Before I was married, I would lie in bed at night and listen
to the smooth voice of Jian Ghomeshi before blissfully drifting off to
sleep. It wasn’t just the sound of
his voice that I loved, but his probing questions and personal take on current
events and cultural events often coincided with my own thoughts. Nowadays, since I share my bed, I don’t
regularly listen to his show “Q” on CBC radio, but when I do get the chance, I
relish every minute.
I wouldn’t call myself a Jian-groupie. If I was, I might have actually been aware
when his book came out. But
I only discovered this book while browsing things to do in my hometown and came
across Ghomeshi’s book tour. Wait
a second, He wrote a book?! And
then I quickly switched to Amazon.ca and found the book entitled 1982. 1982! That’s
the year of my birth!!! Oh my goodness, our connection was meant to be. I bought two tickets to his show,
quickly followed by a trip to the local bookstore to pick up his book.
I immediately loved the style of 1982, most likely because it reads as Jian sounds. But there are some things to like and
some things to dislike. So to
honour a theme of Jian’s book, I will now move to the use of lists to classify
my likes and dislikes.
Things I liked about Jian’s book
· I can hear Jian’s voice in the words
· Reliving numerous events I easily related to
such as making mix tapes off the
radio, actually going to a store to buy music,
and the stress of making phone
calls since you will inevitably have to talk to
your friend’s parent/sibling.
Things I did not like about Jian’s book
· The excessive use of random lists which were
just reiterated thoughts already
explained in the text
· The number of pages dedicated to Jian’s red-blue
Adidas bag (is it really that
special or is he trying to fill pages)
· I knew almost NONE of the bands Jian talked
about . . .I guess I’m just too young.
· The lack of point to the entire book.
Don’t get me wrong: I still love Jian Ghomeshi. And his show was amazing. And I got my book signed.
But as far as learning anything about Jian that would be
useful to understanding him today? Nothing, nadda. Perhaps a tale relying his journey to Q would have been more
up my alley. Or perhaps I am too
young to appreciate Jian’s musical influences. Whatever the reason, I’ll stick to listening to Jian on the
radio.
