreak plain in her lowercase texts, her whole life bleeding through tiny screens. “can you come over? i need you”

Obviously, I do. She’s a bundle on her bed, eyes red, talking circles around this boy “Diego”, hair too perfect, piercing eyes, timing all wrong. I just sit with her, offer tissues, let her vent, and slip in a little wisdom about how sometimes a breakup’s just the opening track for something better.

Before I head out, I spot her turntable, dusty and patient. I dig out A Brief History of Love from my bag and leave it on the dust cover. No speeches. No promises. Just the record, waiting.

Next morning, she texts: “omg, that album!?! i cried myself to sleep and felt so much better this morning.”

Which, honestly, is the best we can hope for. We don’t own these soundtracks; we just carry them until someone else needs the song more than we do.

—Clemency Grave, still flipping the side, passing the torch, and trusting the next verse is out there, ready for whoever needs it.