Things That Piss Me Off, vol. 7

Dave Matthews

Can we all PLEASE just agree that we’re over him and get on with our lives? I can remember being in middle school, when Crash and Under the Table and Dreaming came out, when everyone was swooning over him and his posters went up in countless college dorm rooms across the country. It’s been a decade since Crash came out, yet we’re still swooning and the posters still hang. There’s a time and a place for Dave, and that’s the scene in the movie when the sensitive-guy protagonist walks dejectedly through the night streets after being informed by the true love of his life (who, incidentally, is engaged to an asshole) that she will go through with the wedding the next day, and then there’s a shot of her looking absentmindedly in the mirror as her wedding gown is given a final touch-up and you know that he’ll crash the wedding or she’ll run from the altar and they’ll leave town together in the back of a Greyhound bus that was just about to leave anyway.

The worst part is that I still like him so much. I was just checking the years on those two albums and saw a half-dozen tracks that bring back fond memories of my childhood. And maybe that’s why I’m pissed: just the thought of his songs brings the same feeling as that cliche scene in the movie – it’s going to turn out all right – but it took me ten years to understand why everyone likes him so much.