Desert Island Discs

The final question in my interview with Azahar.

5. What would be your 10 Desert Island Discs?

1) The Box--All The Time, All The Time, All The Time
Possibly the only concept album themed on "Le Petit Prince", by Antoine St-Expury. Which makes it appropriate, for the Little Prince was assuredly shipwrecked on his small star. When they filmed the story of my harrowing adventure, the tune "Remnants" would underscore the opening sequence in which the camera speeds from island across vasty ocean to the shores of whatever nation I was departing from.

2) Pink Floyd--The Wall
When I feel miserable or deeply unhappy, I put PFTW on loud and let my troubles wash away. I think it's because the imagery in the songs is so bleak that in my most miserable moments I look positively chirpy by comparison. This would be a terrific tune once the newness of being stranded on a desert island wore off and I began to sink into depression. I see a moment: I've just chucked the last bottle, which I have just emptied, out to sea with a message in it. My pencil is broken. We get a short sequence of me trying to sharpen it with bottle openers and stones. Then a montage of the pencil continually breaking. Finally I toss the stub out to the beach and lean against a palm, listless and inert. As the sun drops into the tropic seas surrounding my lonely prison, "Is There Anybody Out There" begins to play, followed by either a sequence of clips of my family, worried, at home, underscored by "Another Brick in the Wall Part 1"--with the appropriate image set to the words "... a snapshot in the family album ...". Alternatively, "Nobody Home" with clips of brooding Metro chucking stones into the sea, seated, watching the sun climb and drop again for a day or two would be good.

3) Tom Cochrane and Red Rider--Boy Inside the Man
It was a toss-up between this and Neruda. Neruda contains the tune Lunatic Fringe. But for overall solid enjoyability from one end to the other, it goes to Boy. This would begin to play when, seated on the sand, Metro finally notices some bit of jetsam that must have been drawn to the island from some nearby habitation. Upon seeing this evidence that the outside world really exists, our hero rises from his torpor, probably to the signature track, and gets moving.

4) I have in my collection an ancient tape (yeah, tape) of Rossini's "greatest hits", which I have always found productive. In the movie version, at the part where I stop moping about being stranded on a desert island and begin actually getting off my keister and doing stuff i.e. building rude hut, constructing primitive toilet, building the tiki bar, etc. , this'll be the track played as the skeleton of said hut rises skyward in pixillated motion. I particularly see "The Barber of Seville" as the significant track.

5) In any good desert-island film, the hero must be shown learning to gather food. It is essential that this be shown with pratfalls and grimaces as he tastes unknown and unexplored foods (though the brief episodes of convulsions and vomiting usually go on off-camera). Mine would have to be underscored, I think, by "One Week" by the Barenaked Ladies, from the album "Stunt". Cue humourous incident wherin our hero spears himself in foot while fishing. Clips of improving hunting skills, difficulty in cooking, then finally a view of the careful selection of precisely the correct palm wine to go with speared fish.

6) Once the strandee has established a little life for himself, the obligatory human presence must be detected. A footprint is a good indicator. Initially, said presence must be hostile, in the form of Natives (cannibal, dusky), smugglers (cruel, ruthless), or possibly RIAA representatives (hair-trigger, obstructionist). During such tension-filled moments, the sound you hear would be something threatening. Low and slow at the start. But rising as our hero panics, and runs into the smuggler/pirate/cannibal/cheerleader who will become his new best friend. Matthew Good would come in handy here. Maybe "I Miss New Wave", off "Beautiful Midnight."

7) Once an appropriate Native/Smuggler has been co-opted into our hero's cause, there must be images of fun and frolic as the two people get to know one another. Cue funny Native-shows-clueless-strandee-how-to-do-something-much-more-efficiently sequence, followed by Strandee-tries-to-teach-Native-golf/frisbee/oboe. This would be set to the Rolling Stones "Beast of Burden", from "Some Girls."

8) Of course, if this was more a Blue Lagoon type of movie there would need to be some Dire Straits, just for the love scenes (Brooke! Call me, babe). I favour "Romeo and Juliet" from "Making Movies".

9) Now comes the crisis--something forces our hero's hand and he and faithful Native companion/ good-guy smuggler/ lithe, lissome, love slave must depart in haste. It's an exciting sequence. First there is noise. Either Native drums or the sound of smuggler engines on the end of the Island where they have heretofore been unseen/loath to venture. Then someone spots the line of people, beating the bush and advancing on our heroes' positions. Someone runs rapidly through a green blur of forest to bring the news that the hiding place/food cache/stack of porn mags has been discovered and the someone who now knows they're here is determined to find them. As our hero pulls the cover off the as-yet-incomplete raft and the two shove it into the lagoon, we see clips of the advancing horde of cannibals/coke fiends/cheerleaders pushing through the forest. As they break into a run on the beach, throwing spears/firing rifles/flinging pom-poms, our heroes clear the reef and drift off on their rickety craft, cast into the uncertainties of the unforgiving ocean. The whole thing would be ironically scored by Iron Maiden's "Run to the Hills"--though the disc would be the "Much Music Power Hour" album, 1986.

10) Our heroes languish attractively, parched and sunburnt for many days, until rescue. After several disappointments, a ship hoves into sight, and with the last of their failing strength they manage to capture the crew's attention. Cue recovering heroes, in blankets, struggling to communicate in English after so many years. Then a return to city life, the struggle to adapt/readapt. After long, miserable shots of Metro looking lost in crowds, uncomfortable in suits, and hiding in the bathroom at parties, we see him reach some sort of internal accommodation with his new environment. He sits down at his desk and picks up the phone, we see him from behind as our camera eye vanishes backwards through the wall, out of the building, panning ever wider to the shot of the Great City skyline, where the credits begin to roll, dwarfing the buildings and disrupting the hell out of rush hour. This would be scored by either Coldplay's "Clocks" from "A Rush of Blood to the Head". Alternatively, Dave Matthews' "Crash into Me" would work, off the "Crash" album.

I think that I could stand listening to no music but those albums mentioned here for up to five years. However, this does rather presuppose that I would wind up marooned on the only desert island in history to contain a CD/MP3 player. Of course, I suppose if I was on the right Island the Professor could rig one up from a pile of coconut shells.

This concludes my interview with Az. I hope we all learned something from it. I know I did; although unfortunately I cannot remember exactly what it was. Next post will include the interview instructions for the interested.