The Aluminum Group, "L'Amour Looks Something Like You" (1998)

Brittle-Lemon: I woke up this morning with a pressing question on my mind. Namely, does Kate Bush have a sense of humor?

Bird #1: At least that's a more interesting question than "Is she bonkers?"

Bird #2: What was your answer?

Brittle-Lemon: I don't have one. I wonder if there is one.

Bird #1: I don't think she talks to human beings enough for us to know for sure. At least not while she isn't Macy Grayed out.

Brittle-Lemon: It would be nice to know if she's laughing with us. When I saw the "Running Up That Hill" video for the first time as a kid, I actually laughed out loud. Spontaneously. Not saying that just because we're on the internet.

Bird #1: Sure, "as a kid." But she does sing the phone book on the new album.

Bird #2: Not the phone book -- a mathematical figure.

Bird #1: Same diff.

Bird #2: Mmmm, pie.

Bird #1: Stop it. Have you forgotten what happened to our friends, the blackbirds? Four and twenty young lives, wasted.

Bird #2: Let it go.

Bird #1: Anyway. Surely you don't find her new album funny.

Bird #2: I don't know about funny, but it's a bit dull. Yeah yeah yeah, beautiful, moving blah blah blah sea and sky of honeycakes, but a leeetle dull.

Brittle-Lemon: And bonkers? Is it bonkers?

Bird #2: You're the one talking to birds.

Brittle-Lemon: Only in homage to her.

Bird #2: As is the fact that you're obviously writing this while you're Macy Grayed out.

Bird #1: The album is bonkers. There is that washing machine song.

Brittle-Lemon: That's really the least bonkers song, though, innit? I mean, surely we've all sat in front of the washing machine watching the spin cycle.

Bird #2: Only when there's nothing good on TV.

Bird #1: So, all the time then.

Brittle-Lemon: I had a conversation with someone who was over at my apartment one time, and he was inordinately happy to see that I had a top-loading washer. "Is that good?" I asked him. "Yes," he said. "It allows you to throw in that pair of dirty boxers you forgot even after you've started the cycle." Quietly I thought: (a) don't talk about my dirty boxers, and (b) sure, but with top-loaders there's nothing to watch.

Bird #2: No soap operas! Ha ha ha, I kill myself.

Bird #1: I wish. But you know, there's always the oven.

Brittle-Lemon: I don't roast poultry enough for that to be exciting viewing. Maybe I should start.

Bird #1 and #2: ...

Bird #1: So, washing machines.

Brittle-Lemon: Well, that track is great. It should be Martha Stewart's theme song. There's mud on this shirt! It's driving me nuts! Must get it out! Out, out, damned spot! Washy washy! Singy singy! ARRGGGHHH!!!

Bird #2: Yes, you're right, Serial Mom, we can all identify with domestic madness.

Brittle-Lemon: NO WHITE SHOES AFTER LABOR DAY, MUTHERFUCKERS!!!

Bird #1: Copies of Aerial should come with packs of detergent.

Bird #2: And some tranquilizers for certain listeners. Perhaps of the horse variety.

Bird #1: Don't you have some music to supply?

Brittle-Lemon: How about a cover of Ms. Bush? Let's see how possible madness translates.

Bird #1: Only seems right. But nothing predictable, please.

Bird #2: Oh-oh-oh! Oh oh oh oh oh! How about Hue and Cry's version of "The Man With The Child In His Eyes"?

Bird #1: Soon to show up as the b-side of Charlotte Church's new single! The a-side of which is co-written by Boy George. That's demented.

Brittle-Lemon: I like Hue and Cry's version, but it's not that different from the original. How 'bout The Aluminum Group's cover of "L'Amour Looks Something Like You," done in their 70s soft rock loungey style? This must have been done around the same time as their album Plano, which I love dearly.

Bird #1: It's a little defanged for my taste.

Bird #2. And mine. Because, unlike you, we're not 57 years old.

Brittle-Lemon: I love the "were you only passing through?" bit, where the music slows down...And then the whispered "something!" in the background, and you get those orchestral stabs. And the third time he sings that line he varies it in this really swoonsome way. And those high-pitched mild vocal runs at the end.

Bird #1: No. Mad! Mad! We want mad covers!

Bird #2: This one's loungey! Too coffee-tablesque!

Bird #1: Wait. That might make it appropriate. Like, "domestic bliss at last."

Bird #2: Ooh, yes. The washing's done. The kettle's on. Sit down, Kate; relax, put on some loungey music.

Brittle-Lemon: Don't you cackling crows have a window to fly into?