I told you a hundred times

Many years ago I spent a long afternoon in a bus station in Springfield, Massachusetts. The bus I was riding had some serious mechanical problems and the timing was such that each bus that rolled through was already packed or only had room for a handful of people. If it hadn’t been for my trusty Sony Walkman and a set of mix tapes in my bag I probably would have gone insane. After about three hours things really got boring and music wasn’t helping. When I turned my Walkman off the general sound in the depot was a low hum of activity but there was a little more action just a bit off to my right. A couple of ragged looking gentlemen sat in the corner arguing with each other. I wasn’t sure if they were homeless because, really, given my foul mood everything about that bus depot, Springfield and humanity in general looked downright shabby. What made me eventually turn my head and listen to these two was the interplay. Most of the talking was done by the larger, bulkier of the two and consisted of scolding his companion over and over. No matter what the exchange between the two he followed it up with the same exclamation. The exchanges also sounded like they had been going on so often that one hardly listened to the other. (You know, a “Morning Sam, Morning Ralph” aspect?) The only two clear exchanges I caught were:

“Remember when we went down to Florida?”
“Yeah.”
“Didn’t I tell you a hundred times not to steal nothing while we were there?”
“Yeah.”
“And you had to go stealing stuff!”
“… and that time we were working that job in Worcester?”
“Yeah.”
“Didn’t I tell you a hundred times not to go stealing nothing from that job site?”
“Yeah.”
“But you had to go stealing stuff from there too!”

After that a bus pulled in and I lost the thread of their conversation, although I could hear the rise and fall of the exchange – same as the two I’d heard before. The two took a break from their exchange to pass out and generally stink up the joint for another hour or so but when they woke up they went right back to it. When my replacement bus finally arrived I got ready to board and, sure enough, they were right back to their earlier routine.

So when I heard the new Zillionaire album, The Street Lights Have Been Turned Down,  I was drawn to the track “Loose Leaf” and how the line of “I told you hundred times…” repeats over and over. It’s not the perfect song to recreate that bus station argument but you have to work with what you’re given.

LISTEN:

DOWNLOAD: Zillionaire - Loose Leaf