Mark Linkous a.k.a. Sparklehorse

     About two and a half years ago, I went into to work and one of my co-workers asked me if I had heard that the Sparklehorse guy killed himself. He knew I was a big fan, but I hadn't heard. I think I asked him a couple questions about it, but I was mainly trying not to cry. The next day I didn't have to work and I was on the internet literally all day looking up stories about his suicide and watching youtube video. The news was crushing, but not surprising when you look back at his songs. A couple years before his suicide, I had written a proposal for the 33 1/3 book series on Sparklehorse's album Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot (Viva...). My proposal wasn't well written and not accepted, but it is a great album that sheds much light on Mark Linkous.
     Mark Linkous was a soft-spoken, creative, troubled soul. Two song titles on Viva... seemed to summarize his outlook on life, Heart of Darkness and Sad & Beautiful World. His lyrics suggested a childlike amazement at both the beauty and the sadness of day to day existence. When I listen to Viva..., I imagine Linkous' mind as an abandoned amusement park littered with broken funhouse mirrors and dilapidated carousels. In the background, you sometimes hear what sounds like a demented calliope from an alternate universe. In the song "Tears on Fresh Fruit", he sings Through the bony walls of my skull / they was playing lullabies.  The album is in turns haunting, powerful, fragile and triumphant. It has several classic Linkous lines, such as:

* Yes your hair smells like sunshine today
* Everything that's made is made to decay
* I'd like to tell you how I feel, but I'll probably keep it 'til Saturday
* The parasites will love you when you're dead, la la la la la
* Pretty girl milkin' a cow - oh ya
* Hey little dog, can't even fly

     The album also had two tracks, Rainmaker and Someday I Will Treat You Good, that should've been alternative rock radio classics. But the song that gives me goosebumps every time I hear it is Spirit Ditch, ande it goes something like this:

I want my records back/ and that motorcycle gas tank that I spray painted black
The owls began talkin' to me/ but I'm sworn to secrecy
Woke up in a burnt out basement/ sleeping with metal hands in a spirit ditch

     There's another verse and then he plays a recording of his mother on the phone talking about how she had a dream that he had been hurt. Words can't really convey how haunting this song is.
     When Mark was on tour opening for Radiohead, he nearly died when he passed out from a combination of Valium and painkillers. His legs were pinned under his body for several hours and almost had to be amputated. Much of his next album, Good Morning Spider, was about that experience. He went on to record a couple more albums and collaborated with Tom Waits, PJ Harvey and Danger Mouse, to name a few. He was working on a new album when he killed himself. I'm glad I got to see Sparklehorse open for R.E.M. in 2003 or I may never have been exposed to the dark, beautiful mind of Mark Linkous. Peace.