Oh So Pretty...

One of the real joys of children is their unexpected acts of creativity - the mad drawings, the word play, the clarity of vision and the made up songs. One of my daughters once improvised a lyric about a bumblebee that almost had me in tears. She was perfectly unself-conscious, trying to voice the moment: bee here now.

That's been a regular feature in popular music - an escape to the bower of childhood. The Beatles would commission Ringo to sing about submarines and octopuses gardens. Syd Barrett would get enthralled about his bike, and so on. In more recent years the tradition has been furthered by the wibbling tones of Devendra Banhart, Sufjan Stevens and the new folkies like Tunng.

Locally, we've got some new practitioners called Pretty Child Backfire. They sing about painting the stars and lost innocence in the small hours. Kiddy instruments twinkle and the guitar guy plays those wonky riffs and were returned from African pop music by Vampire Weekend. I like 'em.

Bob Dylan voiced a similar concern about the dangers of age and experience on the artist. On the song 'My Back Pages' he bleated about being lost in the fog of routine and assumed adulthood. In the chorus however, he happily confessed, "I'm younger than that now". It's something to aspire to.