Song of the Week: Squid, Kraken, Octopus...Oasis?

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I'd like to be, under the sea, because the Kraken always seem to eat the ships.

I'm picking a Song of the Week for Kraken: The Curious, Exciting, and Slightly Disturbing Science of Squid. It's the first nonfiction book I finished in a while. (I have trouble starting them, even, these days. They feel like homework, in a way fiction does not. Nonfiction writers, it's not your fault.) And I liked it enough to call up Wendy Williams and interview her about it before she gave a talk on squid in Long Beach on Wednesday.

Obviously, I thought of Ringo Starr's only important song. I have never especially loved Octopus's Garden, though: too precious. But Ringo somehow reminded me of Oasis, and their delightful mid-19-nineties habit of hanging a lantern on their resemblances to The Beatles. Like, their song "Whatever." At the end of that song, their chord structure even reminded themselves of The Beatles, and so it just made sense for Noel Gallagher to break out into Ringo's grownup children's song.

But then THAT song reminded me of an even better Oasis song. "Masterplan" is hereby designated as the Song of the Week. About :40 from the end, you can hear a lyric from the chorus of "Octopus's Garden," by the by.

This might be Oasis' most environmental song. (Not that that would be a high bar; Noel hates the dirty hippies, even if he doesn't have a car.) But it gestures at an idea of a collective good. And there's something lovely in the idea that all we know is that we don't know what is gonna be; maybe he has a different relationship to mystery than scientists do, but if they both see that mystery exists, that's a start.

I'm not saying right is wrong

It's up to us to make

The best of all things that come our way

And all the things that came have past

The answer's in the looking glass

There's four and twenty million doors

Down life's endless corridor

Say it loud and sing it proud

And they...

Will dance if they want to dance

Please brother take a chance

You know they're gonna go

Which way they want to go

All we know is that we don't know

What is gonna be

Please brother let it be

Life on the other hand won't let you understand

Why we're all part of the masterplan

Listen to all of the Songs of the Week.