A colleague asked once what music I listen to while running. “Sigur Ros, recently,” was the answer and she looked at me like I said I put beer in my coffee (which I would probably do because coffee is disgusting). But I get it – you hear they’re heaps in movies and TV but it wouldn’t really work in Rocky. Works for me though, sometimes.
Maybe I use music and/or run differently to others. I love running because it forces me to clear my often overactive mind. Music is not the fuel, it’s what blows out all the clutter so I don’t waste energy. I’ll listen to whatever sounds tap into whatever thoughts and feelings I’m carrying at the time; it helps to embrace and process that energy but let go of actual thoughts. Basically, when it works, it’s meditation.
Organisers of big fun runs seem to think pumping out trance music (I don’t even know/care if that’s the right label) through large speakers at the starting line gets runners ‘in the mood’. These aren’t rave parties; I want to clear my head, not get off it. I find running quite an insular, personal experience.
So it is as I stand in the Arts Centre forecourt at 7.30am on Sunday 17 November, 2013, as the sun slowly warms Melbourne, waiting for the 8am start of the 14km City2Sea. The night before I curated a playlist, 1:23:06 in length, hoping not to need the last couple of tracks.
Indeed, the final song, ‘Blue Order/New Monday’, was selected for the post-run high, though it feels appropriate to cue it up now as I mentally prepare, and use its mesmerising drifts to try and drown out the noise pollution. I feel good about this run on this rare perfect spring-2013 morning; I just wish they’d shut up their stupid beats.
Breaking into a stride as I crossed the start line, I flick to The National’s ‘Terrible Love’ – the song I’ve started every run with since I recently got back into it recently. It opens with a pending sense of dramatic purpose you can use to feel as though you’re taking on a meaningful challenge, and will kick its arse. And there’s something in the way it warms up and hits stride that perfectly complements and drives my mental process as I get going on a run.
I started in a good position, at the back of the first group – special treatment for running on behalf of a charity (work roped me into all this four weeks earlier). Having someone who runs marginally quicker than you want to, that you can mentally lasso, is great for maintaining a soft focus, kind of like a mobile drishti, if yogis would let me use the word in such a way. I also love working through the pack in these runs, while ignoring anyone passing me.
‘Feel It’ is the perfect song in that zone. Repetitive and rhythmic in a way that seeps into you, with a ‘fuck it’ edge that helps me unshackle weighty thoughts. As I pass 2km towards its end I realise that, just quietly, at just under ten minutes for what usually takes about eleven I’m off to a damn strong start.
Yeah, I timed the playlist the night before to keep an idea of how I was tracking without being too distracted by the clock. For a while I stopped timing my runs, telling myself I didn’t care, that it was all about health and headspace. But it actually helps. I’m a little competitive and want to run well, so what? Feelings are great, but it’s nice to have a measurable thing too. And although (because?) I’m not obsessed by it, it’s sort of like a mental drishti during the tedium of longer runs that keeps attention away from particularly tiresome thoughts, like ‘why run when I could walk?’
After the psychedelic dirge of ‘Doused’, ‘It Happened Today’ brings an uplifting mood change. I smile as I look ahead at the sea of sun-soaked heads bobbing up and down along St Kilda Road. Great choice. Minimal, rhyming and rhythmic lyrics followed by an ‘outro’ of exalted wailing that lasts more than half the song. From about 2:05 minutes onward it sounds like what flying must feel like. Three-and-a-half kilometres in, running with focus, energy and a smile, I feel at least like I was cruising.
‘Cherokee’ has a bit of a bloody-minded attitude that I like, which works well enough as I start to sweat and get some messages from the body that it wouldn’t mind a seat.
Then ‘Rival’, one of several songs on this list inspired by a best mate who ‘gets’ running, and tapped me on the shoulder two nights earlier as we watched Black Rebel Motorcycle Club perform it live and said “Great running song”. I thought of him – the guy who recently did the one thing I am *pretty sure* I never will: run a marathon – as it burst into my head. He’s the kind of rival that inspires me to push myself rather than beat him. We almost never run together, but talk running regularly.
Then ‘Awful Sound (Oh Eurydice)’ and ‘It’s Never Over (Oh Orpheus)’. ‘It’s Never Over’ is basically my current favourite song so I knew would be a good distraction and provide some much needed endorphins around the 6-8km mark. They seem to work as a pair and I like them together, so ‘Awful Sound’ got a spot too.
Approaching the 8km flags, as ‘It’s Never Over’ eases into its soft final minute or so, a truly awful sound invades my earspace. A few ‘young people’ in red shirts are grooving and ‘woo-hoo’ing by a DJ set up with four big, red, ugly letters spelling out ‘N O V A’. Disgusted, I put fingers to my ears as I pass.
‘I Remember A Time When Once You Used To Love Me’ (instrumental, soaring and one I haven’t listened to for a while) doesn’t work as well as hoped. Perhaps it is just badly placed, but it isn’t what I need as things get tough.
‘Life Is Hard’ (another new favourite) on the other hand, comes in perfectly for that point just past halfway where you feel the struggle but can’t yet look to the finish line. “The mind wants to give up before the body does,” I remember a yoga teacher saying. If the cries of “Come, celebrate! Life is hard!” can’t get me in the frame of mind to relish smashing through those mental barriers then nothing will.
Despite the fatigue, I’m pretty happy with myself by the time ‘Dog Days Are Over’ starts, crossing the 10km line about a minute in, having aimed to be get there by the time it finished. It has great energy and is troublesome when driving because I always want to clap.
I don’t feel like clapping. The legs are a pounding the ground a little heavier, the arms need relief from being held up in ‘runners position’ for 50 minutes, my body is running out of fuel and I know I have four kilometres to go. Still, I also know I will finish, it’s just a matter of dealing with the tired discomfort. I’m breathing well, that’s something.
A kid is on the side of the road holding out his hand for high fives. I want to, I really do, but I don’t have it in me to change my line. Look straight ahead, run straight ahead, breathe, move the legs, feel it, use it.
‘Oceanographer’s Choice’ has a wonderfully defiant sound, but neither it nor the beautiful, long, instrumental psychedelic rock trip ‘You Look Great When I’m Fucked Up’ are working for me.
Perhaps nothing would have for the 11-13km section. Maybe I need no music at all when all energy is going into just moving the legs and breathing. Looking sideways to check the position of other runners is somewhat nauseating and thinking is like lifting weights with ‘jelly arms’ (which is actually great for rewiring an anxiety/OCD-prone brain).
The finish line is firmly in mind during the last three kilometres. Those fucking teases make us run past it, up Beaconsfield Parade for about a kilometre-and-a-half, before turning back. Streams of people are across the road heading for home and I just want to see where we turn around.
By the time I’m on the other side, coming past the 13km flags, the rousing intro of ‘Rise’ from The Dark Knight Rises soundrack gives me a burst of enthusiasm, before it quickly lulls into long, sombre strains and I fall back into nausea, remembering there are still several hundred metres to run.
I ease off a little until we finally hit the beautiful final turn for home. It’s not the perfect song for the last dash, but I barely hear it; my drishti now is a big red inflated arch and everything goes into running at it. I may not be able to beat my mind for 14km but I know I can beat it for 100m, bursting into a hard run and obliterating everything in my head that’s been urging me to stop and bloody well sit down. It hurts but it will be over in 50, 40, 30, 10 metres, and then gives way to a rush of endorphins, a fantastic feeling, with a mind as free and energised as my body is exhausted.
No one pays me any interest. It’s just me and the Dark Knight Rises soundtrack as I walk and breathe deeply. Shit I love that music. I feel like I’ve accomplished something pretty cool, or defeated bad guys or something. At least in my own body and mind.
‘Sometimes’ comes on as I walk into St Kilda’s Crimmins Reserve and knock back a cup of Gatorade followed by some water. It made the list because it’s an awesome ‘struggle-town’ song, but I’m not really into it today for whatever reason, and pay it little attention.
People are filling the lawns of the reserve, bathed in sunshine, looking out to the sea. They give us medals and a copy of The Age, both of which I find a bit silly. I put the medal in my pocket and indulge in the feeling of accomplishment, having run better than ever before. I think about when, a few years ago, I had neither the physical, nor mental capacity to run more than 2km.
Finding shade under a palm tree, I lie down in reclining bound-ankle pose, looking up at the clear blue sky and let ‘Blue Order/New Monday’ wash over me again. They’re playing that goddamn stupid music here as well, but I close my eyes and tune it out, letting this great feeling just soak in. Happy, calm, content.
Aware that I may seem like an entitled man taking up space and ‘airing’ his groin, I place The Age strategically and care nothing further about it.
Then, after the song finishes, I stand up and tweet my result (which shocked me), with the hashtag ‘#IDGAFbrag’, something like an achievement selfie. And suddenly I’m reconnected to the ‘real’ world, but I feel much better in it than I did about an hour and a half ago.
bored dandy emotional 